UNCASVILLE — It became apparent early this season that the Connecticut Sun‘s eight-year run of WNBA playoff appearances was going to end in 2025.

And so it did as the longest active streak in the league was officially snapped in nightmarish fashion on Sunday afternoon when a 21-point lead in the second half was blown in a 99-93 overtime loss to the Indiana Fever.

The team’s 6-27 record isn’t a surprise to anyone within the team. The organization knew as soon as the 2024 season ended that this year would be a massive rebuild with zero starters returning to a team that came one game short of reaching the 2024 finals. The current roster features five rookies, including two that didn’t join the team until July.

But the Sun also took a risk in hiring head coach Rachid Meziane, the first European coach in league history. A record seven teams brought in new head coaches in 2025, but Meziane was the only one hired without any prior experience in the WNBA. It’s challenging to evaluate the success of the French coach’s adjustment to the league with the roster he was given, but after yet another fourth-quarter meltdown by the Sun, the front office has major questions to answer with 11 games left.

“I think the biggest thing for us right now is progress, and that doesn’t always mean wins and losses but just to see how we’re playing, how the players are responding, how are the game plans that they’re doing in practice, how’s that translating?” Sun general manager Morgan Tuck said. “I think you try to look at everything from a holistic view, and you don’t just pigeon hole to say, ‘Oh, we didn’t win this in the game.’”

The obvious issue in Sunday’s loss to the Fever was a complete lack of adjustment in the second half, especially on defense. The team’s 19-point halftime lead was deceiving because of Indiana’s unusually poor shooting. Veteran star Kelsey Mitchell was 0-for-7 from the field with just four points, and the Fever were 0-for-10 on 3-pointers. But then in the second half and overtime, the Sun gave up 34 points to Mitchell and allowed Indiana to shoot 7-for-12 from beyond the arc.

As Meziane pointed out postgame, Connecticut seemed to abandon its strategy in navigating screens defensively, and Mitchell got open looks almost every time the Sun allowed a post player to switch onto her.

Connecticut never got back on the rails once Mitchell found her shot, and that was most apparent in overtime. The Sun had all 12 players active and three days of recovery coming into the game, but Indiana’s injury-decimated roster outworked them on both ends of the floor less than 48 hours after a Friday night loss to the Washington Mystics.

PHOTOS: Connecticut Sun lose to Indiana fever in overtime 99-93

“The beginning of the third quarter when we stepped on the court, we had to play with respect (for Indiana) and we didn’t respect the plan. Instead of finding our post players (on offense) we took outside shots early in possessions,” Meziane said. “I think that because we were winning by 19 points, we came back maybe lazy or too relaxed, and you see the result. Instead of trying to kill the (other) team, we just allowed them to come back.”

The real question is why Connecticut couldn’t uphold the plan for four quarters, why it came into the second half already losing confidence in a game it led comfortably for most of the first.

The Sun’s ability to fall apart late in games is remarkable, even in their best performances. The issue first emerged in May when the team blew a 15-point lead in the fourth quarter to lose 76-70 in what could have been a statement upset over the Minnesota Lynx. It also happened in two previous matchups with the Fever, first when Connecticut escaped with an 85-83 win on May 30 after allowing Indiana to come back from a 15-point fourth quarter deficit. The Sun never led by more than two when the teams met at TD Garden on July 15, but they were outscored 23-17 and trailed the entire last quarter after seven lead changes and 10 tie scores in the previous three.

Even in Wednesday’s win over the Chicago Sky, the Sun tried to give away the game down the stretch. Chicago was already down superstar forward Angel Reese due to injury and played the entire second half without starters Ariel Atkins and Rebecca Allen after both were ejected along with Sun guard Bria Hartley following a scuffle in the second quarter. Even missing two of their best 3-point shooters and with just seven active players, the Sky clawed back from a 21-point deficit in the third quarter to get within five points of Connecticut in the last three minutes of the fourth.

The loss to Indiana on Sunday felt especially revealing because it came against former Sun head coach Stephanie White in her first game at Mohegan Sun since parting ways with the franchise last November. Even after starting guard Sophie Cunningham went down with a knee injury in the second quarter, White’s team never stopped fighting. They came out of halftime with intensity but not tension, and their confidence only continued to build the longer the game went on. White was in tears in the postgame locker room as she praised the team’s resilience, and the Fever players echoed back, “We’re proud of you, too.”

After an expected adjustment period, Meziane’s system has certainly translated to the WNBA. The Sun are putting up 80.5 points per game since the All-Star break after averaging a league-worst 72.7 in the first half of the season. The team’s young core is also consistently developing. Saniya Rivers became the fastest rookie ever to reach 30 blocks with a career-high five against the Fever, and she leads all first-year players in steals.

Leila Lacan, just 16 games into her professional career, is the only rookie averaging more than two steals per game, and she became the first player since former UConn star Jennifer Rizzotti in 2002 to have 14 assists without a single turnover in the loss to Indiana. Aneesah Morrow had her fourth double-double of the season against the Fever, and she moved to fourth in franchise history in rebounds by a rookie surpassing six-time All-Star Alyssa Thomas.

But where Meziane continues to struggle is as a motivator, in his ability to rally the young team when its focus starts to slip. Tina Charles, a 14-year WNBA veteran who has played for nine different coaches in her career, said as much after the team’s practice Saturday before the Indiana game.

“I think Rachid is just understanding the way the WNBA goes, just knowing when to have intense practices, when you have to pull back, knowing when to rest players, how to communicate to players,” Charles said. “I think that’s probably the main thing for him, but we’re all just trying to get better and help one another out.”

Though Tuck said she’s seen Meziane find more self-assuredness over the course of his first season, that growth has yet to truly show in the biggest moments on the court. The Sun will be more experienced in 2026, but the roster is going to be overwhelmingly young for the foreseeable future, and the franchise has a decision to make about whether Meziane is the right voice to lead its rebuild moving forward.

“I think (I see) him trusting himself more and being more confident in what he’s doing and getting a feel for it,” Tuck said. “He’s living in a different culture, he’s away from his family, so he’s having to balance a lot of things, and I think that he’s done a really good job of taking what we’ve done and learning from it.”

Dom Amore: Fever deliver end-of-summer bummer to Sun as uncertain future awaits CT’s WNBA team