By Charlie O. Mallonee

The Las Vegas Aces (14-20) knew the game on Sunday was their last game of the 2018 season. The Aces had been eliminated from the playoffs on Friday night in Dallas. They hoped to put on a good show for the crowd in their finale and keep the Atlanta Dream from earning a double bye in the first round of the playoffs.

The Aces did put on a good show for the fans–at least for three quarters–but they came up short on their plan to beat the Dream. Atlanta (23-11) beat Las Vegas 93-78 handing the Aces their 20th loss of the season.

The Dream held just a 64-62 lead at the end of three quarters. It looked like the Aces were well positioned to make a run to win the game in the final quarter, but it was not meant to be. Atlanta outscored Las Vegas 29-16 in the final period and ran away with the game. When the final buzzer sounded, the Dream had won the game 93-78 and earned a double bye to escape the single elimination games in the playoffs.

“Games like this are always tough,” said Aces head coach Bill Laimbeer in his postgame comments. “You get eliminated from the playoffs and have to go out there and find the motivation to keep working. We are professional basketball players, so I told the team before that we are going to play a lot of people tonight.  I want to compete – to win the game – and for the most part, I think we did for a half. We came out in the 3rdquarter and you could see we just didn’t have it anymore, mentally, they didn’t put forth the effort to win the game. [Atlanta] needed it badly, they did the job, they got the win.  I told [the team] after the game – be proud of this year, it was a great year for the Las Vegas Aces. We launched a franchise.  We competed and showed who we were – individually and collectively – and our franchise and our fans got to come out and enjoy a great product and a great sport, and MGM did a wonderful job launching this franchise. So, I told them to be proud of themselves.  Yeah, we didn’t make the playoffs, but we are really looking forward to next year.”

Aces Postgame Notes

• A’ja Wilson put up 21 points to score in double figures for the 33rd time to start her career. She also scored 20-plus points for the 18th time in 2018.
• Dearica Hamby–14 points–posted double figures for the 12th time this season.
• Kelsey Bone scored nine points, which was one off of her season-highs.
• The Las Vegas Aces won six more games (14 to 8) this season than they did as the San Antonio Stars in 2017.

Atlanta Postgame Notes

• The Dream finished the season with a franchise record 23 regular season wins.
• Elizabeth Williams led the Dream in scoring with 20 points–her 14th double-digit scoring game of the season.
• Renee Montgomery posted 16 points and dished out a season-high nine assists on Sunday.
• Atlanta’s record is now 16-3 when they score 80-plus points in a game.
• The Dream swept the season series with the Aces.