Road showdown

The Sun and Mystics are close to tip-off here in Washington. The Sun have a lot to play for, as they sit 1.5 games back of Indiana for second in the East, but Washington has even more at stake.

Though the Mystics (14-17) have the inside track on the fourth and final seed for the playoffs, they don’t have much room for error with New York (13-17) and even Chicago (12-19) still a quick win streak – and a Washington slip-up – away from stealing the berth.

Some quick notes on the Sun, the game and more:
(1) Expect Katie Douglas to draw the assignment of Alana Beard. Douglas did a good job on Beard during the first half of the teams’ last game, holding her to four points, but Beard then ran wild, both on Douglas and the rest of the Sun defense, when she scored 11 straight at one point to finish with 20.

Like any good scorer, Beard is best contained when she doesn’t have the ball. The Sun will most likely play some form of man-to-man or at times, a match-up zone defense, meaning Douglas will be shooting to do three things: deny, deny and, well, deny.

(2) The Verizon Center, the Mystics’ home court, has something few if any arenas can boast: Because it sits in Washington’s Chinatown, the arena has both a ‘Verizon’ sign spelled in English and Chinese. The Chinese lettering, however, is in big, bright fluorescent lights – making it much more noticeable than the English version.

(3) With the extra travel today and the limited Internet access at the hotel, the weekly ‘Huskies Update’ that appears in this blog will be posted tomorrow. You wait with bated breath, I know.