Ariel Atkins scored 17, and Aerial Powers added 18 off the bench, but it wasn’t enough for them to overcome the absence of their leading scorer in an 81-76 loss to the Dream on Friday night.
Both the Mystics and Dream were missing their best players (Elena Delle Donne, day to day with a bone bruise, and Angel McCoughtry, out for the playoffs with torn knee ligaments). Both have “secondary” stars in Kristi Toliver and Tiffany Hayes. But the Dream have a clear identity as a defensive juggernaugt that works with or without McCoughtry, while it’s not clear who the Mystics are without Delle Donne.