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Phoenix star Alyssa Thomas had a pair of career-high scoring efforts in July (Photo credit: Chris Poss)

The WNBA regular season’s final full month of games begins with five games tonight, and while the logic of having four games start simultaneously tonight will forever be lost on me, the fact that all 11 games this weekend involve at least one team in the playoff race is undoubtedly a good thing for the league. Six of the 11 games pit two teams in the race against each other, including the headliner of tonight’s overstuffed early session between the third place Mercury and tied-for-fourth Dream.

Phoenix comes in having lost four out of five dating back to its last game of the first half and two out of three on its current five-game road trip, which finishes up on Sunday at Chicago. The Mercury did their best to hang with Indiana in Wednesday’s 107-101 loss to Indiana, but allowed nine more points than in any other game so far. The Fever’s 118.9 points per 100 possessions were also the highest mark put up by a Mercury opponent so far, though not by that large a margin (previously 117.1). Still, Phoenix fell to 1-6 when allowing opponents to put up at least 104 points per 100 possessions compared to 15-4 when keeping their foes under that mark. Two of those four losses came during this 1-4 stretch in road setbacks at Minnesota and New York.

Atlanta comes in having won three out of four after splitting a pair of one-possession games on back-to-back nights on Tuesday vs Golden State (77-75 loss) and Wednesday at Dallas (88-85 win). The Dream’s last three games were decided by a total of nine points dating back to their win at Minnesota all the way back on Sunday. The two wins in that span match the number of wins Atlanta had in games decided by five or fewer points before Sunday — the Dream are 4-6 now after losing five of their first seven such games. They improved to 13-0 when posting an offensive rating of at least 105 points per 100 possessions with a mark of 117.3 on Wednesday, an unbeaten record that includes their win at Phoenix last week (112.5 in that game).

Atlanta was on the back end of a back-to-back when it went into Phoenix last Wednesday and spoiled the Mercury’s “Welcome Back!” party for Kahleah Copper, Satou Sabally and Lexi Held, who all returned from injury that night. Allisha Gray stole the show with 28 points on 10-for-16 from the field including 3-for-6 from deep while adding 7 rebounds and 6 assists as the Dream led 26-17 after a quarter and outscored Phoenix in all but the second quarter. DeWanna Bonner led the Mercury with 18 points on 5-for-11 from the field, but the rest of the team hit just 37.5% of their attempts (although Alyssa Thomas flirted with a triple-double with 7 points, 11 rebounds and 9 assists).

Thomas has been on such a heater as a scorer that she’s left no real choice but to make her the Phoenix player in the spotlight. It’s just about as easy to zero in on Naz Hillmon after her memorable night against Dallas. You might even say it’s Hillmatic.

Thomas scored a career-high 32 points in the loss at Indiana after putting up 27 in her previous outing and has three straight 20-point games for the first time in two years. She also has four 20-point outings in seven games dating back to her previous career-high outing three weeks prior in a win over Minnesota. AT’s only 20-point game prior to this seven-game stretch was in the season opener and she had only two of them last season while seeing a dip in her scoring average from 15.5 points per game in 2023 to 10.6 last year. It’s up to 16.4 this year, which would be a career-high, and she’s averaging 20.6 during this hot streak while still putting up her usually astounding rebound (9.9 per game over her last seven) and assist (8.1 in the same span) numbers.

Hillmon has appeared in a franchise record 134 consecutive games for the Dream dating back to her rookie season, which warrants repeated mention and praise in itself for a player with a career average of 5.4 points per game who entered the league as a second round pick (although college hoops lovers will remember she was a two-time All-American at Michigan). She’s averaging a career-best 8 points per game this season, but has scored 35 in the last two games including a career-high 21 last time out — capped off by the game-winning 3-pointer in the final seconds. She’s scored in double figures in just shy of half of Atlanta’s games (12 of 27), but the Dream are 12-5 when she has at least seven compared to 4-6 when she’s held under that threshold.

The Sparksmentum came to a halt in Cameron Brink’s return but Los Angeles can continue the process of clawing its way back into the playoff race if it pulls the right treat out of its visit to a team that evokes not one but two Tom Hanks movies because Seattle’s Storm are very much like a box of chocolates — you never know what you’re gonna get. If you’re old enough to think that I didn’t need to finish that line, please know that I am too, but unfortunately other people increasingly are not. Please also know that I don’t like Forrest Gump, but I go where the references work (in my broken brain, at least).

Los Angeles had both its win five-game streak and its offensive hot streak end with a resounding thud in both the Sparks’ return from a road trip to start the second half and Brink’s first game in 13 months after suffering a torn ACL. The Sparks put up just 83.1 points per 100 possessions in the 15-point loss to Las Vegas, their worst mark since managing 82.5 on June 21 against the league-best Lynx defense. That snapped a streak of seven straight games with triple-digit ratings including six of at least 110 points per 100 possessions, with the only loss in that seven-game span coming in their fourth and final meeting with Minnesota.

Brink was limited to just 13:55 and had her ups and downs, but there were certainly reminders of her limitless upside during a 5-point outing on 1-for-3 from the field (all from deep, although there is a 2-point attempt erased by a foul drawn and her two free throws). She added three rebounds, an assist, a steal, a block, a turnover and two fouls — a pretty stuffed box score for your first 13 minutes in 13 months.

Seattle is opening a three-game homestand after closing its three-game road trip with a 2-1 record thanks to a 101-85 win at Connecticut on Monday that was more decisive than the margin. The Storm had an offensive rating of 116.1 points per 100 possessions last time out and one of 120.2 in their 38-point win at Chicago to start the road trip that was every bit as decisive as the margin, but they’ve also had two ratings below 75 in the last four games and four under 90 in the last six games. Seattle is tied with Los Angeles for the league lead in games with an offensive rating of at least 115 points per 100 possessions (seven), but they’ve had even more games with a rating under 90 (eight). Only the Sun (11), Mystics (10) and Sky (nine) have had more such games.