Dream aim to regain form against lowly Mercury

The Atlanta Dream showed how good they can be by putting together a seven-game winning streak.

It doesn't have to be back to the drawing board after a couple of defeats, but the Dream will want to take advantage of a chance to get on track again when the Phoenix Mercury visit for Tuesday night's game at College Park, Ga.

The Dream (12-10) lost both ends of a home-and-home with the Connecticut Sun, with Saturday's 86-78 loss the most-recent game.

"We got to move on because our next stretch is really tough for us," Dream coach Tanisha Wright said. "We got to get ready for that."

Still, playing in front of seven sellout home crowds has given the Dream energy. The listed attendance for Saturday's loss at the Gateway Center Arena was 3,209.

That's something the team hopes is repeated Tuesday night.

Atlanta will look for additional boost from Aari McDonald, who has played two games since returning from an injury. She scored 14 points off the bench Saturday.

"I'm happy I'm able to be back and join the team and just contribute with what I can," she said. "Offensively, we didn't have the movement that we needed."

The Mercury (6-16) had their only two-game winning streak of the season until losing 84-69 on Sunday at Washington.

Mercury interim coach Nikki Blue is trying to build a positive culture and that seems to be working.

"Just always being positive, believing in us," Phoenix center Brittney Griner said. "She's making sure we know that she believes in us."

Griner's 18.3 points per game and 6.6 rebounds are tops for Phoenix. Blue said it's going to be important for the Mercury to make sure the spacing is good when Griner is double-teamed.

The Mercury encountered some offensive snags in the Washington game, but guard Sophie Cunningham said the key might be displaying more awareness at the defensive end to keep top scorers from big outings.

"It's more defensively," Cunningham said. "I do think we have stuff to work on offensively."

This game marks the second stop of a four-game road swing for the Mercury.

This is the first of three meetings this season between the Mercury and Dream. They'll meet twice next month.