The Guru’s WNBA Roundup: Atlanta Cliches Tie for 2nd; Awaits Thursday’s Las Vegas Result at Los Angeles to Decide 2-3 Seed Spots

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

As expected, in the sole WNBA game on Wednesday’s schedule, Atlanta (30-14) wrapped up a minimum tie for second place, stepping into the position alone for the moment ahead of idle Las Vegas (29-14) by completing a two-game sweep of 11th place Connecticut (11-33) the last three days, winning this one 88-72 at the Sun’s Mohegan Arena before a crowd of 7,508 in Uncasville, near New London.

Reserve Brittany Griner scored 17 points for the winning Dream while Rhyne Howard scored 15, and Brionna Jones and Allisha Gray each scored 13 points, and Nia Coffey scored 10.

The addition of four contests to the WNBA schedule for all 13 teams makes it a record 44-game regular season, which will conclude Thursday night to complete the pairings and total bracket for the playoffs. The added games have provided room for new achievements, and a few came out of this one.

Atlanta became the sixth team in the league’s 29-year history to reach 30 wins with room for a seventh if Las Vegas wins its 16th straight Thursday night prevailing at ninth-place Los Angeles (21-22) in the final game of the final day at 10 p.m. on NBA TV.

Also, Howard’s 3-7 from deep made her the ninth player to score 100 three-pointers in a season.

Connecticut’s Marina Mabrey scored 22, rookie Aneesah Morrow out of DePaul and LSU had a double double of 11 points and ten rebounds and rookie Saniya Rivers out of N.C. State set a franchise rookie record of 43 3-pointers. Veteran Tina Charles, whose 14-year career began as the overall first-round pick by the Sun out of UConn and continued elsewhere until her return this season, scored seven to pass 700 points the first time.

Atlanta built a big lead quickly eventually reaching 24 points before the home team used a 16-4 run to reduce the lead to nine late in the third quarter but the Dream went on to regain the advantage by double digits.

The winners advance to the playoffs which begin Sunday on ABC and ESPN with all four opening games in the best-of-three first-round in a revised 1-1-1 format allowing the under-seeds one home game during the week.

The semifinals remain best of five with top seed Minnesota, if advancing, holding one of the home advantages as well as in the record best-of-seven finals while either Atlanta or Las Vegas will hold the other home advantage if also advancing to the semifinals.

Connecticut moves to the draft lottery with Los Angeles, 10th place Washington (16-28), Chicago (10-33) and Dallas (9-34).

The Sun’s big offseason story will be its future fate to be decided from bids of $350 million by a group wanting to move them to Boston and another desiring Hartford while the state of Connecticut, based on reports. plans to get involved as a minority owner with the team sharing its present home and Hartford.

In all of this have been reports the league desires, if a move is to be made, it should be to Houston, which lost out to the recently announced successful existing record $250 million expansion bids by Cleveland (2028), Detroit (2029) and Philadelphia (2030).

Previously announced Toronto and Portland begin next season following the successful start this season by Golden State (23-20) which set records of selling out all 22 home games in the 18,064-seat Chase Center in San Francisco, besides most new team wins and becoming the first expansion franchise to be in the eight team playoffs.

Looking Ahead

The stretch drive in the last month behind runaway Minnesota (33-10) in the otherwise compacted standings have been playoffs for the playoffs.

The eighth and final team took care of its own business Tuesday night when Erica Wheeler’s shot with 18 seconds left gave Seattle (23-21) a rally win over Golden State to finish the Storm’s season and oust Los Angeles while Indiana (24-20) upset Minnesota to finish and await Sunday.

Five seeds (2-3-6-7-8) still need to be completed to set Sunday’s openers and that’s the storyline of Thursday’s four-game card.

Minnesota owned the season, though its lead got less huge down the stretch, and wrapped up all the perks late last month with the only suspense left from the schedule is whether the Lynx’s Napheesa Collier bests reigning MVP A’ja Wilson of Las Vegas and triple-double queen Alyssa Harris for this year’s top player honor.

Ballots are due Friday from the national media panel.

The only pairings that are set are No. 4 Phoenix (27-16), which was in the race for second, and No. 5 New York (26-17), the defending champion, which got off to a franchise-best 9-0 start before a slew of injuries caused a slide to its playoff status but on Tuesday all the important parts were together again for the win at home over Washington at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Both teams Thursday night at 8 p.m. on League Pass get to tune up for Sunday against eliminated ones: Phoenix is at Dallas, which has overall No. 1 pick Paige Bueckers, while New York is at Chicago.

Mathematically, they could tie but Phoenix won the series and has the home advantage greeting New York in a Sunday opener though a healthy Liberty squad can win the first-round pairing from which the prize is dubious.

In the semifinals the 4-5 winner is likely to meet Minnesota, which in the case of New York means seeing the Lynx, which went 3-0 before the Liberty took the last one, one step earlier than last October when New York won its first title in the 28-year history of the franchise, beating Minnesota at home at the end of overtime in decisive Game 5.

The Lynx on Thursday host Golden State at 8 p.m. on NBA TV. Minnesota could see one of three teams at this hour on Sunday, but with a win it will be the same Valkyries, who would be sixth had they not melted down at Seattle, which would have also left Los Angeles alive going into Thursday.

A Golden State win reclaims sixth, otherwise its eighth, but that result will determine the seeds for Seattle and Indiana.

In the case of Indiana, the Fever finished on a three-game win streak minus five players lost with season-ending injuries.

The most prominent is reigning rookie of the year Caitlin Clark, who only saw 13 games after injury-free her collegiate career at Iowa and first WNBA season and last played on July 14th.

Clark suffered a second groin pull at the end of that game against Connecticut in Boston, just ahead of the weekend All-Star activities in her home arena in which she was to compete in the 3-point contest and be one of the team captains after receiving the most fan votes for the pool of ten starters.

Though Indiana kept hoping for Clark’s return, she announced Friday that time has run out on the recovery process for this season.

All of which leads to Thursday night’s last game and how difficult Los Angeles, following its tough elimination, will make it for Las Vegas, who’s last loss was a WNBA record home blowout to Minnesota when the Aces were struggling just to stay in the playoff count.

By the opening tip, the seventh seed, at the two on Sunday, and the sixth, which is at the three, will be known.

A Sparks upset makes Atlanta the two and Las Vegas the three, otherwise it’s a tie, making the Aces the two off winning the series from the Dream and gaining the other semifinals home advantage.