The Sparks have lost five consecutive games, four coming since the team agreed to a contract divorce with center Liz Cambage last month.

At 12-19, the Sparks are in 10th place in the WNBA standings. And with five games remaining, their playoff chances are seemingly slipping away.

However, Sparks All-Star forward Nneka Ogwumike is staying positive.

“There’s still a chance,” Ogwumike said. “That’s the only thing we can reckon from all of this, there’s still a chance. Every game is an opportunity.”

The Sparks must win on the road against the Atlanta Dream (13-18) on Friday (4:30 p.m. PT, CBS Sports Network) to capitalize on that opportunity to stay in the playoff race.

The game against Atlanta will be the Sparks’ third game on a four-game East Coast trip that ends with a noon game at the Washington Mystics on Sunday.

The Sparks beat Atlanta 85-78 in Los Angeles on July 21, when Ogwumike scored a game-high 20 points. However, they lost to Atlanta 77-75 in May, so this is a must-win game. The Sparks need to earn the tiebreaker against the Dream by winning the season series 2-1.

To win, the Sparks must slow down WNBA All-Star and Rookie of the Year candidate Rhyne Howard, the former No. 1 overall pick who is coming off a team-high 20 points against the Indiana Fever on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the Sparks traveled cross-country on an overnight red-eye flight, landing in NYC early Monday morning and subsequently lost back-to-back games against the New York Liberty by scores of 102-73 on Tuesday and 64-61 on Wednesday.

In their three-point loss, the Sparks were up by as much as 20 points in the second quarter and 15 points in the third quarter but could not sustain the energy for all 40 minutes to contain Liberty All-Star guard Sabrina Ionescu, who scored a game-high 20 points, including a game-winning 3-pointer with 6.9 seconds to go.

Meanwhile, Ogwumike scored a team-high 19 points against the Liberty on Wednesday and passed Swin Cash for 20th on the WNBA all-time points list.

However, sister Chiney Ogwumike did not start due to a facial injury and guard Chennedy Carter did not play, per a coach’s decision, leaving the Sparks with an eight-person rotation that seemingly ran out of gas against the Liberty.

Rookie center Olivia Nelson-Ododa, a 2022 second-round pick of out UConn, flashed her potential in her first career start. The 6-foot-5 post player nearly finished with a double-double, racking up eight points and career bests of 10 rebounds and four blocks in a career-high 31 minutes.

Related Articles

“She’s growing up,” Sparks interim head coach Fred Williams said. “Every game she gets better and better.”

Meanwhile, Williams said with the balance between the sixth through 11th teams in the WNBA, if the Sparks can put together a winning streak before the end of the regular season, anything can happen.

“It’s still possible,” Williams said. “We’re still in the (playoff) hunt. We still have an opportunity and as long as that door is open for us, we’re going to try and take advance of that.”

Sparks at Atlanta

When: 4:30 p.m. Friday

Where: Gateway Center Arena at College Park, Atlanta

TV: CBS Sports Network