WNBA: Phoenix Mercury off to strong start thanks to defense, depth

The new era of Phoenix Mercury basketball is off to a good start, even if things aren’t going quite as planned. Despite early-season injuries to key players Kahleah Copper and Alyssa Thomas, Phoenix is in third place in the WNBA standings at 5-2, thanks to strong team defense and contributions from players who began the season as virtual unknowns.

When the Mercury went all-in to acquire Thomas and Satou Sabally last offseason, one of their goals was to build a team around them that could play a free-flowing offensive style head coach Nate Tibbetts described as “positionless.” The pair’s diverse skillsets would, in theory, allow Phoenix to think differently when constructing the rest of its roster, focusing more on how further additions would play alongside the team’s best players without worrying as much about how they match up individually.

It’s been the Mercury’s defense, however, that has carried them early in 2025. With Copper, their leading perimeter scorer, out for the first four to six weeks of the season following a knee procedure, the Mercury’s offensive ceiling is somewhat limited, but they’ve still been able to get themselves going in transition. Phoenix is currently leading the WNBA in opponents’ turnover rate at 22 percent and is second in the league in defensive rating, allowing 93.4 points per 100 possessions.

“I’ve been extremely proud of how we’ve competed at the defensive end,” Tibbetts said after his team defeated the Los Angeles Sparks for the second time this season. “We’ve played with toughness and grit most of the year.”

No WNBA player embodies those two words more than Thomas. The six-time All-Defense honoree has so far been everything the Mercury had hoped, averaging 15.2 points, 7.6 rebounds and a team-high eight assists per game.

Unfortunately, they’ll now need to learn to play without her, too. Thomas has joined Copper on the sidelines with a calf injury, and she’ll miss her third-straight game on Tuesday.

If there’s a bright side, it’s that the Mercury’s star talent missing so much time this early in the season has the development of its complementary players running ahead of schedule. Five of the players on Phoenix’s roster—Kathryn Westbeld, Kitija Laksa, Monique Akoa Makani, Lexi Held and Murjanatu Musa—had no prior WNBA experience when the Mercury brought them aboard in free agency, and while they were originally signed to play supporting roles next to Copper, Thomas and Sabally, they’ve had to do much more with two of those three core pieces injured.

The experiment has shown more than a few signs of success. Akoa Makani has quickly proven to be a steady-handed point guard, Westbeld’s defensive playmaking in the frontcourt has been crucial and Laksa is every bit of the jumpshooter she was advertised as in Europe. Each of them is shooting better than 40 percent on 3-pointers—an important stat for an offense that’s currently lacking a good chunk of its shot creation ability.

“Our front office has done a really good job of getting players who know who they are around our stars,” Tibbetts said. “They’re confident, they’re professional, [and] they’re competitors.”

Based on what we’ve seen from the Mercury so far, it’s hard to disagree with him. Copper is still a few weeks away from returning while Thomas remains day-to-day, but with the way Phoenix has played in spite of those circumstances, there will be that much more to look forward to when the team is fully healthy.