Tiffany Hayes Gives Atlanta Another Highlight Maker

Brian Martin

When it comes to landing a spot in the WNBA’s top plays, Dream guard Tiffany Hayes is a bit of an expert. It makes sense that the WNBA’s highlight machine hail from Atlanta, the same place that gave us “The Human Highlight Film,” Dominique Wilkins.

Check out a few of Hayes’ top moments from this season with the highlight reel below, including her ankle-breaking crossover dribble and finish against Dallas last week that drew oohs and ahhs from the Philips Arena crowd, made the Dream bench erupt to celebrate and generated plenty of Vine loops over the past few days.

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Hayes is doing more than embarrassing defenders with crossovers, up-and-under finishes and other spectacular plays; she is in the midst of a career year in her fifth season in the WNBA.

A second round pick (14th overall) by the Dream in 2012, the athletic wing from UConn has been a reliable ally to star forward Angel McCoughtry, the reigning WNBA Eastern Conference Player of the Week. While Angel has received most of the headlines in Atlanta, Hayes is now commanding more of the spotlight than ever before.

After coming off the bench for the most of her first two seasons in the WNBA, Hayes was elevated to the starting lineup in 2014 and was the model of consistency, averaging nearly identical stats in each of the last two seasons.

Season PTS REB AST STL BLK
2014 12.9 3.0 2.5 1.0 0.2
2015 12.9 3.0 2.2 1.0 0.3
2016 15.9 3.5 2.9 1.3 0.3

 

But this season, Hayes has elevated her game to new heights. She is averaging career highs in points (15.9, 11th in the WNBA), rebounds (3.5), assists (2.9), steals (1.3), free throw percentage (84.1%) and nearly matching her career best in field goal percentage (46.3%, just 0.1% off her top mark from 2014).

The improved play of Hayes, along with the routine brilliance of McCoughtry, has helped Atlanta defy preseason expectations that had many picking the Dream near the bottom of the Eastern Conference. The WNBA’s GMs gave the Dream just an eight percent chance of having the most wins in the East this year — fourth behind Indiana, New York and Chicago. Through Tuesday’s games, only one team in the East (New York) and three in the entire league (L.A. and Minnesota being the others) have more wins than Atlanta.

The Dream are in prime position for a playoff berth, which will provide Hayes more opportunities to showcase her improved game and more opportunities to make jaw-dropping plays that warrant a follow-up mixtape.

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