Four classic Mercury games will begin airing this week
The WNBA was supposed to begin play this week. With no live games to air, Fox Sports Arizona is taking fans back to relive the Phoenix Mercury’s three WNBA titles. The regional sports channel will begin airing the four games on Tuesday, May 19 and run through Saturday, June 6.
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The games kick off with the 2014 title-clinching Game 3 between Phoenix and the Chicago Sky on May 19. The game will start at 10 p.m. EDT (7 p.m. local time) on Fox Sports Arizona. It will rerun on May 20 at 5:30 p.m. EDT and May 22 at 7:30 p.m. EDT.
Despite being without Brittney Griner in Game 3, the Mercury defeated the Sky 87-82 on Chicago’s home court on Friday, Sept. 12, 2014. It capped off the 3-0 series win for Phoenix.
Diana Taurasi had 24 points and 5 assists in the game that gave the Mercury the last of their three championships. The effort was enough to garner her second WNBA Finals MVP award.
On May 24, FSAZ will take fans back to the franchise’s second title with the 2009 Game 5. The premiere will start at 6 p.m. EDT/3 p.m. MST followed by reruns on May 26 and May 27 at 4:30 p.m. EDT.
Taurasi won the first of her WNBA Finals MVP awards after averaging 20.4 points per game in the Finals. Phoenix took the series with the 94-86 victory for the only title-clinching win on their home court in franchise history.
With the Indiana Fever leading the series 2-1, the Mercury had to win Game 4 on the road to push the series back to Phoenix. On Oct. 9, 2009, in the friendly confines of U.S. Airways Center, Taurasi and Cappie Pondexter put on a show with 50 points combined in front of a sold-out crowd of 17,313.
The stroll down memory lane will wind up with the last two games from the franchise’s first title run in 2007. First on the docket is the Sept. 13, 2007 Game 4 between Phoenix and the defending champion Detroit Shock.
With their backs against the wall, Phoenix needed the heroics of Pondexter to force a Game 5. Over the final 1:55, the Mercury went on a 7-2 run with every point either scored or assisted by Pondexter. With just 21 ticks on the clock, she drove towards the basket to bank in the shot that would give the Mercury a 77-76 victory and force a final game on the Shock’s home court. They were the final two of her game-high 26 points that night.
The celebration of the Mercury’s championships will conclude on June 6 at 6 p.m. EDT/3 p.m. MST as FSAZ airs Game 5 of the 2007 WNBA Finals. Reruns of the team’s first championship will be aired on both June 7 and June 8 at 7 p.m. EDT.
Pondexter had another night for the ages on Sept. 16, 2007. The second-year player would score 26 points once again on her way to winning the WNBA Finals MVP. Her team was making its second appearance in the Finals, having come up short in 1998. This time would be different.
It was a dominant performance by Phoenix as the team rushed out to an 11-point lead in the first quarter. The Shock would never get closer than nine points as the Mercury became the first team to win a title on the road.
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