Sparks take down Eastern Conference-leading Liberty, 77-67

A fiery Candace Parker set the tone of the Sparks’ 77-67 win over the Eastern Conference-leading New York Liberty Sunday at Staples Center with 10 first-quarter points, but it was Nneka Ogwumike’s 22 points and 15 rebounds that stood out in the team’s fifth consecutive win.

Again donning orange sneakers with the word “Rebound” written on them in honor of her late college coach, Pat Summitt, Parker finished the game with 15 points and five boards. She cooled down after an aggressive first quarter in which six of her points came off of and-one drives to the basket.

“This was a grind-it-out game,” Parker said. “We were both kind of tired and it showed a little bit, but we executed down the stretch and were able to make plays when we needed to.”

New York’s Tina Charles, the league’s leading scorer this season, put up 27 points as the Liberty fought to keep up with the Sparks, but Los Angeles’ league-leading defense restrained New York (12-6) to 38.1% shooting from the field.

Still, Charles was able to help the Liberty reduce a deficit that grew to 11 points early on to three points in the middle of the third quarter before the Sparks (16-1) buckled down and surged ahead.

“It wasn’t a breeze. It was hard,” Ogwumike said. “Tina did amazing as always, and it’s very difficult to stop Sugar [Rodgers, who scored 14 for the Liberty] when she’s going. You want to be able to stop people from scoring, and we did an OK job of that, but we did a better job of converting on the offensive end because of our defense.”

Soon-to-be--a-Laker Luol Deng sat courtside at Staples Center as a crowd of 10,003 watched Ogwumike post her eighth double-double of the season. Kristi Toliver added 15 points for the Sparks.

After about a month and a half of playing a game every other day, the league-leading Sparks, whose only loss was to the second-place Minnesota Lynx, will host the Indiana Fever Wednesday night.

Ogwumike attributed much of the Sparks’ success so far to their chemistry both on and off the court, and she said the team will be celebrating the Fourth of July at Parker’s place, with Montenegro native and Sparks forward Jelena Dubljevic bringing the American flag.