Tiffany Hayes scored a season-high 20 points, Angel McCoughtry added 18 more, and the Dream knocked off Seattle 80-69 on Friday at Philips Arena.
Erika de Souza scored 14 and grabbed eight rebounds, and Sancho Lyttle scored 13 and had 10 rebounds to help the Dream snap a two-game losing streak. The points allowed was a season low for the Dream this year. Atlanta (3-2) will play at Connecticut on Sunday.
Fifth starter Jasmine Thomas scored 11 points. It was the first time this season that all five starters scored at least 10 points. They were needed to help overcome Atlanta’s poor bench scoring of just four points. Seattle’s scored 32.
Hayes, whose career-high is 23 points, hit six of her nine shots, including both 3-point attempts. Her previous high this season was 12 points. She didn’t score any in the previous game against Indiana, despite playing more than 27 minutes.
Her total on Friday was more than all of her points (19) in previous games this season.
She said she knew her offense would come.
“The first shot went down and confidence goes up,” she said. “You keep shooting and doing what you need to do for your team to win.”
McCoughtry wasn’t as efficient, hitting eight of 20 attempts, but she had a season-high eight assists and two steals.
It seemed like it would be a long night for McCoughtry, who was second in the league in scoring at 22.3 points per game.
She couldn’t get the ball to drop through the first 2½ quarters. Open jumpers would roll around the rim before falling out and layups would strike the iron and carom away. She missed nine of her first 12 shots and looked frustrated.
But McCoughtry started to find her range midway through the third quarter and it began to change the game.
She drilled a 3-pointer and followed that with another long jumper a few minutes later to give the Dream a 52-51 lead. She converted a three-point play to increase the Dream’s lead to 55-51 on the next play.
With defenders running at her, space started to open inside and McCoughtry took advantage of it. She hit Lyttle for two consecutive baskets to give the Dream a 59-53 lead to end the third quarter. Atlanta finished the period with a 14-2 run.
“Great teams will have those runs,” coach Michael Cooper said. “As long as we aren’t throwing the ball away and giving ourselves a chance to win, it will put us in some games.”
The Dream’s offense dried up in the opening minutes of the fourth and Seattle tied the game at 61 on free throws by Noelle Quinn with 6:20 left.
De Souza hit two free throws to give the Dream a 63-61 lead. McCoughtry hit de Souza for a layup to push the lead to 65-61.
McCoughtry then drove the baseline before passing to Lyttle for a basket and a 67-62 lead.
McCoughtry followed that with a jumper from the free-throw line and Atlanta led 69-62 with less than three minutes remaining.
Hayes added two free throws to give Atlanta a 73-64 lead with 1:49 left.
Etc: Shoni Schimmel had one assist. She was averaging 9.3 per game. Her season total of 38 is still tied for the most in league history for a player in her first five career games.
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