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The IX Basketball<\/a>: A basketball newsroom brought to you by The IX Sports<\/a>. 24\/7\/365 women\u2019s basketball coverage, written, edited and photographed by our young, diverse staff and dedicated to breaking news, analysis, historical deep dives and projections about the game we love.<\/p>\n
Howard never shied from the moment. She and Allisha Gray<\/a> shouldered the load, each scoring 20 points to spark No. 3 seed Dream to an 80-68 win against a physical, short-handed No. 6 Fever squad. Howard also added six rebounds, two assists and a steal while Naz Hillmon<\/a> nearly contributed a double-double outing with 16 points and nine rebounds in the victory.<\/p>\n Inside a sold-out Gateway Center Arena, the game swung like a pendulum for three quarters. Seven ties. Three lead changes. The Dream couldn\u2019t shake the Fever until the final nine minutes of the contest. The Fever struck first, closing the opening quarter with a three-point lead that quieted the home crowd. Atlanta responded in the second, cranking up its defense and outscoring Indiana 22-12 to build a seven-point cushion at halftime. Still, nothing felt secure.<\/p>\n Kelsey Mitchell<\/a> and Lexie Hull<\/a> made sure of that. The Fever guards combined for 18 points in the third, including a blistering 7-0 run out of the break that cut into Atlanta\u2019s edge. By the end of the quarter, the Dream\u2019s lead had shrunk again. That\u2019s when Howard and Hillmon took over, pouring in 16 of Atlanta\u2019s 22 points in the fourth, creating separation and sealing the victory.<\/p>\n \u201cI just thought in the second quarter, we kind of settled in, and, you know, we forced a lot more tough shots [for the Fever], and we forced a few more turnovers,\u201d Smesko said postgame. \u201cWe really needed [it]. \u2026 I thought we kind of asserted ourselves in the second quarter and gave us a little bit of a lead going into the half. But, then we came out in the third quarter, and within a minute or two, all that lead that we built was gone just like that. This is a tough team. \u2026We\u2019re going to have to have to play really well to win another game in the series.\u201d<\/p>\n Gritty barely scratches the surface of what unfolded in Game 1. Bodies hit the hardwood throughout the afternoon as whistles echoed inside GCA. The two teams combined for 43 personal fouls \u2014 24 of them on Atlanta \u2014 in a contest that often looked more like war than a playoff opener.<\/p>\n Howard felt that physicality firsthand. Near the 8:00 mark of the second quarter, she collided with Fever\u2019s Lexie Hull and walked off the court \u2014 and eventually into the locker room \u2014 clutching her mouth. Minutes later, she was back, settling into the same rhythm that has defined her season.<\/p>\n Neither side shot the ball cleanly. Both finished under 40 percent from the field, and Atlanta\u2019s 7-of-22 showing from beyond the arc was hard-earned. Indiana came into Sunday\u2019s game only allowing 7.1 made threes per contest, the second fewest in the league. Still, Howard took advantage of looks she had from beyond the arc, drilling four triples.<\/p>\n Want even more women\u2019s sports in your inbox?<\/strong><\/p>\n Subscribe now to The IX Sports<\/a> and receive our daily women\u2019s sports newsletter covering soccer, tennis, basketball, golf, hockey and gymnastics from our incredible team of writers. That includes Basketball Wednesday from founder and editor Howard Megdal.<\/p>\n Readers of The IX Basketball now save 50% on their subscription to The IX.<\/p>\n Her 20-point night marked the 12th time this season she crossed that threshold, but the playoffs, she reminded afterward, are different. The fouls sting more. Every possession feels heavier. And if the Dream want to keep pushing forward toward a WNBA title, Howard knows they will have to embrace the grind.<\/p>\n \u201cWe know that the playoffs is a whole new ball game, way more physicality, less calls,\u201d Howard said postgame. \u201cObviously, that wasn\u2019t the case today, but just coming in with the mindset of wanting to punch first and knowing that it\u2019s going to be physical, knowing that you\u2019re going to be playing in a dog fight, I think that really helped us, even with the slow start.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe still were able to combat what they [Fever] were doing and making sure that we were able to get back on track and making sure that we were able to get ourselves back going.\u201d<\/p>\n Turnovers also plagued the Dream. They coughed it up 15 times \u2014 the same number as Indiana \u2014 and the Fever turned those mistakes into 20 points. Each missed opportunity by Atlanta kept Indiana within striking distance for a majority of the contest. Still, Smesko didn\u2019t flinch. Sitting between Rhyne Howard and Naz Hillmon in the postgame news conference, he expected some rough edges in the contest, especially when the intensity shifted from regular season to playoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think it was kind of what you might expect from a first game in the playoffs, like these people are kind of feeling each other out seeing where there\u2019s a weakness and trying to attack that weakness,\u201d Smesko said. \u201c\u2026 I really like our team. I think we have been playing really well going into the playoffs. I have a lot of confidence that if things don\u2019t start off well, that we can pull it together and make comebacks.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2026 This is a nice win, but you go into the next game, and the only thing that carries over is the win. \u2026 You got to win another one just to advance. So the big thing for us is understanding that the job is not done in this series, and there\u2019s things that we can do better.\u201d<\/p>\n Backed by Howard and Gray, and lifted by Hillmon and Brionna Jones \u2014 who chipped in 12 points as the Dream\u2019s fourth double-figure scorer \u2014 Atlanta earned more than just a win Sunday. The 80-68 victory was the franchise\u2019s first postseason triumph since Aug. 31, 2018, when the Dream defeated the Washington Mystics on the road in the semifinals.<\/p>\n For Howard, the perspective hit hard. Seven years ago, she was a freshman at Kentucky, dreaming of moments like this. Now, alongside Hillmon \u2014 her 2022 draft classmate \u2014 she helped deliver the Dream\u2019s breakthrough in front of their home crowd.<\/p>\n The Dream\u2019s youth was undeniable. Five players \u2014 Howard, Hillmon, Maya Caldwell<\/a>, and rookies Te-Hina Paopao and Sika Kon\u00e9<\/a> \u2014 had never been part of a playoff win until Sunday. Entering the postseason, Atlanta carried the third-least playoff experience of any team in the field. Only the expansion Golden State Valkyries and the Seattle Storm brought less postseason mileage into September.<\/p>\n But none of that mattered once the final buzzer sounded. The Dream had their taste of playoff success, and Howard made it clear afterward that one win won\u2019t be enough.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis is me and Naz [Hillmon\u2019s] first home game period in the playoffs,\u201d Howard said after Sunday\u2019s win. \u201cFor us to even have accomplished that much, to have homecourt advantage, we knew we had to make a good one. \u2026We are looking to continue to have more.\u201d<\/p>\n Howard and the Dream will seek to wrap up the best-of-three series when the Dream go on the road to face the Fever at 7:30 p.m. ET Tuesday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Howard knew this wasn\u2019t just another game. It was the start of a chase for the franchise\u2019s first…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":229040,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[121849,234,78349,1521,62,67,132,68,232],"class_list":{"0":"post-229039","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-2025-wnba-playoffs","9":"tag-indiana-fever","10":"tag-naz-hillmon","11":"tag-rhyne-howard","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us","16":"tag-wnba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115209048340894708","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229039","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=229039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229039\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/USATSI_27085123-1.jpg\")
Sep 14, 2025; College Park, Georgia, USA; Atlanta Dream forward Naz Hillmon (00) and forward Brionna Jones<\/a> (24) and guard Rhyne Howard (10) react after a basket against the Indiana Fever in the fourth quarter during game one of round one for the 2025 WNBA Playoffs at Gateway Center Arena at College Park. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-Imagn Images<\/p>\n