{"id":92542,"date":"2025-08-24T02:04:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-24T02:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/92542\/"},"modified":"2025-08-24T02:04:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-24T02:04:07","slug":"seattle-look-to-stay-in-playoff-hunt-avoid-season-sweep-against-mystics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/92542\/","title":{"rendered":"Seattle look to stay in playoff hunt, avoid season sweep against Mystics"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Seattle Storm<\/a> have stayed in the playoff hunt after a rough stretch, but keeping it going while amid a string of road games won’t be easy.<\/p>\n

The Storm try to bolster their status again when visiting the Washington Mystics<\/a> on Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n

“It’s important, especially in a stretch like this,” Seattle coach Noelle Quinn said. “On the road. With a lot of games, not a lot of days in between to kind of rest and recover.”<\/p>\n

The Storm (19-18) has won three of its last four games, including the first two stops on a five-game road swing.<\/p>\n

“I think the group understands the sense of urgency we have to have,” Quinn said. “This stretch we’ve had a lot of good production from a lot of different places.”<\/p>\n

Seattle trounced host Dallas the last time out 95-60 behind rookie Dominique Malonga’s 22 points. With 62 points scored by reserves, the Storm set a single-game franchise record for bench points.<\/p>\n

“The hot hand could be anyone,” Quinn said. “It’s going to be a team effort. I think right now we’re finding ways to be ‘one,’ starting with our defense.”<\/p>\n

Malonga is the first Seattle player with three games of 20 or more points off the bench in the same season.<\/p>\n

“She works on it, she reps it,” Quinn said of Malonga’s variety of scoring methods. “She has a natural feel for the things you’re seeing.”<\/p>\n

The Mystics (16-21) are on a three-game losing streak after Saturday afternoon’s 91-81 home loss to the Las Vegas Aces.<\/p>\n

Washington’s Kiki Iriafen’s 21 points Saturday ended a stretch when Sonia Citron had been the team’s leading scorer in five straight games. Iriafen has a 10-game string as the top rebounder for the Mystics. She pulled down a game-high 15 on Saturday.<\/p>\n

“Regardless of how the game outcome was, I think I learned a lot,” Iriafen said.<\/p>\n

Coach Sydney Johnson altered his Mystics’ starting lineup by giving Alysha Clark the start Saturday.<\/p>\n

“Just in terms of her leadership, her IQ, she’s just a really versatile and giving player,” Johnson said. “I was going to make a move at some point.”<\/p>\n

Washington won both previous games against the Storm, prevailing 74-69 and 69-58 last month.<\/p>\n

–Field Level Media<\/p>\n

\n Copyright 2025 STATS LLC and Field Level Media. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of STATS LLC and Field Level Media is strictly prohibited.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Seattle Storm have stayed in the playoff hunt after a rough stretch, but keeping it going while…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38623,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,1611,82,737,630],"class_list":{"0":"post-92542","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-seattle-storm","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-washington-mystics","13":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}