Dream return residence to face first-place Lynx

With both teams set on making deep postseason runs in their respective conferences, the Atlanta Dream host the league-best Minnesota Lynx in a potential WNBA Finals preview on Thursday in College Park, Ga.

Minnesota (28-6) had its six-game winning streak snapped on Tuesday in an 85-75 road loss to the New York Liberty. The Lynx still hold a 6 1/2 game lead over the Liberty and the Dream for the league’s best record, while they sit seven games ahead of the Phoenix Mercury and Las Vegas Aces atop the Western Conference standings.

The Lynx are on pace to break a single-season franchise win record, but they still want to avoid hiccups like Tuesday — a game they trailed for the final 38 minutes.

“It was a surprise to me in terms of how we didn’t start the game ready,” Minnesota head coach Cheryl Reeve said. “Our starters weren’t ready, and that was surprising. Credit to New York, they got the ball hopping. … Their starters played great, ours did not.”

To Reeve’s point, 38 of Minnesota’s 75 points came from reserves Natisha Hiedeman (16 points), DiJonai Carrington (11 points) and Maria Kliundikova (11 points). Napheesa Collier (23.5 ppg), the league’s leading scorer, has missed five consecutive games with a right ankle injury, but has a chance to return on Thursday.

Atlanta (22-13) will set a single-season franchise mark with two more wins, but has dropped two of three since producing a six-game winning streak. Despite the Dream’s 74-72 setback to the Las Vegas Aces on Tuesday, Atlanta rookie coach Karl Smesko — a Coach of the Year candidate — is happy to return home after a six-game road trip.

“I’m proud of how our players competed through this whole trip in every game,” Smesko said. “A couple games at the wire didn’t go our way and that’s going to be the big thing going forward. But I’m proud of our team for what we were able to accomplish on this trip. You’ve got to get past this one, learn what you can and be ready to compete a day later. We keep getting better and we’re going to be in a good position at the end of the year.”

Allisha Gray leads Atlanta with 18.5 points per game, followed by Rhyne Howard’s 16.5 and Brionna Jones’ 12.7.

–Field Level Media