Phoenix Mercury's Diana Taurasi, Skylar Diggins-Smith separated after incident on bench
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
The Phoenix Mercury lost more than just the game to the Las Vegas Aces on Tuesday night.
Two of the team's players, Diana Taurasi and Skylar Diggins-Smith, lost their composure with each other on the bench.
Videos captured a heated exchange between the two stars during a timeout late in the first half, with Taurasi and Diggins-Smith having to be separated.
More: Phoenix Mercury's Diana Taurasi lambasts WNBA travel conditions: 'We're just women'
Skylar Diggins-Smith and Diana Taurasi had to be separated after a heated exchange on the bench. pic.twitter.com/QGCghYuHAf
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) May 18, 2022
Things got heated on the @PhoenixMercury bench between @DianaTaurasi and @SkyDigg4 during a timeout . 😳👀 pic.twitter.com/h0aampv4ZR
— Donnetta Ms Ballin D Coleman (@msballind) May 18, 2022
Mercury coach Vanessa Nygaard addressed the incident after the game.
“People play sports with a lot of passion and so we’ve seen it," she said. "We’re not the first team to have any kind of arguments or disagreements on the bench. We’ve seen it throughout the NBA and other leagues this season. The players, they play hard, they play with passion. This is their lives, this is the game that they love, and there’s a lot going on. Our team has even more going on with the BG situation too. That isn’t something that goes away for us. I would call it passion.”
Recap: Kelsey Plum scores 20, Jackie Young adds 19 as Las Vegas Aces beat Phoenix Mercury 86-74
Trenia Barbee @Boss__Barbee asked Phoenix Mercury head coach Vanessa Nygaard about the conflict between teammates Diana Taurasi and Skylar Diggins-Smith during the game at Las Vegas Tuesday night (May 17). #WNBA #WNBATwitter pic.twitter.com/uPO5jk5zGS
— Hoopfeed.com 🏀 (@hoopfeed) May 18, 2022
Diggins-Smith and Taurasi combined to score 18 points on 4-for-15 shooting from the field in the 86-74 loss for Phoenix.
Phoenix is 2-2 on the season with both losses coming against the Aces, who are 4-1.
More: State Department pushing to see Brittney Griner; NBA Commissioner weighs in
Reach Jeremy Cluff at jeremy.cluff@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on Twitter @Jeremy_Cluff.
Support local journalism: Subscribe to azcentral.com today.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Phoenix Mercury: Diana Taurasi, Skylar Diggins-Smith separated on bench