Allisha Gray scored a game-high 27 points on Saturday afternoon, helping lead the Atlanta Dream to an 83-75 victory over the visiting Dallas Wings in College Park, Ga.
Brittney Griner added 15 points and eight rebounds for Atlanta (2-2), while Brionna Jones compiled 11 points and 15 boards. Rhyne Howard chipped in with nine points, 10 assists and seven rebounds for the Dream, who have won two of their last three games.
NaLyssa Smith led Dallas (0-4) with 13 points, followed by Maddy Siegrist’s 12 and Paige Bueckers’ 11. Teaira McCowan and Tyasha Harris each added 10 points for the Wings, who remain the Western Conference’s last winless team.
After taking a seven-point lead at halftime, Atlanta’s margin ballooned to 13 after Jones’ three-point play and layup gave the Dream a 48-35 advantage with 6:24 left in the third — forcing a Wings’ timeout.
Nia Coffey’s 3-pointer later extended Atlanta’s commanding lead to 59-39, before Arike Ogunbowale’s jumper and Siegrist’s layup pulled Dallas’ deficit to 15 with less than two minutes left in the third.
After Gray’s triple was answered with Ogunbowale’s mid-range jumper, the Dream grabbed a 68-50 lead entering the final quarter. Dallas opened the fourth on a 11-0 run, stamped with Siegrist’s layup at the 6:29 mark.
Gray’s basket with 5:35 to go took the lid off the basket for Atlanta before five straight Dallas points cut the Wings’ deficit to five. Kaila Charles’ layup trimmed the gap to eight with 2:11 left, but Howard knocked down three free throws to ice the win.
Dallas took an 18-17 lead into the second quarter despite shooting just 1-for-6 on its 3-point attempts. From there, neither team took a lead larger than four until the 3:06 mark, when Griner’s layup gave Atlanta a 30-26 edge.
After Myisha Hines-Allen’s first basket cut the Dream’s lead to two, Maya Caldwell’s triple and Gray’s free throws gave Atlanta a 37-30 halftime-lead. Gray led all scorers with 11 first-quarter points as the two sides combined to shoot 5-for-22 from 3-point range.
–Field Level Media
