Four days between a World Cup final and 12th place
Kahleah Copper was holding a World Cup trophy in Berlin on Sunday, 15 points in a 97-79 win over France. By Thursday she is back in a Phoenix Mercury uniform, playing out a season that stopped mattering weeks ago. The Mercury sit 12th in a 15-team league.
Her club coach, Nate Tibbetts, worked that final from the USA bench as an assistant, and he had a story about how it turned. France led because Gabby Williams could not be stopped, 16 points before the break. So the staff redrew the matchups and handed Williams to Copper. She scored four the rest of the way. Tibbetts said afterward that his player found another gear when the game asked for one.
None of which fixes what waits for her in Phoenix.
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Finals last year, 14-26 now
Phoenix are 14-26 heading to Portland. They lost seven of the nine games they played before the World Cup forced a 17-day break. Twelve months ago this franchise was in the Finals, getting swept 4-0 by the Las Vegas Aces. The fall has been steep and fast.
Copper’s individual numbers never dipped. She is averaging 21.3 points, fourth in the league. Alyssa Thomas is at 14.2 points, 8.4 assists and 7.7 rebounds, tied with Caitlin Clark for the WNBA assist lead. The talent was there. The wins were not.
Portland’s coach has already moved on to 2027
The opposition is an expansion team at 16-24, ninth in the standings and eight games adrift of the last playoff spot. Nobody had Portland Fire anywhere near that. They are on course to finish above last season’s runner-up in their first year of existence.
Alex Sarama is not pretending otherwise about these last four games. The coach says the long-term plan has been running since opening night, built around player usage and systems rather than a late scramble at a playoff berth.
Carla Leite, plucked from the Golden State Valkyries in the expansion draft, leads the Fire in scoring at 15.9 and in assists at 6.3. Bridget Carleton adds 14.3 a night and sits joint fourth in the league on 106 made threes. Megan DiLeo contributes 13.2. The teams have split their two meetings this season, and both winners were the road side.
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