The Seattle Storm hope the All-Star break doesn’t dent the defensive momentum they have created.

Seattle (14-9) is seeking another stellar defensive effort when it hosts the Dallas Wings (6-17) on Tuesday night.

Before the All-Star break began, the Storm put together their top defensive effort of the season in last Wednesday’s 67-58 home win over the Golden State Valkyries.

The 58 points allowed is a season-best for Seattle. The Storm limited Golden State to 31.7 percent from the field, including 7-of-31 from 3-point range.

The defensive wizardry was necessary as neither team scored 20 points in any quarter. Seattle shot 32.8 percent overall and misfired on 22-of-29 attempts from behind the arc.

“The offense will be what it will be,” Storm guard Erica Wheeler said after the game. “As long as we play lockdown defense, we’ll be fine. That’s what we did, and we also made shots at the right time.”

Seattle has split its last four games after winning nine of its previous 12.

The Storm had three players in Saturday’s All-Star Game, including Skylar Diggins, who recorded the first triple-double in All-Star history with 11 points, 11 rebounds and an All-Star Game record 15 assists as her Team Collier side beat Team Clark 151-131. Diggins leads Seattle in scoring (17.5) and assists (5.8).

Seattle’s Nneka Ogwumike contributed 16 points on 7-of-8 shooting and grabbed seven rebounds for Team Collier and Gabby Williams had 16 points and five rebounds for Team Clark.

Dallas rookie Paige Bueckers played for Team Collier and registered six points and eight assists.

Bueckers, the No. 1 overall draft pick, has stood out for Dallas and leads the team in scoring (18.4), assists (5.5) and steals (1.7).

However, the Wings haven’t progressed as a team and have lost four straight by an average of 16 points entering the contest in Seattle. Dallas is also 2-10 on the road.

Dallas resides in 12th place in the 13-team league, but first-year coach Chris Koclanes maintains that an in-season turnaround is possible.

“There’s a bigger picture here and if we continue to build good habits, positive habits, and stay together, we’ll get this thing to where we want to get it,” Koclanes said, according to the Dallas Morning News.

The Storm beat the Wings twice earlier this season. Ogwumike fell two boards shy of her career high when she had 23 points and 18 rebounds in a 79-71 road win on May 19. Bueckers was out with a concussion when Dallas lost 83-77 at Seattle on June 3.

–Field Level Media

The New York Liberty made two additions to the roster Monday, reportedly receiving commitment from two-time WNBA All-Star Emma Meesseman and signing veteran forward Stephanie Talbot.

When Belgium native Meesseman is able to join the team will reportedly depend on the visa application process, per ESPN.

The 6-foot-4 forward last played in the WNBA in 2022 for the Chicago Sky, averaging 12.4 points, 5.6 rebounds and 3.8 assists in 36 starts.

Prior to that, she played seven seasons with the Washington Mystics, garnering Finals MVP honors while guiding the team to the 2019 championship. She has career averages of 11.5 points, 5.3 boards and 2.6 assists in 238 games (186 starts).

Meesseman, 32, competed in EuroBasket with Belgium this summer and has a bevy of international experience, including two EuroBasket MVP awards and three straight EuroLeague MVP honors.

Talbot, 31, was waived last week by the first-year Golden State Valkyries.

The Mercury selected the 6-foot-2 Australia native in the third round of the 2014 WNBA Draft, but she did not play stateside until the 2017 season, her first of two with Phoenix. She later played with the Minnesota Lynx (2019), Seattle Storm (2021-22) and Los Angeles Sparks (2024).

The Sparks left her unprotected in the expansion draft, and she was selected by the Valkyries.

In 16 games (10 starts) with Golden State, Talbot averaged 3.6 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.0 assists over 16.8 minutes per game.

In 215 WNBA games (72 starts), she has averages of 4.5 points, 2.7 rebounds and 1.6 assists. She is a career 35.2 percent shooter from long range.

She played under current Liberty coach Sandy Brondello when Brondello coached the Mercury as well as with the Australian national team.

–Field Level Media

The Atlanta Dream begin the second half of the season with three straight road games starting on Tuesday night against the Las Vegas Aces.

It’s the first matchup of the season between two teams hoping to make a strong push for the playoffs.

Atlanta (13-9) overwhelmed the short-handed Chicago Sky before the break with an 86-49 victory last Wednesday, but that win followed a run of inconsistent play for the Dream with five losses in their previous seven games.

“It’s been a little uneven, meaning there are some times where we play at a level that’s right at the top of the league,” Atlanta coach Karl Smesko said. “And then there’s other times where we just kind of lose focus and just kind of lose our principles of how we’re supposed to play.”

Tuesday is the first night of a back-to-back for the Dream with a Wednesday night visit to the Phoenix Mercury.

Making matters worse for Atlanta is the absence of star Rhyne Howard, who injured her knee in a loss to the Indiana Fever on July 11.

Howard is not set to return until August, which puts Atlanta at a disadvantage against Las Vegas (11-11) and superstar A’ja Wilson.

The three-time MVP leads the Aces in points, rebounds, steals and blocks per game, including 37 points and 10 rebounds in a 90-86 victory over the Dallas Wings last Wednesday.

The Aces’ .500 record would indicate that the team needs more than Wilson to get back near the top of the league.

“She cares about winning and the winning hasn’t come enough. She’d pretty much trade any of those numbers for more wins,” Las Vegas coach Becky Hammon said of Wilson. “It takes a full team and typically as great as A’ja is, our team goes as our guards go. There’s three of them. There’s only one of her.”

Offseason acquisition Jewell Loyd was expected to replace former Aces and current Los Angeles Sparks star Kelsey Plum, but the six-time All-Star is averaging 11.2 points per game on 38.2-percent shooting this season. That’s the lowest scoring average for Loyd since her 2015 rookie season.

–Field Level Media

The Los Angeles Sparks found the right kind of rhythm prior to the short WNBA All-Star break, and they will be looking to maintain that when they visit the Washington Mystics on Tuesday.

It will be a rematch of the most recent game for each team. The Sparks blew out visiting Washington 99-80 last Tuesday in the final game for the teams before the hiatus. Three Los Angeles players reached the 20-point mark in the game, led by Dearica Hamby’s 26.

“I think we’re starting to figure it out, and being healthy helps,” Sparks coach Lynne Roberts said.

Mystics coach Sydney Johnson said he saw room for improvement from his club.

“They exposed a little bit of our weaknesses,” Johnson said. “There are some things I can help our players with to help us play better.”

Defensive breakdowns in the first meeting will need to be addressed, Johnson said. The Mystics (11-11) will aim to get back on track after their three-game winning streak was snapped in Los Angeles.

“They’re a great frontcourt, versatile,” said forward-center Shakira Austin, who led Washington with 16 points against the Sparks. “They were a little more physical. We have to stop being the less physical team.”

The Sparks (8-14) are bracing for a different approach from the Mystics.

“They’re going to come at us differently,” said Kelsey Plum, who leads the Sparks in scoring with 20.1 points per game. “We know that, so just be prepared for that.”

The Sparks are still adjusting under Roberts. She is in her first season on the Los Angeles bench after being hired to replace the fired Curt Miller.

“It’s just time together and in the system and it takes a minute,” Roberts said. “We just got to keep our foot on the gas as a group.”

A key contributor for Los Angeles has been Julie Allemand, who dished out 10 assists last week against Washington. The Sparks were plus-22 with Allemand on the court, even though she scored only three points in 32 minutes.

“That’s hard to do,” Roberts said of the plus-minus ratio. “Her value cannot be unstated.”

Brittney Sykes is Washington’s top scorer at 17.1 points per game, and she was added as an injury replacement for the All-Star Game. Rookie teammates Sonia Citron and Kiki Iriafen also represented the Mystics at the All-Star Game.

“They’re checking a lot of boxes,” Johnson said of his team. “They’re working. They’re getting better. There’s humility.”

Mystics guard Sug Sutton said the first half of the season was a stretch of getting to know each other.

“We still have another 22 games,” Sutton said. “I think we’ve been doing good, holding each other accountable.”

–Field Level Media

One Eastern Conference team is getting healthier after the WNBA All-Star break, and it isn’t the Indiana Fever.

While Indiana expects Caitlin Clark to miss Tuesday’s game, the New York Liberty should have former league MVP Jonquel Jones back in the fold when they host the Fever.

Jones has missed nine games for New York (15-6) since aggravating a right ankle injury on June 19. The Liberty missed the 6-foot-6 center and her averages of 12.1 points and 9.6 rebounds per game.

They initially struggled, losing the game Jones was hurt in and four of the next six after that. But the Liberty pulled out three straight wins entering the All-Star break, capped by a 98-77 home win over the Clark-less Fever last Wednesday.

“I think we were losing some of those games ourselves. We were just not coming out with the right energy, we were not playing Liberty basketball,” Sabrina Ionescu said last week. “There was kind of just this realization of, if we just kind of settle in to doing that, we’re in a really good spot. Obviously (coach) Sandy (Brondello) continued to keep us together, which in a time like that can make or break teams.”

Breanna Stewart racked up 24 points, 11 rebounds, seven assists and four blocks against Indiana. She paces the Liberty with 19.7 points per game.

The Fever (12-11) got 16 points from Kelsey Mitchell and 12 from Sophie Cunningham in that game, but they allowed New York to shoot 57.8 percent from the field and 51.9 percent from 3-point range. The Liberty lead the season series 2-1 entering their final meeting Tuesday.

“The mood of the team is OK,” Fever guard Aari McDonald said after that game. “We were talking before the game and we’re just like, ‘We’re all we got, so we have to stick together.'”

Clark has averaged 16.5 points, 8.8 assists and 5.0 rebounds in her second pro season, but she played in just 13 of the Fever’s 23 regular-season games before the break due to quadriceps and groin injuries. The team said Clark will get other opinions on her latest tweak, a right groin injury, but coach Stephanie White said she is progressing.

Clark missed the WNBA 3-point Contest and All-Star Game in Indianapolis over the weekend. Napheesa Collier (Minnesota Lynx) scored 36 points to lead Team Collier over Team Clark 151-131.

Meanwhile, Ionescu and Liberty teammate Natasha Cloud swept the 3-point contest and skills competition.

–Field Level Media