When San Antonio arrived at Philips Arena for an 11 a.m. workout, the Dream's Camille Little embraced her former teammates, and current teammate Betty Lennox chatted up Erin Buescher.

Eight hours later, the smiles and laughter were gone as the Dream's Tamera Young ripped her arm away from Becky Hammon's grasp. Dream center Katie Feenstra fell backward from an Ann Wauters push. Forward Stacey Lovelace held her jaw in pain.

In the end, the Dream dropped another battle Wednesday night, as Hammon's season-high 25-point performance led the Silver Stars to an 81-66 victory.

As a result, the Dream owns the second-longest winless streak to open a season in WNBA history and is two losses shy of matching the Detroit Shock's 0-13 drought in 2002.

Despite some stellar efforts by their post players, the Dream could not break their losing spell.

Coach Marynell Meadors challenged her frontcourt during their morning practice, and it paid off.

Young nearly tallied a triple-double with 13 boards, nine points and seven assists.

Lovelace, who was averaging 5.6 points per game before Wednesday's game, led the team in scoring with 18 points.

"I told them they needed to step up," Meadors said. "We need them. We can't just be a guard-oriented team. You've got to have an inside presence. And Stacey did a nice job tonight."

Lennox couldn't get into a rhythm with a double-team smothering her all night. The Silver Stars limited her to two points in the first half on 1-of-3 shooting.

She finished in single digits (nine points) for only the second time this season. The Silver Stars seemed to move too quickly for the Dream, throwing lob passes to transition runners. They scored 14 points on fast-break opportunities.

Meanwhile, the Dream struggled shooting, converting 36.1 percent of their shots to San Antonio's 51.9. They shot 18.2 percent on 3-point shots and missed nearly a dozen layups.

"It breaks your back," Lovelace said. "You work hard to get the layup, and then to not finish it, it just knocks the wind out of your sails."

San Antonio built as much as a 16-point lead, before the Dream made one of its frequent last-ditch rallies.

"We still have that eagerness towards the end," Lennox said. "That's the positive thing you can pull from this, that we still have that fire. But we need to play four quarters and not just the last five minutes."

Ivory Latta cut the lead to 73-64 with two free throws with 3:16 remaining, but the Dream would throw away three consecutive turnovers to close out the game.

"They have Olympians on that team. And they have people that have 12 years experience in this league," Meadors said. "They always step up at the end because they know what it takes. We're still trying to find it."

Guard Iziane Castro Marques made her home debut since returning from her stint on the Brazil national team.

The former starter played 18 minutes, 17 seconds off the bench, but Meadors said she plans to start her Friday against Washington.