Atlanta Dream owner Ron Terwilliger expected his team to lose games and money this year.

Turns out, it is losing more of each than he projected.

The WNBA expansion team has lost all of its games so far —- 17 and counting —- and has lost, according to Terwilliger, "a little bit more" money than forecast.

Not that he's really complaining at this point.

Well, maybe a little about the 0-17 record.

"We knew we were going to have a losing season. That's just the way leagues are set up for expansion teams," Terwilliger said. "I don't agree with it. I pushed real hard for the No. 1 draft choice, even suggesting I wasn't going to do this without it. But that didn't move [WNBA president] Donna Orender or [NBA commissioner] David Stern."

The No. 1 choice in the college draft yielded rookie sensation Candace Parker for the Los Angeles Sparks. The Dream wound up picking eighth.

And so the Dream season has turned into, if not a nightmare, a quintessential tale of a first-year expansion club.

Terwilliger, the longtime chairman and CEO of Atlanta-based apartment and condominium developer Trammell Crow Residential, returned from a vacation in Europe just in time to see the Dream get outscored 33-9 in the second quarter of a 97-79 loss to defending league champion Phoenix at Philips Arena on Tuesday night.

Just another loss in the longest losing streak in the WNBA's 12-year history.

In a small victory of sorts, the game was played before a spirited crowd. The announced attendance —- generously defined by the WNBA and most pro sports leagues as tickets distributed —- was 9,795. There appeared to be closer to 7,000 in the arena, a good turnout nevertheless for a winless team on a weeknight with the Braves playing a couple of miles away. After the game, coach Marynell Meadors thanked the fans for being "fantastic."

"The exciting thing for me," Dream president Bill Bolen said, "is how fans are staying to the end of the games. You don't always see that in this town, especially when the team is not winning a lot."

The Dream's average announced home attendance is 7,942, slightly above the league-wide average. Playing in an arena that, with the upper deck curtained off, seats 10,000-plus, the Dream sold out their first two games. Tuesday's crowd, bolstered by several youth groups and a discount ticket offer, was the largest since the team's opening weekend.

Terwilliger knew the franchise —- stocked mostly with other clubs' castoffs —- would struggle on the court and lose money off the court for a few years. While not disclosing how much money the team will lose this year, the owner seems unfazed by it. That the loss will be slightly larger than projected is primarily due to the challenge of selling corporate sponsorships in a weak economy, he said.

"You watch: When you see me start a sports team, recession is around the corner," said Terwilliger, noting that an economic downturn also followed his 1989 launch of a short-lived pro soccer team, the Atlanta Attack.

In a nod to the economy, the Dream recently started a promotion tied to the price of gas, offering a limited number of seats at weeknight games for $4 apiece. "Cheaper by the Gallon," the team calls the offer.

This has been a season of trial and error, on and off the court.

"This year, we're trying all kinds of different offers, initiatives, marketing," Bolen said. "You look at it and say, 'That worked well,' or 'That bombed.' To me, we'll be so much better next year."

Terwilliger thought his fledgling franchise would have won at least a few games by now, and although not unhappy with the attendance, "I think it would be better if we were winning some games," he said. "We need to keep building the franchise and build on that core [fan base]."

Terwilliger's goals are to contend for a championship within five years and to rank in the league's top three, "eventually No. 1," in attendance and sponsorship revenue. The team is near the middle of the 14-team league in attendance and, Bolen said, sponsorships.

"I'm happy I did it," Terwilliger said of buying the team. "It's something I did for Atlanta and women and girls. If it ends up making sense financially, great."

A more pressing item of business: finding that elusive first victory in franchise history.

"You'd like to win a couple of games this year to get the monkey off your back," Terwilliger said. "But what's important is the improvement we make next year."