The New York Liberty are headed to the WNBA Playoffs. If you’re a Liberty fan and you want that to be the extent of the discussion around the team right now, you could be forgiven.
It was another bad one for New York on Tuesday in a season that has become defined by underwhelming performances. It added up to a 66-58 road loss to the Golden State Valkyries. But with the Phoenix Mercury beating the Indiana Fever earlier in the night, it became mathematically impossible for the defending champions to miss out of the postseason.
It’s almost fitting, however, that they needed someone else to do it for them. The defending champions haven’t looked like an elite team since their 9-0 start to the season, playing under .500 for nearly three months.
The game followed a frustratingly familiar script. After a back-and-forth start, the Valkyries opened up a massive lead – this time 24 points — only for the Liberty to make a furious comeback and fall short in a hard-fought effort.
“It’s the story of our season right now, like when we have to take the ball out of the net, we struggle a little bit,” Breanna Stewart said. “We gave up 26 points [in the second quarter] and our spacing was a little bit bad, and I thought sometimes we had good looks, we just missed. Butto put ourselves in a hole like that, it's unacceptable.”
The cruel part is that while head coach Sandy Brondello has criticized the team’s effort and intensity this year, the effort was there on Tuesday. Only the execution was not.
The Liberty shot 32 percent from the field and 26 percent from three, making only three field goals in a disastrous second quarter in which the Valkyries held them to eight total points.
“They compacted the paint and made sure that we saw bodies everywhere,” Stewart added. “When your back is against the wall, it’s going to be tough.”
If the Liberty hadn’t spent most of the season playing down to the level of their opponent, this one could be chalked up to an off night. Shots didn’t fall and there were some turnovers even this team doesn’t typically make.
But the Liberty gave themselves no margin for error by being a sub-.500 team since mid-June. It was an off night in a season full of them.
“It’s easy to fight back when you’re down. This is disappointing collectively,” Stewart said. “There can be bright spots and whatever, but we have three games left and we’re not where we need to be.”
It’s all about seeding for the Liberty
With the Liberty officially headed back to the playoffs, they can proceed through these final three games purely looking maintain their hold on the 5 seed — though there’s an outside chance they can finish even higher than that.
At the same time, they must do whatever they can to build chemistry with a group that has played shockingly few games together due to injuries.
“Obviously it's been a tough season for us in terms of injuries and [now we’re] trying to work it out on the fly and not getting, the chemistry that we need that other teams probably get with more players,” Brondello said. “Especially when you lose [Jonquel Jones], Stewie, and now Sabrina [Ionescu], and they're a key part of what we do. We have to use these next games. It's just trying to find out now what works best because we haven't had enough experiences.”
The 5 seed would likely mean a first-round matchup with the Phoenix Mercury. The Liberty are 1-3 against them this season, and with Phoenix owning homecourt advantage, New York could enter the playoffs in immediate danger.
Not that this team is going to shy away from a challenge. The Liberty have dealt with adversity all year — admittedly, some of it self-inflicted. They have three more games to clean it up.
