WASHINGTON — They entered the day with an opportunity to leave it as the second-best road team in the league. They had defeated the Washington Mystics in D.C. earlier this season.
However, the road warriors known as the Los Angeles Sparks were unable to sweep the Mystics in 2025 games at CareFirst Arena on Sunday afternoon, as 37 combined second-half points from the team’s best players in Kelsey Plum and Dearica Hamby were not enough to overcome the 53 points allowed in the first half to a Washington
team that was hungry to get back to home success, as well as move into a ninth place tie with LA and hopefully within a half game of the eighth-place Seattle Storm.
Due to the Seattle Storm’s loss to the Phoenix Mercury later Sunday night, the Mystics, winners 95-86 over the Sparks, are indeed only a half game out of the playoff picture, as are the Sparks (both 16-18).
I could talk about all the hope LA still has this season, bemoan their defensive struggles (as our Edwin Garcia recently did) or point out the highlights and lowlights from the non-Plum/Hamby individual performances. But Plum achieved something pretty darn historic, so let’s start with that.
Plum’s 20-and-5s
Diana Taurasi averaged more than 20 points seven times in her career. She averaged better than five assists four times. She accomplished both feats in the same season just twice. And she’s the GOAT.
Plum is on pace to match Taurasi with two such seasons and turns 31 later in August (Taurasi turned 31 in June of the season she FIRST notched 20-plus and five-plus feat). So since we know her averages, it’s no surprise that Plum tied the WNBA record for most 20 and five games in a single season with her 18th of 2025 on Sunday.
Plum has a had an incredible season, averaging career-highs of 20.4 points and 6.1 assists (both third in the league). She averaged 20.2 and 5.1 in 2022, coming in third in MVP voting that year.
Her numbers have been amazing from the jump, though we tend to forget about her because the Sparks are not one of the top teams. Well, they went 8-1 from July 13 to Aug. 7—before alternating losses and wins over their last five—to give themselves a great shot at making the playoffs, thanks in large part to Plum. So let’s give her her flowers now that she has tied this record and should easily break it.
On Sunday, she scored 11 of her 17 second-half points in the fourth quarter. She was the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer upon graduating from Washington for a reason: sometimes you just can’t stop her off the dribble. So it wasn’t anything new to see her go on a 6-2 individual run to open the final frame with three driving the layups. For the middle of those, she had to drive twice—backing out of the paint to mislead defender Lucy Olsen only to go right back at her—but that just made it all the more masterful.
She added another layup and then a 3 from the right corner that cut it to six with 2:02 to go. She also dished out two helpers in the fourth, both resulting in Hamby layups, including the one that cut it to three with 6:25 remaining. That’s as close as the Sparks would get.
Before the game, Plum was repping Sparks legend Candace Parker. While the two never played together in LA, they did join forces on the 2023 champion Las Vegas Aces. Plus, Plum grew up in San Diego a fan of the Sparks during Parker’s time with the team. She has also stated that she grew up wanting to play for Pat Summitt at Tennessee, where Parker and Summitt won back-to-back national championships at the time Plum was 12 and 13 years old.
Hamby heroics
Hamby finished with an even better stat line than Plum: 26 points, seven assists, four rebounds, a steal and a block on 12-for-17 shooting from the field, including 1-for-1 from downtown. She was charged with her second foul less than four minutes into the contest, but was able to finish the first half with almost 12 minutes played without picking up a third.
This discipline allowed her to play comfortably to start the second half. She would score seven points in the first 2:04 following the break and 12 in the first 5:13, capping that stretch with a straightaway trey. She added eight points in the fourth.
Clearly, both Plum and Hamby treated the game as crucial. Hamby came out to start the third and Plum came out to start the fourth with a sense of urgency. They played like the veteran stars that they are and can hardly be faulted for their offensive performances in the second half.
Indeed, Sparks head coach Lynne Roberts offered postgame praise of the duo:
Those are our two leaders. I thought they were great. KP did a great job of getting to the bucket there to get us going. She was not gonna be denied. And then I thought Dearica did a really good job on their ball screen coverage rolling and we found her, and she was tough going to the basket. KP and D have been this way all season. They’ve led us when it’s hard. Today was hard. And you have to give credit to Washington; I thought they played well, they executed well. It just took us that first half to really get going. So that’s disappointing, but we got to move on.
No need to panic
With a win, the Sparks would have clinched the season series against Washington by going up 3-0 with one game to go. Now, the Mystics still have a chance of tying the season series, which would push the tiebreaker between the teams to best record against teams with winning records. LA is currently 7-13 against teams with winning records with six such games to go, while the Mystics are 5-15 with six to go; of course, which teams have winning records is subject to change. It’s also possible that the Sparks tie with the Storm or someone else besides the Mystics for the eighth spot. A lot of things are still possible because there’s a whole lot of time left!
The Sparks have an opportunity to make the playoffs easily. They already went on that 8-1 run; if they go on another, they’ll get in comfortably. But they’ll likely have some trouble winning those six against teams with winning records, so it will be important to try and defeat the Dallas Wings twice, as well as the Mystics and Storm.
Here’s what Roberts had to say about the team’s mindset moving forward:
We can’t panic or think that the sky is falling. We’ve had tough losses before and we’ve always bounced back. I believe in this group and trust ‘em. These two sitting next to me (Plum and Hamby) are as reliable as they come. When your best players are like that, you have every reason to be confident.
No rebounds, no road win
LA is 11th in defensive rating and dead last in points allowed per game at 88.8. The 95 points given up on Sunday were far too many. The Sparks did manage to hold Washington to 42 points in the second half, which is much more respectable. But it didn’t seem like LA was doing well defensively. While the Sparks put up a solid total of 45 of their own points in the second half, they allowed the Mystics to answer them at all the key moments. And it was mainly Sonia Citron doing the answering. After putting up 15 second-half points (13 fourth-quarter) on Wednesday against the Golden State Valkyries, Citron poured in 18 (10 fourth-quarter) against LA. This included going 4-for-5 from 3 (2-for-3 in the fourth).
For the game, the Sparks allowed Washington to shoot red-hot clips of 59.3 percent from the field and 55 percent from 3 (Citron was 5-for-6). Another stat they are last in is 3-point makes allowed per game with 9.7; they allowed 11 on Sunday.
Here’s Roberts on the defense:
I need to watch the film to point out specifics, but I thought we let them kind of execute their stuff. Citron was phenomenal; every time we kind of got it close and pushed, she hit a big shot. … I think there’s a ton of things we need to get better at. I thought our help rotation was a little late. Second half we were better; first half not so much. There’s a lot of things, I mean we gave up 95 points. But I don’t want to get into the details without having a great answer yet.
Perhaps even more glaring than the high efficiency surrendered was the performance in the rebounding department, both defensively and offensively. LA managed just 11 defensive rebounds to the Mystics’ 8 offensive, so they weren’t ending a ton of the possessions that didn’t end in a Mystics basket. This allowed Washington 10 second-chance points. The opposing team’s offensive boards shouldn’t be only three lower than your defensive ones. On the other end of the floor, the Sparks had just four offensive rebounds to the Mystics’ 27 defensive.
The Sparks have the second-best field goal percentage in the league and the second-worst field goal percentage allowed, so there usually aren’t a lot of rebounds to be had. But their rebound margin is just 0.1 below even, so it was surprising to see them lose the battle on the glass by 20 on Sunday.
2 bright spots for the Sparks
There were some bright spots for LA.
First of all, they didn’t fall in love with the 3, and this allowed them to outscore Washington 46-34 in the paint. They were just below their season average in 3-point attempts, as was Plum individually, as she went 2-for-5. She missed a wide-open one late that would have cut it the Sparks’ deficit to three points. I’m sure she wishes she could take that one again and make it, but she did a great job of penetrating and either finishing or making a nice pass throughout the fourth. In the third, she was 3-for-3 from the field with three 2s. For the game, she was 8-for-10 on 2s; Hamby was 4-for-4 in the fourth and 12-for-16 on the afternoon.
Another key bright spot was winning the turnover battle by 10, including forcing 18. This was a strong point for the defense, and maybe something they can build off. Entering the game, the Sparks were ninth in turnovers forced per game with 12.6. The WNBA high is 16.2 (Storm). LA scored 25 points off of turnovers to the Mystics’ eight. The eight turnovers the Sparks were guilty of is below the WNBA best of 12.4 (also the Storm). When your turnovers forced are above the league-best mark and your turnovers committed are below the league-best, it’s a good day in that department.
How the rest of LA’s rotation fared
Rickea Jackson carried the scoring load for LA early with eight points in the first quarter and 13 in the first half. She finished with 17 points, but just two rebounds.
Rae Burrell, whose career-high is 18 points, showed up with a nice contribution off the bench in the first half. She wouldn’t add to her 10 points in the second half, but her perfect 2-for-2 effort from 3 held up. She fell hard on her right shoulder toward the end of the second quarter, but got up and made both free throws. She went on to play 7:58 in the second half.
It was a quiet afternoon for All-Star snub Azurá Stevens, who averages 14.4 points and 7.9 rebounds on the season. She was 0-for-5 from 3 with just six points and two boards.
Known for getting into foul trouble at Stanford, Cameron Brink picked up her fourth foul with 11 seconds to go in the first half. She would play just 1:38 in the second half for a total of 12:03 and was held scoreless with one block, the category she is most known for. With little time left and the game still hanging in the balance, she wasn’t on the court, likely because you want two true guards out there and it’s hard to take out Hamby, Stevens or Jackson. Plus, she wasn’t in tune with the rhythm of the game. But at some point, you would expect Brink to become the type of player you absolutely have to have on the court during crunch time. She has major star potential.
The Belgian Julies (Allemand and Vanloo) were held to a combined two points, which came from Allemand across her 25 minutes; Vanloo played 10 minutes. With Jackson, Stevens and Allemand getting the start, Burrell was the only player to score off the Sparks’ bench. The game’s overall margin of nine was nearly identical to the Mystics’ advantage in bench points (10).
