Atlanta — Connecticut raced out to a 14-point lead against the Atlanta Dream on Sunday.

The Sun still lost.

Connecticut’s offense vanished in the second half of a costly 90-77 Eastern Conference loss before 5,661 at Philips Arena. It went over nine minutes without in a basket in a drought that spanned two quarters.

It was another conference loss for fifth-place Connecticut (12-12). It has the East’s worst conference record (4-11).

The Sun fell 2½ games behind the second-place Washington Mystics, who knocked off the league-leading Minnesota Lynx 77-69. Washington holds the head-to-head tiebreaker over Connecticut.

The third-place Indiana Fever and Chicago Sky are both two games ahead of the Sun, who have 10 games left.

Indiana owns the head-to-head tiebreaker against Connecticut. Chicago has beaten the Sun in two of three meetings with two games left.

Connecticut shot 39.7 percent from the floor.

“We moved the ball and sometimes we didn’t,” Sun coach Anne Donovan said. “Generally, I’m confident that (Jasmine) Thomas or (Alex) Bentley are going to knock down some shots, but we just struggled to put the ball in the hole against the zone. We need to do a whole lot better with our attack.”

The last-place Dream had no such issues, shooting 45.8 percent.

“We were poor defensively,” Donovan said. “We were supposed to lock up and get it together in the second half, but it didn’t happen. I have to give Atlanta a lot of credit. They play with a lot of aggressiveness. … (and) got a lot of shots in the second half and some good boards.”

Thomas said, “We just can’t let them score that much. It’s our second game giving away that many points, so we have to be better defensively.”

Thomas’ 3-pointer gave Connecticut a 57-52 lead with four minutes, one second left in the third quarter.

The Sun missed their next 14 shots.

Connecticut reserve Nikki Greene, signed last Thursday as an emergency replacement player due to injuries, snapped her new team’s shooting drought with a put-back with 5:35 remaining in the game. The Sun trailed, 74-61.

Rookie reserve Reshanda Gray had 18 points and six rebounds and Angel McCoughtry scored 18 for Atlanta (9-15). It also benefitted from making 31 of 36 free throws, the most shot against the Sun this season.

Connecticut took 14 free throws.

Camille Little had 13 points and a game-high 10 rebounds for the Sun and Jennifer Lacy tied her a career-high with 21 points.

Connecticut was without starting forward Alyssa Thomas (shoulder sprain) and reserve center Elizabeth Williams (knee contusion). Williams will miss at least one more games; Thomas is out a minimum of two weeks.

Little’s 3-pointer gave the Sun a 20-6 lead with 4 minutes, 59 seconds left in the first half.

Connecticut led 52-45 with 5:47 left in the third quarter. It was shooting 54.1 percent at the time. The Sun missed 16 of their next 17 shots.

“There were a few bad shots, but they were also just a lot of shots that didn’t go (down) in the second half,” Thomas said. “They just didn’t fall.”