Sparks visit Sun with eyes on fourth straight win

The Los Angeles Sparks will look to extend their season-high winning streak to four games on Thursday night when they visit the struggling Connecticut Sun in Uncasville, Conn.

The Sparks (9-14) lost seven of nine games before beginning their current run of good fortune with a 92-88 victory over the Sun (3-19) on July 13.

Kelsey Plum scored 23 points in that game and Azura Stevens added 21 to go along with 11 rebounds as Los Angeles halted a 13-game losing streak against Connecticut.

Dearica Hamby followed up her 17-point performance in that game by scoring 26 and 24 points, respectively, as the Sparks recorded a home-and-home series sweep of Washington. She added 14 rebounds in Los Angeles' 93-86 win over the Mystics on Tuesday.

"Everybody's buying into the system right now, and we talked about it in the beginning of the year, then everyone's gonna eat," Hamby said.

While the Sparks are trending upward, the Sun are heading in the other direction. Connecticut has lost three in a row and 13 of its last 14 games to languish in the WNBA basement.

Sun rookie Saniya Rivers, however, has seen progress in the midst of a difficult campaign.

"The record doesn't matter, because I think we're really finding our identity, and everybody's tapping into their individual roles, and we're playing together, and we're having fun doing this," Rivers said, per the Stamford (Conn.) Advocate. "... We're giving all these teams a run for their money, like these teams aren't walking over us anymore.

"We're not losing by 20. We're not losing by 15 anymore. So, it's progress, and it's a rebuild year, and I just have all the confidence in the world that we're gonna turn this thing around and actually turn it into W's."

Leila Lacan stepped up while playing in just her fifth game of the season on July 15. The 21-year-old Frenchwoman scored 19 points on 8-of-13 shooting and added three steals off the bench in Connecticut's 85-77 setback to the Indiana Fever.

Sun star Bria Hartley erupted for a season-high 25 points in the July 13 loss to the Sparks and Rivers added 20.

--Field Level Media