Things aren’t going well for the Atlanta Dream right now. They just lost their fourth consecutive game against the Washington Mystics, and Jordin Canada, Rhyne Howard, and Karl Smesko were openly frustrated with the officiating. On top of that, the Dream is the only top-five team without an All-Star starter. The sixth-placed Dallas Wings, meanwhile, have two players, and three players from the seventh-placed Indiana Fever were voted in.
But the Dream shouldn’t be without an All-Star for long. The coaches will vote for the reserves, and Dream coach Karl Smesko is confident that they will give some Atlanta players the nod.
“I expect the coaches to put all three of those [Rhyne Howard, Allisha Gray, and Angel Reese] in as no-brainers,” Smesko said in the postgame media availability after the loss to Washington. He also advocated for Jordin Canada to get some All-Star consideration for her two-way play as the Dream’s leader.
All three of Howard, Gray, and Reese have excellent cases to be All-Star reserves this year.
Rhyne Howard was the biggest All-Star starter snub
There are only four spots for guards when it comes to All-Star starters, so someone deserving will always be left off the list. Paige Bueckers, Olivia Miles, Caitlin Clark, and Kelsey Mitchell are all putting up All-Star-worthy numbers, and Miles in particular is driving team success at an extremely high level, especially for a rookie. Still, it’s tough to see Howard, who is playing extremely well on both ends of the floor for a team that’s sitting in fourth place, being left off.
She had a better case than Gray, since she is scoring more, and a better case than Reese, who is putting together another good season but isn’t quite on the same level as bigs like A’ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart, Jessica Shepard, and Natasha Howard.
Howard leads the Dream in minutes, points, and steals per game. Both her 18.9 points and 2.6 steals per game are career highs. She leads the W in steals per game as one of only three players to get at least two per contest. She also ranks tenth in points per game and has made the second-most 3-pointers for the season behind Marina Mabrey.
“Rhyne’s had a fantastic year,” Smesko said of his star player. “She’s been one of the best players in the league, two-way players in the league, all season and is continuing to play really well.”
What hurt Howard’s case to be an All-Star starter was the fan vote. Howard finished fourth among guards in the media vote and second in the player vote, but only ninth in the fan vote. Paige Bueckers is the only player who finished ahead of her in both media and player votes. The media had her second and the players first. Olivia Miles finished first in the media vote, third in the player vote, and fifth in fan voting.
Caitlin Clark and Kelsey Mitchell, unlike Howard, benefited greatly from the fan vote. Mitchell finished seventh in both media and player voting, but was third in fan voting. Clark was ranked third by the media, eleventh by players, and second by fans.
However, it’s important to note that the player vote should be taken with a grain of salt. ESPN’s Alexa Philippou reported that only 85 of the players in the league voted and that there were some organizational issues. A few Sparks players, for example, reportedly never even received a ballot before the results came out.
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