Kara Lawson added 18 points for the Sun, while Asjha Jones chipped in with 15 and Tan White had 10. Sandrine Gruda came off the Sun bench to contribute 14 points in a winning effort.
Atlanta’s Angel McCoughtry, the top pick in the 2009 WNBA Draft who scored 11 points for USA Basketball in last week’s WNBA All-Star game played at the Mohegan Sun Arena, led all scorers with 27 points. Former Sun player Erika de Souza added 16 points for the Dream, while Sancho Lyttle turned in a double-double with 12 points and 11 rebounds.
As comfortable as the final margin of victory may appear, this was a classic case of the final score not being a true indication of how close the game actually was. Atlanta came out of the gates smoking, taking a 28-20 lead at the end of the first period. Connecticut rallied in the second frame, but the Dream still went into the locker room at halftime with a 41-39 advantage.
Atlanta dominated the paint in the first half, grabbing 17 rebounds in the first period, tying the most rebounds ever allowed by Connecticut in a single quarter, and totaled 29 boards for the half—the most the Sun have allowed an opponent this season.
Like a classic serve-and-volley tennis match, the lead went back-and-forth early in the second half. A three-pointer by White put the Sun up 49-47 with 6:06 left in the third period. McCoughtry responded with a short jumper to even the score at 49 points apiece with 6:06 remaining in the third stanza… at which point the Sun blew the doors off the barn.
Over the next 10 and a-half minutes, the Sun took off on a 30-5 run, with 17 of those points coming from the bench. By the time Kara Lawson capped the surge with a three-point bomb, the Sun led 79-64 with 5:44 left in the contest.
Almost as if a passage out of Dickens, the Sun had the best of times in the second half, scoring 57 points on 20-of-33 shooting from the floor (60.6 percent), the highest one-half point total for the team this season and just one point shy of the franchise record set in 2007.
But this was no classic novel. In fact, Sun head coach Mike Thibault had prepared his team for a second-half assault, given the fact that the Dream had traveled to Indianapolis and lost to the Fever, 89-70 on Friday night.
“I felt like we needed to play all 10 players in the first half to wear them down,” he said after the game. “They traveled and got in late. I thought our energy and use of 10 players would bother them. The shots we missed in the first half went in, in the second half.”
Thibault’s counterpart on the opposing bench concurred with that assessment.
“I don’t want to use that as an excuse, but sometimes when you are fatigued you make bad decisions, and I thought we had some bad offensive shot selections that led to their points,” said Atlanta head coach Marynell Meadors on the Sun’s decisive run ending the third period and starting the fourth. “We got down in that hole and it’s just hard to come back.
“It’s tough, and the commercial travel makes it really tough,” she continued. “These are professional athletes and my concern is they are tired and subject to injury and that bothers me because they make their livelihood with their feet, their knees and their legs and their bodies.”
With the win, the Sun improve to 12-8, including an 8-1 record at the Mohegan Sun Arena. In losing their third straight game, the Dream fell to 14-8 and are now percentage points behind the division-leading Washington Mystics.
The Sun next entertain the New York Liberty on Tuesday night. Tip-off at the Mohegan Sun Arena is slated for 8 p.m., and the game will be televised on ESPN2. The Dream, meanwhile, continue their trek through the Eastern Conference and will travel to D.C. where they will face first-place Washington in a weekday morning matinee on Wednesday. Tip-off at the Verizon Center is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. The game will be televised on NBA TV.
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