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Perth Lynx coach Andy Stewart says his side can get by without influential co-captain Sami Whitcomb for one WNBL finals game but the minor premiers will struggle to win a series or championship without her.
The high-scoring guard suffered a wrist injury in Perth’s final regular-season game at Townsville on Saturday.
How much, if any, of Wednesday night’s semi-final series opener away to Melbourne Boomers Whitcomb plays remains to be seen.
“We don’t know how Sami Whitcomb is going to pull up in the morning so that’s our major concern,” Stewart told AAP late on Wednesday.
“We feel we can win games without her, it would be hard to win a series and a championship.
“We play Wednesday then we travel Thursday and play Friday, so we might be able to cover her for one game, but it would really wear the group out because she’s a major minutes player.”
Whitcomb and fellow American Courtney Williams are among the five highest scorers per game in the competition and Boomers coach Guy Molloy rated them as good a WNBL backcourt duo as he has seen.
“We want the series to be all it can be, so we wish Sami a speedy recovery from whatever she might be suffering and we look forward to playing the best team they can put on the court,” Molloy told AAP.
“She’s a really tough player and she’s a pro, so I’m sure she’ll do whatever she can do to be on the court.”
Molloy has one injury concern of his own in Rebecca Cole (knee).
One player cleared to go is Lynx centre Amanda Dowe, who hurt a knee against Canberra last Friday and didn’t play against Townsville two days later.
“She looks fine, I don’t know how many minutes we can play her, but she definitely will play,” Stewart said.
Given the injury issues they had last weekend Stewart wasn’t overly concerned they lost both games after winning their previous 14.
He acknowledged it would be tough to shut down dominant Boomers centre Liz Cambage, the league’s leading scorer and rebounder.
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