PHOENIX — The talk of the New York Liberty all season was potential.
The reigning champions needed all of it, plus a reset ahead of overtime, to avoid putting their backs against the wall in the first round of the WNBA playoffs. The Liberty relied almost exclusively on the starting five it rarely had available during the regular season to steal Game 1, 76-69, from the better-seeded Phoenix Mercury at PHX Arena on Sunday.
Advertisement
Not until overtime did New York take full control, capitalizing on Phoenix’s miscues to gain home-court advantage ahead of Game 2 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on Wednesday (8 p.m. ET, ESPN). Game 1 featured 15 lead changes and 12 ties, delivering the expected theatrics before New York recognized the reality.
“We realized it was winning time, obviously,” Jonquel Jones said. “We had another opportunity to walk out of here winning Game 1, and everybody locked in and we were able to do it.”
They did it by the slimmest of margins, which they never expected to see at this point of the year. It’s old hat at this point to highlight the revolving door of a Liberty availability report. “Everyone knows,” head coach Sandy Brondello said pregame. No other team cares, or is going to take it easy on champions from New York, a star-studded cast assembled for trophies. No. 4 Phoenix gave them all they could handle.
Advertisement
If anyone knows how to do the near impossible by taking a No. 5 seed to the WNBA Finals, it’s Brondello. Four years ago, Brondello stood on the other sideline of PHX Arena, tinkering to lead the No. 5-seeded Mercury two wins from a championship. Attempting to do it again, she drew from the experience, even though this time she had the added target of a 2024 championship.
“It doesn’t matter what the standings are,” Brondello said. “It’s 0-0, it’s a whole new season. We know what we’re capable of, and now it’s just coming out and doing it.”
It would take a return to their identity, their best basketball, and having “our complete roster certainly helps,” Brondello said. All season, while different starters — including Jones, Sabrina Ionescu and Breanna Stewart — hit the end of the bench in street clothes, the claim was that New York, when healthy, was a cut above the rest.
That didn’t always show up in a physical battle of experience and wills. Phoenix scored the first four, though the Liberty took a first-quarter lead. The gap didn’t grow above four points from 2:18 of the first to the final minute of the third.
Advertisement
New York let Phoenix stay in it, and nearly found themselves on the wrong side of realized potential. For the success the Liberty finally provided on the boards, they negated it with 20 turnovers, which the Mercury turned into 15 points. Not exactly the prizing of possessions Brondello said determines champions.
Breanna Stewart was emotional on the bench after getting hurt during overtime in the Liberty’s Game 1 win in Phoenix on Sunday. (Photo by Aryanna Frank/Getty Images)
(Aryanna Frank via Getty Images)
The potential was there for the Liberty to meet time and again. Go-ahead buckets in the final minutes of a tie ball game were squelched by miscommunication between Ionescu and a cutting Natasha Cloud. There was a missed layup off a forced turnover, and later, a shot-put 3-point attempt with two defenders smothering Ionescu on the sideline. A sure-fire drive by Alyssa Thomas, bouncing out of the hoop in the final seconds, saved New York from heading home on the brink.
The first thing Natasha Cloud said in the huddle before overtime was that the more aggressive team would win. She opened the frame with a 3-pointer, and Stewart pushed the lead to five on a baseline cut.
Advertisement
“Another reason [we pulled out the win] is all that bulls*** that we went through at the beginning of the year when we weren’t coming out on top of the ends of games and we weren’t executing,” said Cloud, the game’s high scorer with 23 points (on a 75% clip). “I’ve been saying and harping on like those moments are gonna prepare us for this moment here, and when this moment comes, we’re gonna f****** execute. And this moment came when we f****** executed.”
New York outscored Phoenix, 11-4, in the final five minutes. But it might have cost them more. Stewart banged hard into Satou Sabally, who was called for a foul, on that overtime baseline drive and stayed on the court for a few minutes, clutching her left knee. A bone bruise in her right knee sidelined her most of August as the Liberty plummeted from No. 2 to No. 5 in the standings.
Stewart walked back to the bench with her head back, putting a hand on her left hip during the Liberty’s timeout. She returned, missed the free throw and was pulled out a minute later.
“She asked me to sub her out there, and she looked uncomfortable,” Brondello said. “So that was the reason we took her out there.”
Advertisement
The three-time champion and defensive linchpin was emotional on the bench with a brace on her knee. Brondello said immediately after the game there was no update on her heading into Game 2.
It will be next woman up, Cloud said, as it has been all season for a team full of championship expectations without any of the requisite luck. That’s how the Liberty are even in this position to begin with.
Asked ahead of tip-off who she’s looking to as a potential X-factor, Brondello said, “there are a lot of people on our team.” The chemistry of her starters, she said, is the X-factor. They have a plus-26 net rating on the court together and are 11-1 when starting. The sole loss came to Los Angeles in July when Stewart was injured, playing only three minutes. Without Stewart, they’re 5-8.
Advertisement
Emma Meesseman, their late-season acquisition that at the time made the rich richer, will be the first up if Stewart can’t play. Brondello included her as a potential X-factor, but on Sunday, she scored one paltry bucket on six attempts. The 2019 Finals MVP with Washington had eight rebounds in 12:51.
They were the Liberty’s only bench points of the game, and Brondello played each of her starters at least 39 of 45 minutes. The Mercury, in control of a needed victory, received their extra contributions from DeWanna Bonner and Sami Whitcomb, a two-time champion with Stewart in Seattle, in an eight-woman rotation.
The Liberty built their repeat championship hopes on an All-Star-studded starting five and a deep bench. They’re still very much alive, but as was the case most of the season, their outlook isn’t as rosy as a 1-0 series lead would suggest.
