<\/p>\n
Phoenix Mercury guard Kelsey Plum shoots a free throw against the Washington Mystics in the second half at Mortgage Matchup Center on Aug. 25, 2026<\/p>\n
Rick Scuteri, Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Mercury general manager Nick U’Ren has been adamant that Plum is part of his vision for the team if she signs\u00a0with Phoenix in the offseason.<\/p>\n
Plum has had an uncharacteristic season, with injuries shortening it to 17 games. In her five games with\u00a0the Mercury, she averaged 15.8 points and 2.8 assists.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Everyone has been playing a lot of\u00a0basketball\u00a0and I got some catching up to do,” Plum said. “I’ve\u00a0been working\u00a0really hard\u00a0to get ready for this\u00a0moment,\u00a0so if anything,\u00a0I’m\u00a0just going to enjoy it.\u00a0It’s\u00a0been a tough season, but\u00a0it’s\u00a0been a blessing to be able to play and\u00a0to play\u00a0here.”<\/p>\n
The remaining six games on the Mercury’s schedule serve as an individual season for Plum, who is still learning the Mercury’s system with Thomas and Kahleah Copper.<\/p>\n
The rotation was once again updated after DeWanna Bonner took a contract buyout on Monday. The Mercury\u00a0returned to\u00a0starting\u00a0Natasha Mack at center, a position she’s started\u00a020\u00a0games\u00a0previously.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mack\u00a0looked like the player she was before being injured in\u00a0late June, being “everywhere all the time,” and was limiting second-chance shots and finding open shots\u00a0against a big and physical Mystics’\u00a0frontcourt.<\/p>\n
“The last couple of games, I’ve been off, so I decided, what the hell,” Mack said. “I might as well do what I can and hope for the best.”<\/p>\n
Mack reached a career-high 19 points, matching Copper as the Mercury’s top scorer.\u00a0Her nine field goals and three blocked shots led the team.<\/p>\n
“Her conditioning was really good,” Tibbetts said. “The touch around the basket was great. I’m really happy for her that she came out and performed the way she did tonight against a really good team.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Phoenix Mercury guard Kelsey Plum shoots a free throw against the Washington Mystics in the second half at…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1025634,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[49],"tags":[5610,9338,1502,62,67,132,68,1514,232,16966],"class_list":["post-1025633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-kelsey-plum","tag-national-football-league","tag-phoenix-mercury","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-washington-mystics","tag-wnba","tag-women"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117162875931723904","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1025633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1025633"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1025633\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1025634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1025633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1025633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1025633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}