Sparks start slow and can’t catch the Atlanta Dream in loss

It has been anything but a dream season for the Sparks and in a game they desperately needed to win, visiting Atlanta scored 20 of the first 28 points en route to an 80-62 victory Sunday afternoon at Crypto.com Arena.

Playing with the desperation of a team fighting for a playoff spot, Atlanta completed the season sweep paced by center Tina Charles, who went seven of nine from the floor for 14 points and grabbed four rebounds in the first quarter alone. She finished with 23 points and 10 rebounds in 26 minutes.

“Their scheme was to challenge us to make perimeter shots, and what we needed to do to counter that defense we just didn’t do consistently enough,” Sparks coach Curt Miller said. “It was a real tough shooting night from behind the arc, and I wasn’t happy with our defensive rebounding. We gave up 17 second-chance points, which is unacceptable.”

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Li Yueru scored 14 points off the bench for the Sparks (7-25), who were trying to build off their momentum from Wednesday’s surprising 94-88 victory over the league-leading New York Liberty thanks to Dearica Hamby’s 21-point effort. The Sparks were three for 21 from three-point range (14.3%).

Forward Rickea Jackson added 13 points for the Sparks and became only the fourth player in franchise history to score more than 400 points as a rookie, joining Candace Parker (610 in 2008), Nneka Ogwumike (462 in 2012) and Lisa Leslie (445 in 1997).

Jackson and Li were the only Sparks to finish in double figures in points.

“If coach says I’m becoming a star then I feel that I am because he doesn’t say that much, but I’m never content,” Jackson said. “I’ve tried to get better each and every game. I pride myself more on defense, not my scoring and I’m still not 100% where I want to be, but one day I’ll get there.”

Kia Nurse and Odyssey Sims each contributed eight points for the Sparks in the third and final matchup this season between the teams. The Sparks dropped the previous meeting 87-74 in Atlanta on June 16 in the middle of their season-high eight-game losing streak and fell in the first encounter 92-81 on May 15 in Los Angeles.

Aari McDonald, nursing a foot injury, was upgraded to probable before the game and played three minutes in a reserve role, recording one assist. Lexie Brown (illness) and Layshia Clarendon (personal reasons) also did not play and rookie Cameron Brink is out for the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament.

Li admitted she learned a lot from having to guard Charles in the paint.

“I tried to help my team however I could,” Li said. “I met Tina in China, and she’s a really good player, so I tried to defend her better as the game went on and not let her rebound.”

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The game was a homecoming of sorts for Dream guard Jordin Canada, an L.A. native who starred at Windward High and UCLA and later spent two seasons with the Sparks. The Dream acquired the two-time WNBA champion point guard in a February trade that sent McDonald and the eighth pick in the draft to the Sparks. On Sunday, Canada had six points, six assists and five rebounds.

The win moved Atlanta (11-21) into a tie with the Chicago Sky for the eighth and final playoff spot with one game left between the teams, but Chicago owns the tiebreaker.

“They were daring us to shoot the three. We had a lot of open looks, and they didn’t go down,” Miller said. “It’s a make or miss league. To not have one quarter with 20 or more points was disappointing. It’s hard to win that way. Regardless of the wins and losses, I want there to be an attitude and a culture of growth and we’re building that.”

The Sparks have eight games remaining, four of them on the road, beginning Wednesday in Indiana.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.