The Washington Mystics will have to send Sue Bird into retirement if they plan on advancing in the WNBA playoffs. They’ll also have to knock off an MVP favorite and a former MVP who unceremoniously left Washington in the offseason.
Mystics locked into WNBA playoff matchup with Storm
“Yeah, I don’t think we care,” the Mystics’ Elena Delle Donne said of the additional hoopla. “For us, it’s like: ‘Head down, focus. What do we need to do to be successful?’ All the storylines and all that, they’re huge and great for them. But for us it’s like: ‘Let’s stay focused. There’s really nothing that can take us out of our focus and mind-set at this point. Let’s stay locked in on what we need to.’ ”
The matchup was set when the Connecticut Sun (23-11) defeated the Los Angeles Sparks on Tuesday. The Sun holds the tiebreaker over the Storm (21-13) and cannot fall further than the No. 3 playoff slot. That leaves the Storm and Mystics (20-14) in the No. 4 and No. 5 spots, in some order.
The Mystics have to win their final two games — both against the Indiana Fever, on Friday and Sunday — and have the Storm lose its final two games, against the Minnesota Lynx on Friday and the Las Vegas Aces on Sunday, to leapfrog into the No. 4 seed because Seattle holds the tiebreaker. Otherwise, the Storm will host the Mystics for the first two games of the best-of-three series.
“[Home-court advantage is] important, but if we don’t get it, it ain’t,” the Mystics’ Ariel Atkins said. “We’re out here to win.”
The Storm rolled the Mystics, 85-71, on June 23 in the teams’ lone meeting in Seattle — in Bird’s first home game after announcing her plan to retire after the season. The teams met in Washington for a back-to-back at the end of July; the Storm won the first, 82-77, to clinch the tiebreaker. Delle Donne hit a half-hook through contact from former Mystics star Tina Charles with 46.5 seconds left to secure a 78-75 win in the second game.
Up first, however, is a pair of games against last-place Indiana (5-29).
“[It’s] in the back of your mind because your staff starts doing preparation,” Mystics Coach Mike Thibault said. “It’s interesting: In practicing for this weekend, there are some things that both teams do, Seattle and Indiana, defensively that will serve us well. Because ironically, the defense that Seattle plays, a lot of it is instilled from Coach [Gary] Kloppenburg when he was there, and he’s now the defensive coach in Indiana. So we’ll see some similar things. And so that’s probably helpful in our preparation, too.”
The playoff matchup will feature the top defensive teams in the WNBA. Washington leads the league with opponents scoring 75.8 points per game; Seattle allows 77.8. The Mystics are the top team in defensive rating (95.8) with the Storm at No. 3 (96.9).
Storm forward Breanna Stewart is in the MVP race with Aces forward A’ja Wilson; Stewart is averaging 22 points, 7.3 rebounds, 2.8 assists, 1.7 steals and one block. The only player in WNBA history to average 21-plus points, six-plus rebounds, two-plus assists, one-plus steal and one-plus block for a season was Stewart in 2018 — when she won the MVP award.
“She’s just so versatile,” said the Mystics’ Alysha Clark, who played five seasons with Stewart in Seattle. “I think her versatility is the reason why she’s continuously been in the running for MVP — just because she’s able to do a lot of things. This year you see her more mid-post, midrange a lot more. And obviously she’s shooting at a really high percentage. So I think that just takes it up another notch. That’s what makes her so tough and one of the best players in the world — it’s just that she’s just so versatile and can score from all levels.”
The Mystics signed guard Jazmine Jones to add some emergency depth on the perimeter. The 6-foot Louisville product was the No. 12 pick by the New York Liberty in 2020 and averaged 10.8 points, 4.1 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 1.4 steals as a rookie. She shot a career-high 38.3 percent from behind the arc in 2021. Jones was waived by the Liberty in February, then picked up and waived by the Fever before she signed three seven-day contracts and played seven games with the Sun this season.
Forward Myisha Hines-Allen missed practice Wednesday and was tested to see if she will be placed in the coronavirus health and safety protocols.
“Insurance,” Thibault said of signing Jones. “We couldn’t have signed anybody until today [salary] cap-wise. We got ourselves under the cap today for the rest of the season. So we’ve been trying to figure how to have some insurance at guard. We debated about some people that really haven’t played in the league versus somebody who’s played in a playoff game and knows what the league’s about.
“[Jones] can defend. She may never play — I don’t know. But it’s a way to have insurance that we felt like we needed and a 12-person roster.”
Source: WP
