On Tuesday evening, the Washington Mystics will visit the Toronto Tempo for the third of four matchups between the teams this season (7 p.m. ET, NBA TV).
And while it might be an overstatement to claim that these two squads are rivals, they are quite intertwined, a somewhat curious circumstance considering this is Toronto’s first season on the WNBA scene.
The Tempo’s first-ever game came against the Mystics, when Washington secured an opening night win in Toronto by three points thanks to four clutch
free throws from Shakira Austin. The second game, held in DC, offered up an even more dramatic ending, as Lauren Betts tipped a jump ball to Sonia Citron for the game-winning jumper as the buzzer sounded.
Those competitive contests came after transactional decisions that already connected the two teams. Ahead of a third matchup that seems destined to be hard fought, let’s examine the tangled fates of the Mystics-Tempo and consider what could have been.
1. What if the Mystics did not match the Tempo’s offer sheet to Shakira Austin?
Over the offseason, the Tempo tendered a restricted free agent qualifying offer to Austin for $3.57 million over three years. The Mystics matched the contract offer, keeping Austin in DC as part of a talented, yet-crowded frontcourt.
Austin, plagued by nagging injuries through much of her WNBA career, is putting together a career-best season with the Mystics.
In almost 29 minutes per game, Shakira is scoring 14 points per game, a total achieved, in part, by getting to the line for 5.3 free throws per game and experimenting with over a 3-point attempt per game. With a sub-70-percent free throw percentage, she’s leaving more points at the line, even as she’s drilling her triples at an impressive, although possibly unsustainable, 42.3 percent rate. Austin’s also bringing down a career-high 9.1 rebounds per game, in addition to swatting 1.4 shots per game, a number that’s also a career high.
Zack Ward just wrote about Shakira’s superstar showing in Washington’s most recent win over the Seattle Storm.
All that production could have been transformative for the Tempo.
None of their bigs provide the offensive production and defensive presence of Austin. The Tempo offense is highly-dependent on the isolation scoring of Marina Mabrey and, when healthy, Brittney Sykes, in addition to the 3-point shooting of their supporting perimeter players. While bigs Isabelle Harrison and Nyara Sabally have scored efficiently for Toronto, Austin is more dynamic than both, although the bigger difference would come on the other end. Even if Shakira isn’t an All-Defense-level defender, and could not singularly elevate a leaky Toronto defense, she would offer a lot more resistance than Harrison or Sabally.
On the other side, Washington would, obviously, be worse off without Austin, especially in the immediate.
Yet, it’s worth asking if, in the longterm, the absence of Austin would be a positive. As Beckett Harrison has covered, the Mystics currently sit in a curious spot. The organization consistently has signaled their intention to slowly and steadily build a sustainable, winning team. Yet, the team is more talented than anticipated, with Austin, along with Citron and Kiki Iriafen, already proving capable of carrying the team to wins, despite all the questions that dot the rest of the roster.
The tension between a present-day playoff push and longerterm outlook is intensified by the fact that Washington drafted Lauren Betts with No. 4 overall pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft before selecting two more frontcourt-tilted players in Angela Dugalić and Cotie McMahon in the first round.
Because Austin and Iriafen are too good, it’s difficult to allocate adequate playing time to the rookies. Yet, as Washington invested valuable assets in these prospects, the organization needs to understand how they translate to the WNBA, particularly since they’re, presumably, part of the longterm vision.
So, yes, Washington would have fewer wins without Austin, but they would also have fewer roster complications.
2. What if the Mystic had drafted Kiki Rice and the Tempo had drafted Lauren Betts?
Alternatively, Washington could have avoided such an imbalanced roster by just drafting different players. Beckett likewise has puzzled over the Mystics’ draft-day decisions.
The player ultimately selected by the Tempo might have made everything in Washington make a lot more sense, and that’s not even factoring in that Kiki Rice is from the DC area.
Yes, Betts was the best player available at No. 4 overall because, as it’s often said, “You can’t teach 6-foot-7.” Yet, determining “best” is an art, not a science. And if Betts can’t become the best version of herself in DC due to the talent ahead of her in the rotation, was Rice, in fact, the “best” player on the board at No. 4?
Rice, a steady ball handler, strong driver and solid defender, would slot in seamlessly alongside the Mystics’ Citron-Iriafen-Austin trio, forming a core-four foundation that could, sooner than later, become the bedrock of a upper-tier playoff team, if not a true title contender.
And maybe in this alternate universe, Rice doesn’t suffer a Grade 3 ankle sprain, allowing her to flesh out the All-Rookie First Team-caliber season she was starting to put together?
Additionally, if we assume that the Chicago Sky still select Gabriela Jaquez, yet another UCLA Bruin, at No. 5 overall, Betts would be there for the Tempo to take at No. 6. For a team that missed out on plucking Austin away from the Mystics, the Tempo could have instead invested in Betts as their true big of the future.
Although neither team is in a bad spot, it seems like both Washington and Toronto would be better situated if Kiki was in DC and Lo was in the Six.
3. What the if the Mystics had never traded Brittney Sykes?
We’re traveling even further back in time for this one.
Last season, the Mystics were flirting with the fringes of the playoff picture until deciding to abandon such a pursuit at midseason, a decision that demonstrated the organization’s aforementioned focus on the future.
Trading Sykes, then the team’s lead offensive creator and scorer, was the surest sign that the Mystics would not be tempted by the short term. Sykes finished the season with the Storm, where she unevenly adapted the ball-dominant stylings she had leaned into in Washington to then-veteran Seattle.
However, Sykes’ work in Washington, plus a banner Unrivaled season, encouraged the Tempo to go all in, making Slim one piece of the first million-dollar backcourt in WNBA history. Prior to a foot injury, the Sykes investment was paying off for the Tempo, as she was functioning as the high-volume scorer Toronto envisioned.
If the Mystics had stuck with Sykes last season, might she have also stuck around this offseason, re-signing in Washington instead of becoming one of the inaugural pillars in Toronto?
Compared to other “what ifs,” I think both teams should be satisfied with how this situation actually played out.
Are there any other Mystics-Tempo intertwinnings that I’m missing? (Maybe there’s a dodgeball game brewing between the teams?) Which “what if” do you think is most significant? Which one do wish had happened differently?
And, do any other two WNBA teams have shared fates like Washington and Toronto?
The Portland Fire and Connecticut Sun, two teams that both employ young, dynamic French point guards in Carla Leite and Leïla Lacan, are meeting for a Tuesday matinee game (11 a.m. ET, WNBA League Pass). Outside of that French connection, I don’t see any other obvious associations between the two teams.
Share your thoughts, musings and more in the comments.
