Arlington, Texas — The Connecticut Sun have endured their share of close, annoying losses this WNBA season.

Connecticut left nothing to chance on Wednesday afternoon against the Dallas Wings. Chiney Ogwumike had one of the best games of her young career as the Sun started the game with a lead and never relinquished it in an 89-78 win before 4,873 at College Park Center.

“I’m really proud of our players,” Connecticut head coach Curt Miller said. “We’ve lost a lot of close games over the past few weeks. I think they were frustrated and really wanted to put a full game together.”

Ogwumike had a career-high 26 points and seven blocks with 15 rebounds and four steals for the Sun (7-16).

“I think we played aggressive,” Ogwumike said. “We have a new vibe. We’re very optimistic as a team. Our record doesn’t indicate how hard we play. I’m proud of our team because we had a lot of adversity.

“We weren’t even feeling good, today. All of us were sort of sick. So we were like ‘Let’s fight through! Let’s fight through!’ So I’m really proud of our team and our effort and how we’re not letting things go before the (upcoming) Olympic break. We’re staying hungry.”

Jasmine Thomas had 20 points, four rebounds, three assists and three blocks for Connecticut and Alyssa Thomas added 11 points, seven rebounds, four assists and tied her career record with four steals.

Rookie reserves Morgan Tuck (13 points, five assists) and Courtney Williams (14 points) also scored in double figures for the Sun, which tied a franchise record with 11 blocks.

Odyssey Sims had 20 points and eight rebounds for Dallas (9-15) and Courtney Paris added 14 points and 11 rebounds.

Jasmine Thomas scored the game’s first five points as the Sun took an 11-2 lead with four minutes, 52 seconds remaining in the first quarter.

The Wings cut their deficit to two points late that quarter, but Tuck finished it with a 3-pointer to give Connecticut a 20-15 lead.

“It was nice to see us play with a lot of energy from start to finish,” Thomas said. “Every run they made, when things didn’t go our way, we still stuck together and made good plays to make up for it.”

Thomas’ layup with 5:05 remaining in the game gave Connecticut its largest lead, 84-61.

“I’m really proud of the defense,” Miller said. “We stuck to the game plan that we had in place the entire game, made a lot of the plays that we needed to play, and had a great game by Chiney (Ogwumike).”

Connecticut plays at the Chicago Sky on Friday in its final game before the break.