Sydney Johnson was thrown out of Washington’s 109-77 loss to the Atlanta Dream on Saturday after a third-quarter confrontation with referees turned into two technical fouls and a police escort off the floor. The Mystics coach ejection Atlanta Dream sequence stopped a game that was already sliding badly for Washington and left Johnson finishing the night on his own route back to the locker room, with staff following behind him.
The flashpoint came at the 3:52 mark of the third quarter in College Park, Georgia, when Johnson was in a heated discussion with the officiating crew and several Washington staff members had to hold him back. Forward Kiki Iriafen also stepped in to keep him away from the referees as Johnson continued to argue, even after the second technical sent him to the sideline and then out of the game. Police escorted him away from the floor, and he kept jawing at officials as he left.
Johnson did not finish the game for the Mystics, who were trying to match up with an Atlanta team that entered at 7-3 while Washington came in at 4-5. The loss was one of the heaviest of the season for the franchise in another way, too: the 109 points allowed were the third most in Mystics history. Atlanta’s offense kept moving, with every Dream player who took the court scoring and five finishing in double figures.
Still, the most revealing part came after the noise. Johnson said he lost his cool and would not get into what set him off, saying he did not want to take away from how Atlanta played or how Washington played. That leaves the officiating sequence itself as the unanswered part of the night, even as the larger picture was plain enough: the Mystics were beaten soundly, and their coach was gone before the final buzzer.
On the Washington side, Sonia Citron gave the team one of its cleaner performances in a rough loss, returning from a foot injury to finish with 18 points and six assists. Kiki Iriafen led the Mystics with 24 points, while the Dream got 19 points and six steals from Rhyne Howard and a dominant 18-point, 17-rebound, four-steal line from Angel Reese.
