The Dream’s Angel McCoughtry took the court at Georgia Tech’s McCamish Pavilion on Thursday night as the league’s fourth-leading scorer with 19.6 points per game but did not yet know if she would be on the 2014 WNBA Eastern Conference All-Star roster. By the end of the third quarter against the Connecticut Sun, McCoughtry led the Dream with 19 points and appeared worthy of the recognition that awaited her.
Predicting McCoughtry’s electrifying second half and the Dream’s 83-71 victory against the Sun was nearly impossible at halftime — although she saw it coming.
Approaching the final three minutes of the first quarter, the Connecticut Sun (9-11) had crept within a point of the Dream (13-5), down 14-13. Connecticut fought aggressively under the basket and matched the Dream’s defensive rebounds in the first quarter with eight.
Although the Dream experienced offensive sparks like a half-court assist from rookie guard Shoni Schimmel to forward Sancho Lyttle in the second quarter, the team could only match the Sun’s productivity from inside the three-point line early on. Both the Dream and the Sun completed only eight of their 18 field-goal attempts in the first half.
The Dream made four of its five free throws in the first half which helped widen the gap, but the team could wholly rely on McCoughtry offensively come the second half.
In the final minutes of the first half, McCoughtry was hit hard and came crashing down on her right elbow. She ruminated during halftime. “I think I play better when I’m mad,” she said.
McCoughtry only needed 15 seconds to make a three-point jumper to start the third quarter. She followed her opening shot up with a layup a minute later. Next came an aggressive offensive rebound and a putback layup. Her elbow was sore, but the Sun defenders couldn’t tell.
McCoughtry added seven points to the scoreboard in less than two minutes and the Sun didn’t recover. “We just wanted to get back in it defensively,” she said of the team’s momentum after the half. “We like to run and we started running.”
By the end of the third quarter, McCoughtry had 19 points, nearly matching her season average of 19.6. She finished the game with 22 points. Tiffany Hayes scored 17 points and Erika de Souza followed up with 13.
In order to alleviate the stress that comes with an often travel-intensive July, the Dream took over Georgia Tech’s McCamish Pavilion while their home plays host to a convention for the next few days.
In 2013, the Dream played all but one game on the road during the month of July. They lost each of those games except for one home game against the Sun. The team didn’t play a single game in Philips Arena in July of 2012 and went 2-3 that month.
Described as an “experiment” by a Dream representative, Thursday’s game in McCamish Pavilion and others are an attempt to combat scheduling conflicts with the team’s home arena.
“I thought it was more conducive for us because it was like a college atmosphere,” coach Michael Cooper said of the intimate setting. “You could feel the electricity in here from the start. Again with (the fans) being so close I think our players got a good sweat early as opposed to being (at) our arena at Philips where there’s a little draft in there. You kind of have to work your way into getting a sweat.”
The Dream sit in first place in the Eastern Conference standings, 4 1/2 games ahead of the second-place Indiana Fever.
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