Alyssa Thomas, Sun take aim at struggling Mercury

A potential first-round playoff preview will take place Friday when the Phoenix Mercury play host to the Connecticut Sun.

Both teams already have qualified for the playoffs and would face each other in the opening round if the Mercury remain at No. 7 in the overall final standings, while the Sun move up one spot from No. 3 to No. 2. They are a game behind the second-place Minnesota Lynx.

Each side has four games remaining in their regular-season schedule, with the Sun playing host to the Lynx on Tuesday. The regular season ends next Thursday with the playoffs set to begin Sept. 22.

Since clinching a playoff spot on Aug. 24, the Sun (26-10) have wobbled to a 4-3 record and will enter Friday's game off an 86-66 victory on the road against the Los Angeles Sparks on Tuesday.

Alyssa Thomas scored seven points with 11 rebounds and 12 assists, falling just short of two triple-doubles in three days against the Sparks. She did set the franchise record for made field goals and now has 1,485. She also set the franchise record for career steals with 491.

"She's as versatile a player as we've seen in the league with what she is able to do," Sun head coach Stephanie White said, according to the Hartford Courant. "... She's got a lot of records that she can continue to break and a lot of milestones that she'll set the standard for."

Marina Mabrey scored 26 team-high points for Connecticut off the bench.

The Mercury (17-19) claimed their playoff spot on Sept. 3, when they earned a 74-66 victory at home over the Atlanta Dream. They have lost both of their games since and have dropped five of six overall.

Phoenix fell 90-66 at Seattle on Saturday after dropping a 90-77 decision to the Washington Mystics Sept. 5.

Mercury veteran Diana Taurasi scored 18 points Saturday, just above her average of 15.1 per game, and added five rebounds with four assists. Team leading scorer Kahleah Copper, at 21.6 points per game, added 11.

"We got to decide as a group what we want to get done here to finish," Mercury head coach Nate Tibbetts said. "We have been extremely poor, there's no ducking that. We hold ourselves to a higher standard, and we've been bad."

--Field Level Media