Playoff-bound Storm out to avoid letdown vs. lowly Sparks

Aiming to secure home-court advantage in the first round of the WNBA playoffs, the Seattle Storm begin their final three-game stretch of the regular season on Sunday against the visiting Los Angeles Sparks.

Seattle (23-14) sits in fifth, one game behind Las Vegas entering Sunday. The Storm and Aces are all but locked into facing each other in the opening round, but home court in the best-of-three series will be decided in the coming days.

Seattle and Las Vegas meet on Tuesday in the Storm's regular-season home finale. Seattle aims to carry a winning streak into the pivotal showdown, needing a win over last-place Los Angeles to extend its run to four straight.

The Storm escaped from Dallas with an 83-81 win on Friday when Skylar Diggins-Smith's late free throws ended a furious Wings rally. Dallas ripped off seven unanswered points to force a tie in the closing minute, but Diggins-Smith - who led the Storm with 21 points -- sank a pair of free throws with 17 seconds remaining.

The wild finish followed Seattle's own comeback from down 13 at halftime.

"We shouldn't need a pep talk from (coach Noelle Quinn)," Diggins-Smith told the Seattle Times. "We shouldn't need all these incentives to go out there and play ... like we know how to play."

The Storm's incentive is clear in this final stretch as they look to avoid a letdown against the struggling Sparks.

Los Angeles (7-30) lost its sixth in a row on Tuesday when it hosted Seattle in a 90-82 defeat. Rookie Rickea Jackson scored 22 points for her 14th game of 13-plus points in the last 15 outings, but the Storm limited Sparks leading scorer Dearica Hamby to just six points.

Hamby is scoring 16.9 points per game and grabbing 9.2 rebounds to lead the team in both categories. Jackson is scoring 13.1 points per game. The two have been constants for a team ravaged by injury all season.

Another potentially devastating injury loomed in the loss to the Storm when Odyssey Sims -- who is averaging 10.3 points and a team-leading 5.3 assists per game in 12 appearances -- sustained a shoulder injury.

Sims will be available for Sunday's game, part of a stretch that the Sparks are treating as their "playoffs."

"We don't have anything to lose, so what we control is our effort," Sims said. "That's more important because it trickles down. We're staying together. We have a young group, but you see glimpses of how good we can be."

--Field Level Media