Washington Mystics’ six-game winning streak ends at hands of Chicago Sky

The Mystics had only lost one game since July 13

CHICAGO – The Washington Mystics rolled into Chicago about as hot as a team can be. Losers of just one game since July 13, winners of six straight and fresh off of a 39-point defenestration of the Indiana Fever on Sunday, it seemed a whole lot would have to go wrong for them to walk out of Wintrust Arena losers to the Chicago Sky on Friday night.

As it happens, a whole lot went wrong for Washington. The Mystics entered tonight the best scoring team in the league, but shot just 35.6 percent from the field, scored more points in the second quarter than they did in the entire second half, and fell to the surging, playoff-bound Sky 85-78.

Washington also entered tonight the least turnover-prone team in the league so, of course, they coughed it up 14 times, including a staggering four traveling violations. Without the stabilizing passing force of Kristi Toliver, the team’s second-leading scorer who sat out with a knee injury, coach Mike Thibault said the Sky’s defensive pressure was ultimately too much to handle.

“I thought they moved the ball better than us and they put us in some tough positions defensively,” he said. “Their defense got them going offensively. They just made us struggle tonight. It was one of those games. We played like we practiced the last couple days, just not quite sharp. They worked harder than we did I thought. ”

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Thought it had the makings of an off night from the beginning, none of it seemed like it would matter initially. Sure, the Sky sprinted out to an 8-0 lead, Thibault was mounting a verbal offensive against any official within shouting distance and presumptive league MVP Elena Delle Donne failed to score from the field until about nine minutes after tip-off, but as with most great teams, there is an aura of inevitability about the Mystics at times. And the last 15 minutes of the first half were a prime example.

Washington didn’t even bother taking a timeout at the apex of the Sky’s early run, reeling off a 9-0 run of their own to take the lead about two minutes later. Then they summarily dominated the second quarter, outscoring the Sky 31-19 and taking a seven-point lead to the locker room, appearing to have withstood the Sky’s best shot. In addition, star Chicago guard Courtney Vandersloot had to be helped off the court towards the end of the first half with an apparent ankle injury. The script for how the rest of this was going to go down seemed pretty much written. The ink just needed to dry.

But reader, it did not dry. Vandersloot was back to start the second half, and healthier than ever. (She finished with a 15-8-9 line, to confirm this). After a few minutes of status quo Mystics game management to start the second half, she helped engineer a 9-0 run that vaulted the Sky into a lead they would not relinquish.

So, aside from the team-wide sloppiness, what else went wrong? You’d probably assume Delle Donne was held in check for much of the night, and you’d be right. Though she finished with 16 points, she got off to a slow start and never quite recovered, shooting just 1-for-5 from three-point range and 5-for-14 overall.

“Shots weren’t falling,” Delle Donne said. “You’ve got to learn from nights like this because you can’t live and die by the three. You’ve got to be able to still defend and have energy on defense and I feel like we’re allowing our poor offense to affect our defense.”

Frustrating as this loss may be, the colossus that is the Washington Mystics has still lost just two games since July 13 and were perhaps due a sloppy game after a five-day break and literally months of dominance. Thibault didn’t seem all too concerned afterwards, chalking Washington’s struggles up to standard game-to-game challenges that even elite teams are not immune to.

“You have games where the other team is going to test you physically, they’re going to see what they can get away with, they’re going to test the officials. You’re not going to get calls some nights,” he said. “But you’ve got to play through all that and figure out a way to do it regardless. We’ve had a great stretch on the road, we’ve won 10 road games, but things may have caught up to us.”

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