The Minnesota Lynx have been the best team in the league all season long. With a 28-5 record, last year’s championship runner-up is firmly established as the top seed. The next closest team is seven games behind Minnesota. Not even losing Napheesa Collier to an ankle injury could slow the Lynx down. They have won every single game since Collier went down in a 111-58 blowout win over the Las Vegas Aces.
With an impressive record and Collier’s return on the horizon, the Lynx are already set up well to win a title. Nevertheless, they continue to improve their chances of winning it all. The team’s latest win over the defending champions taught the Lynx a lesson that will be valuable once the playoffs roll around.
It was a gritty game. The Lynx were up early but lost the lead in the second quarter and never truly managed to separate themselves again. The six-point win was the result of gritty defense and clutch offensive plays from Courtney Williams, Alanna Smith, and Kayla McBride.
After the game, Cheryl Reeve and Alanna Smith stressed how important the experience of winning an ugly, close game will be in the postseason.
“It’s a really good experience for us as a collective just to know what it takes to win when things aren’t pretty, when maybe you’re not playing the way that you want to be playing, but still be able to win the basketball game and that type of stuff is really invaluable for us,” Smith said. “We didn’t play as well as we wanted to and we still won. That’s kind of how you want to play in playoff basketball.”
Reeve voiced a similar sentiment, saying, “Winning any game that you have to gut out, when you don’t play your best or your opponent makes you not play your best, you’re thrilled with. It’s those sort of marks along the season that when you have it and you had to find a way, that builds for you those experiences that you know you’re going to have when you get to the postseason.”
The Lynx didn’t play their best game against the Liberty
Any game between the Lynx and Liberty is a battle. The Lynx won the first meeting of the season by seven points, took the second victory with a 12-point advantage, and then gutted out a six-point win.
It wasn’t the most efficient game for Minnesota. The Lynx shot 43.1 percent from the field, 31.8 percent from three, and 69.7 percent from the free-throw line. Free throws really bailed the Lynx out. New York committed ten more fouls than Minnesota, and, while the Lynx left a lot of points at the line, the sheer number of attempts allowed them to make up for the points they missed out on from the field.
Kayla McBride, for example, only made three of her fourteen field-goal attempts, but sank nine free throws on her way to seventeen points. Alanna Smith, Courtney Williams, and Jessica Shepard were the only players who had truly efficient scoring nights.
The Lynx managed to deliver defensively, though, apart from a rough stretch in the second quarter. Sabrina Ionesco went 5-16 from the field, Emma Meesseman scored only ten points, and the Liberty committed 13 turnovers.
This is a championship-or-bust season for Minnesota
After coming within one game of winning the championship last year, this season has only one successful outcome for the Lynx. Falling short of winning the title again would be a massive disappointment considering how well the Lynx have played all season long.
The third regular-season game against the Liberty was proof that the Lynx can beat other contenders without their best player and when things aren’t going their way. It was also proof that they have some serious competition, though. The Liberty were also playing without one of their best players, but still managed to make it a close game after falling behind early on.