Sun rise

And that’s all, folks. The 2025 Connecticut Sun season ended not with a bang, but with a whimper followed by a small bang followed by a whimper, as they fell to red-hot Atlanta 85-70 Wednesday night at Mohegan Sun Arena. I’m sad it’s over, but obviously not nearly as sad as I’ve been in past seasons, which have usually ended sometime in October deep in the playoffs. Make no mistake, although it looked worse a month ago, the Sun were a bad basketball team this season, finishing with a record of 11-33 that the analytics say could have been worse without a little fortune. It also stinks that the Sun had to finish the season without what should be their MVP, rookie Leila Lacan, and her loss was felt deeply, although it was a long, long season for Lacan in France through the WNBA games. It also should be remembered that Olivia Nelson-Ododa has had the most win shares (trust the analytics) for the Sun all season long, and maybe the analytics are onto something because the team looked muc...

  End of the line. It comes with mixed emotions, this was an extremely trying season at times, especially when you’re used to long playoff runs every season. We were told what was coming, we saw the entire 2024 team depart for greener practice facilities and pastures, but until the team took the floor, it was hard to picture what losing so many games would look like. But it could have been worse, much worse, and looked like it was going to be one of the worst seasons in WNBA history when the Sun were 2-16 in mid-July and you could argue that both victories up to that point were a fluke. The Sun will get at least one more season at Mohegan Sun Arena, it appears However, then Leila Lacan’s arrival breathed some life into the operation, and fellow rookies Saniya Rivers and Aneesah Morrow also stepped up their games, first making the team watchable and then winning, like more than once. There was a moment there where the Sun was among the hottest teams in the WNBA, and that looked so u...

It took a while, but Monday’s game in Atlanta kind of ended how we thought it would, an 87-64 Dream blowout, although it was much closer at halftime and for most of the third quarter. But there was never a point in the game where I was supremely confident Connecticut was going to win this contest, even as Saniya Rivers looked as confident as she ever has on the offensive end in the first half. We’ve seen this movie too many times, at least on this occasion the Sun had some excuses, playing without Leila Lacan and Olivia Nelson-Ododa (as well as Bria Hartley), and it was encouraging to see some fight in the first half, even if the fact they were in the game seemed mostly due to Atlanta missing fairly easy shots more than anything the Sun did terribly well, although they get some credit for defensive intensity in the second quarter. The script, however, was eventually the same as we’ve seen in perhaps a dozen road games this season: Marina Mabrey missing shots and not helping the Sun on ...

We’ve reached the point of the season where everyone is looking to the playoffs, there are some seeds still to be set, but for teams out of the running, it’s time to begin to look around and see who is going and who is staying for 2026. Luckily, the Sun - despite some of the chaos far away from the court - should be one of the more stable teams compared to this year going forward. Unless there are dramatic changes in the new Collective Bargaining Agreement (and we hope there is one so there’s no delay to next season) and/or how players are protected for expansion, Connecticut’s young core of Aneesah Morrow, Saniya Rivers, Leila Lacan, Olivia Nelson-Ododa, and Aaliyah Edwards should be intact. Who is with them will be an open question. And we’re pretty sure the 2026 season will take place at Mohegan Sun Arena as the saga of the sale and relocation of the franchise may take a back seat as the league tries to prevent disaster and pick up what should be sizable financial gain for everyone ...

I asked in the preview to Saturday’s game what the Connecticut Sun had left in 2025 and whether - with three games left against possible WNBA title contenders - they might just go gentle into that good night for the season. But they most decidedly did not, instead hanging a potentially damaging 87-84 loss to Phoenix in front of another big Mohegan Sun Arena crowd. From the opening tip, Sun players were flying everywhere, Tina Charles was emptying whatever tank she had left (and trash talking Alyssa Thomas in the process), and our enjoyable Sun team we’ve seen in the second half of the season was back, even with Bria Hartley and Olivia Nelson-Ododa still on the sidelines. I’ve gone back and forth on Rachid Meziane this season, the Sun - particularly on the defensive end - have had several outings where they didn’t look prepared and have given up more layups that anyone else in the WNBA. However, Saturday, the Sun looked prepared more than most for what Alyssa Thomas was going to bring,...

Well, what do you have left, Connecticut Sun ? The Sun looked like they have one part of their collective brains on vacation on Wednesday in a listless loss to Chicago and now face three games against teams fighting for the No. 2 seed in the WNBA playoffs, which suggests that things might get worse before they get better at the end of a trying season for Connecticut. The answers in the postgame didn’t exactly instill confidence that the Sun have just about turned the page from 2025 already, and - in the situation they’re in - there’s always some forces pulling you that way, but it’s still disappointing as a loyal fan. Alyssa Thomas and DeWanna Bonner both return to Mohegan Sun Arena Saturday afternoon with the Mercury (Marcus Stevens/ Slam) But we’ve always had hope here, and we might as well have it until the end of the season. I personally feel bad, once the summer ends and school starts, it’s very hard for me to get to Mohegan Sun Arena. I was hoping this would be my last game, but...