The first repeat WNBA champions in two decades are one of the best teams ever seen in basketball – and a proof of concept for investment in women’s sports
The Las Vegas Aces made it look so easy for so long during their record-setting romp to a second straight championship that it was only fitting they were made to finish it the hard way. Down two starters and trailing the New York Liberty by double digits in the third quarter of Wednesday night’s Game 4 of the WNBA finals, the Aces appeared on course for a second straight defeat and a winner-take-all fifth game on Friday back in Las Vegas. They were on wobbly legs, their ball movement sloppy and error-strewn, given no quarter by a deafening crowd of 16,851 hostile spectators in a building where they’d lost each of three previous visits this year by an average margin of 20 points.
Then it came, more of a trickle than a deluge, but steady just the same. A running jumper by offensive dynamo Jackie Young. Back-to-back three-pointers by Cayla George, the former MVP of Australia’s WNBL making her first career playoff start. Nine straight points from A’ja Wilson, the world’s best player today no doubt inspired by her MVP slight. Two quick baskets from veteran wing Alysha Clark in the closing minute. All of a sudden the undermanned Aces led by two entering the fourth and would never trail again, finally celebrating their 70-69 victory in a mob at center court before a silenced arena after a last-gasp shot by New York’s Courtney Vandersloot missed the target.
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