Copper, Mercury beat Dream to snap 3-game skid, secure playoff spot

The Phoenix Mercury (17-17) snapped their three-game skid, beating the Atlanta Dream at home, 74-66, Tuesday.

The victory puts Phoenix into the WNBA playoffs for the first time since 2022, thanks to some assistance from the Las Vegas Aces. Phoenix, No. 7 in the standings, needed Las Vegas to beat the No. 8 Chicago Sky Tuesday night, which the Aces did, 90-71 at home.

“The thing is it’s kind of a new group. I think we only maybe have three players from last year,” Tibbetts said after the game. “It definitely was a goal of ours to get to the playoffs. They had the least amount of wins a year ago. This is a group that’s greedy. I don’t think any of us are happy where we’re at, but we’ve also dealt with a bunch of adversity. We’re definitely happy, but we’re not satisfied.”

Phoenix’s Kahleah Copper and Atlanta’s Rhyne Howard put on a scoring exhibition, as they put up 28 points and 31, respectively. Copper shot 50%, and Howard was 45.8% including six 3s made.

“It was fun to watch,” Tibbetts said. He added about Howard and Copper, “The game is so easy for her. She got up 15 3s tonight, and we’re trying to take away 3s. That’s how talented she is. Kah is like a force of nature when she gets going downhill, and she had that pop tonight. She made a couple 3s, you could see that confidence.”

The Mercury’s other top performers were Brittney Griner (16 points, eight rebounds, four assists, one block) and Diana Taurasi (13 points, five assists). Atlanta’s veteran forward and former MVP Tina Charles had 12 points and a game-high 12 rebounds.

Phoenix, which is 10th in rebounding, won the battle on the glass, 33-29, against the league’s No. 3 in that category.

“It’s just a collective effort, no matter who’s out there,” Griner said. “It starts with me. Definitely saying I’m not the best rebounder sometimes, so just trying to make a conscious effort to just pursue boards and we’re all buying into it. Just trying to keep our man from getting it. When we all buy in to go after boards like that, good things are gonna happen for us.”

The Mercury led the entire game, and their biggest lead was 16 points early in the third quarter.

The Dream trailed 40-25 at halftime but began the second half on a 12-6 run, and cut the lead to two with eight minutes left to play. But Phoenix pulled away in the final minutes.

At 4:30 left to play, Griner scored six points, including her seventh trey this season, and made one of two free throws to extend the lead to 70-62. As Howard continued scoring to keep it close, backup rookie guard Celeste Taylor (two points, four rebounds, two assists, two steals, five turnovers in 33 minutes) made a layup, and Sophie Cunningham (seven points, six rebounds) sealed the win on a pair of free throws.

The Mercury handled point guard duties by committee in the absence of primary ball handler Natasha Cloud, who served a one-game suspension because of her seventh technical foul this season in their home loss to Las Vegas on Sunday.

Taylor replaced Cloud for her first start with the Mercury this season, and Copper, Cunningham as well as Taurasi helped initiate the offense.

“This is probably the most minutes she’s gotten for the year, just in one game,” Tibbetts said about Taylor in her first start for the Mercury. “DT handled it a ton. I thought she (Taurasi) did great job, she only had two turnovers. I think some of Celeste’s turnovers came on the second side when we were playing to the second side. Sophie brought it up some, Kah handled it more. … They (Dream) knew Tash was out, so they picked up the pressure and tried to speed us up, and we handled it very well.”

Phoenix shot 41.3% but committed 19 turnovers and gave up 20 points off them. Atlanta had 14 turnovers but only allowed eight points on those giveaways.

The Mercury held the Dream to just 35.3% shooting, including 7-of-25 from 3.

Before Monday’s win, the Mercury were in a downward spiral of bad first-quarter performances during their previous five losses since the Olympic break ended in mid-August.

In addition, they had a lot of complaints to the media and during games about the officiating, setting a league record in technical fouls.

The Mercury held a team meeting at their practice on Labor Day to address how to correct their lack of execution.

“Just coming together and at this point of the season, just keeping it real with each other” Copper said. “I think that’s important for us moving forward. People taking accountability, top to bottom, and we’re trying to move in the right direction going into the playoffs.”

The Mercury plays the final of their five-game homestand against the No. 10 Washington Mystics on Thursday at 7 p.m.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Copper, Mercury beat Dream to snap 3-game skid, secure playoff spot