The Liberty have openly made winning the WNBA title a goal, and Sunday they got a preview of a likely Finals foe.
And it wasn’t pretty.
In a sneak peak at what would be the likeliest finals matchup, the Liberty gave away the game, digging a huge hole and falling, 88-79, to visiting Minnesota at Barclays Center.
The defeat didn’t just snap the Liberty’s five-game winning streak and give Minnesota the season series 3-1.
It also wasted not just a great Breanna Stewart performance but a chance to clinch the top overall seed in the playoffs, with these Lynx still giving chase.
The Liberty (31-7) saw their cushion on Western Conference leading Minnesota for the top overall seed shaved to 2 ½ games.
If they lose out and the Lynx — who’ve won six straight to improve to 29-9 — wins out, the Liberty would fall to No. 2.
“Yeah, I think it’s a really good team, well-coached. They’ve played extremely well. It’s a team that we may meet down the stretch; so we want to play well,” Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said beforehand. “We want to win the game and clinch the No. 1 seed, and go into the playoffs playing good basketball, a good style of basketball. So, excited for this game. It’s a good challenge for us.”
They were measured and found wanting.
Again.
When the Liberty faced Minnesota on May 25, they fell 84-67 for what had been their most lopsided loss of the season.
They trailed by as much as 25 in the third quarter Sunday, rendering Stewart’s fourth-quarter rally moot.
Stewart had 38 points and 18 rebounds, pouring in 17 in the fourth quarter alone.
But trailing by two dozen after three, even that fourth wasn’t enough.
“We should treat this like a playoff game. We should come out there and compete for 40 minutes like a playoff game. You know, one (win) allows us to clinch that number one (seed), and we want that. That’s our goal,” Brondello said beforehand. “But it’s all about playing good basketball when it really matters. So that’s the most important thing to me.”
They didn’t play good basketball until it was too late to matter.
New York fell behind 16-6 out of the gate, and never really challenged the rest of the afternoon.
The deficit swelled to a couple of touchdowns at 25-11, and they never found an offensive answer.
The Liberty trailed 35-18 just 1:06 into the second quarter when a scramble by the defense led to Cecilia Zandalasini finding Bridget Carleton (team-high 19 points) for a wide-open corner 3-pointer.
And Kayla McBride’s 3-pointer handed the Liberty their biggest deficit of the game, at 74-48 late in the third.
The quarter ended with Sabrina Ionescu missing not one, not two but three 3-pointers on the final possession.
With the Liberty going into the fourth down 74-50, they reeled off 13 unanswered points to try and get back into it.
Kayla Thornton drilled a 25-footer off an Ionescu feed to cut the deficit to 74-63 with 7:05 remaining in the game.
Ionescu (13 points, eight assists) found Stewart for a 3-pointer that made it 80-72 with 4:39 to play, and her free throws cut it to 85-77 in the final minute.
But they got no closer.
