History to Watch For: 2024 Atlanta Dream
With the WNBA Draft in the rearview and training camps officially tipping off tomorrow, the 2024 WNBA season is just over two weeks away.
In the meantime, let’s break down some potential history in sight for each of the league’s franchises. Today, it’s an overview of some of the records in reach for the Atlanta Dream.
Rhyne Howard
When you talk about the Atlanta Dream’s future, it has to start with Rhyne Howard.
Last season, she flew past 150 career three-pointers, hitting the mark in just her second season. Specifically, she made her 150th three-pointer in just her 57th WNBA regular season game, the best mark in league history.
| Player | Games to 150 3PM |
|---|---|
| Rhyne Howard | 57 |
| Katie Smith | 65 |
| Cynthia Cooper-Dyke | 66 |
| Tamika Catchings | 66 |
| Kelsey Mitchell | 69 |
In terms of age, only Lauren Jackson got to 150 earlier (just barely), making her 150th at 23 years and 58 days, compared to Rhyne’s 23 years and 87 days. Of course, Jackson started her WNBA career at 20 years old, while Rhyne was 22 years old in her first game.
If nothing about the Dream or Rhyne’s game drastically changes, it should be expected she’ll get to 200 made threes within the first 5-10 games of the 2024 season (entering the season with 184 in her career so far).
To also claim the title as fastest to 200 made threes, she’ll need to make at least 16 total in her next seven games. That would best the mark Katie Smith set and has held on to for over 20 years.
| Player | Games to 200 3PM | Date of 200th 3PM |
|---|---|---|
| Katie Smith | 81 | July 18, 2001 |
| Sabrina Ionescu | 86 | July 19, 2023 |
| Kelsey Mitchell | 88 | September 8, 2020 |
| Diana Taurasi | 92 | July 27, 2006 |
| Arike Ogunbowale | 92 | May 19, 2022 |
Looking at the trajectory of cumulative made threes for both Howard and Smith on their way to 200 total, the hot streaks and flat stretches stick out.
Smith had a record run of 23 made threes over her first five games in her second season (career games 31 to 35) and then another fun run of 16 made threes in three games toward the end of the push to 200 total. Howard’s career has been a bit more consistent, but her 32 made threes over 8 games from career game 49 to 56 added a ton of separation.
Another record chase for Rhyne? In 2023, she scored her 1,000th regular season point in the WNBA, getting there in just her 59th game, an Atlanta Dream franchise record. She’s now 767 points from 2,000, so we’re likely looking toward the end of the season at the earliest for her to reach that mark, but scoring 750+ in a season is more and more common.
It’ll be a tough challenge to be fastest Dream player to 2,000 points. The record currently belongs to Angel McCoughtry (108 games), so Howard would have to score 767+ in just 34 games (22.6 per game) to do better.
Since about the 60-game mark, Howard and McCoughtry’s career trajectory have been nearly identical. In fact, after 73 games, Howard has scored 1,233 points. At that same point in her career, McCoughtry had 1,227.
Tina Charles
As subjective as greatness is, while you can quibble about greatest WNBA players to never win a title, the greatest player to never even play a WNBA Finals game is probably unequivocally Tina Charles.
Assuming she suits up as a regular part of this Dream squad, she’ll pretty quickly top the charts of players without Finals appearances in terms of regular season games played (Michelle Snow had 402, Charles has 391) and regular season wins (Leilani Mitchell had 195, Charles has 191).
She is already by far the category’s leader in regular season points scored with 7,115. Next closest is Chamique Holdsclaw, who scored 4,716 points.
The Dream are in an interesting spot in their rebuild where they are coming off a postseason appearance but have shaken up the roster enough to destroy any predictability about their 2024 outlook, so who knows if this is the season that will land Charles in the WNBA Finals? If she plays consistently though, she’ll likely make some major marks in the regular season record books.
First of all, just one game with the Dream will make her just the second No. 1 WNBA Draft pick to play for six different franchises. Lindsey Harding (Lynx, Mystics, Dream, Sparks, Liberty, and Mercury) did it first, and Charles currently sits at five (Sun, Liberty, Mystics, Mercury, and Storm).
Charles is already 4th in total points, needing just 266 to pass Tamika Catchings and 374 to pass Tina Thompson.
| Player | Regular Season PTS |
|---|---|
| Diana Taurasi | 10,108 |
| Tina Thompson | 7,488 |
| Tamika Catchings | 7,380 |
| Tina Charles | 7,115 |
374 points over a 40-game season is about 9.4 per game, more than 5 per game less than what she averaged in her last season in the WNBA (2022), also a career low.
In terms of rebounds, she enters the season with 3,640 in her career, needing 360 to join Sylvia Fowles as the second player in league history with 4,000+ in regular season history. She would then need just 7 more to pass Fowles (4,006) outright.
Getting to 4,000 this year would require at least nine rebounds per game, right around Charles’ career average but significantly above her 2022 average of 7.3. Without knowing her potential role on this team, it’s hard to see that record being in reach in 2024.
Again, depending on game-to-game role, one of Fowles’ records that could be breakable this year is her career double-doubles. Charles enters the year with 173, 20 behind Fowles’ 193. Charles hasn’t had 20 double-doubles since the 2016 season and most of her double-doubles came very early in her career, but a 40-game season at least provides more opportunities.
Tanisha Wright
In her third year as head coach in the WNBA, Tanisha Wright will look to get the Dream back to postseason winning.
This year she reunites with former New York Liberty teammate Tina Charles, hoping some retooled depth can get the franchise back to the top third of the league.
15 games will move her past Nicki Collen (90) up to third in Dream history in regular season games coached, and a full season would put her alongside Marynell Meadors and Michael Cooper as just the third in franchise history to coach 100+ regular season games.
| Coach | Dream Games | Dream Wins |
|---|---|---|
| Marynell Meadors | 160 | 73 |
| Michael Cooper | 136 | 63 |
| Nicki Collen | 90 | 38 |
| Tanisha Wright | 76 | 33 |
In terms of wins, Wright enters the season with 33, needing just six to pass Collen (38). With a record-breaking season, she could reach Cooper’s mark of 63 wins. Passing Meadors’ mark of 73 will come in to play next year.
Playoff Dreams
The Dream made significant progress last year, ending their four-year run without a postseason appearance, and certainly on their mind this year is getting there and winning.
The last time the Dream won in the WNBA Playoffs was 2018, when a strong 23-11 regular season finish earned them a double-bye to the semifinals, where they pushed the Washington Mystics to five games but fell 2-3.
That ended up being Angel McCoughtry’s last full season with the franchise, and if not for an injury that ended her season early, the WNBA Finals could have looked very different.
The Dream are nearing six years without a postseason win, second only to what will be the Indiana Fever’s nine years (since Game 4 of the 2015 WNBA Finals on October 11, 2015).
| Team | Last postseason win | Finish |
|---|---|---|
| Indiana Fever | October 11, 2015 | Finals |
| Atlanta Dream | August 31, 2018 | Semifinals |
| Los Angeles Sparks | September 15, 2019 | Semifinals |
| Washington Mystics | October 10, 2019 | Championship |
| Phoenix Mercury | October 13, 2021 | Finals |
Ending that drought this year would land it about eighth on the all-time list, right around the same length as the Seattle Storm’s winless postseason run from September 30, 2012, until August 26, 2018. If there’s any reason to reminisce on the 2018 Dream and aim to mirror that Storm run, well, it’s that the Storm went on to win the WNBA Finals that very year.
Every donation helps!
Can you spare a dollar a month? Even a one-time donation goes a long way!
The support for Across the Timeline has been incredible and so appreciated. If you want to help keep acrossthetimeline.com and this newsletter free, every one-time and monthly donation helps. Click/tap here to support.
And of course, please share with anyone who may be interested and/or able to help.
acrossthetimeline.com
@WBBTimeline
Support/Donate