'That Wasn't Us': Liberty Address Game 2 Mistakes, Enter Playoff Homecoming
The official WNBA ledgers will note that the New York Liberty partook in a postseason contest against the Chicago Sky on Aug. 20, 2022. Those who allegedly partook in that game insist otherwise.
An improbable New York playoff push hit a thudding roadblock on Saturday afternoon, as the seventh-seeded Liberty was denied a shot at postseason advancement in the direst of historic fashion. The defending champion Chicago Sky, denied a single point over the final three-plus minutes in the Liberty's victorious opener of a three-game set last Wednesday, made up for lost time to the tune of a 100-62 shellacking in Game 2. It was the most one-sided defeat in WNBA playoff history, breaking their own record set during last season's championship series.
It doesn't take much box score sleuthing to figure out why the Liberty could never keep pace on Saturday: the team lost eight offensive rebounds and seven turnovers in the first quarter alone en route to sinking in an instant 21-point hole after putting up only eight of each on Wednesday.
Head coach Sandy Brondello directly addressed the shortcomings in the immediate aftermath. She blamed the destruction of on-court unity in the panic of absorbing Chicago's punch. In her chastising, Brondello opted for disappointment over anger in analyzing the "silly" turnovers and "quick shots" that played right into the hands of a Sky group almost impossible to stop on the fast break. Defending WNBA Finals MVP and the Association's arguably deadliest fastbreak threat Kahleah Copper took full advantage, brushing off all notions of a reported injury scare with a game-high 20 points, including the first five that helped put the game out of reach early.
"I think we went away from what we wanted to accomplish here and playing together as a team," Brondello said. "We were taking terrible shots and playing into their hands. So we need more poise … once we have better execution we can keep them out of the transition phase."
"With our poor decision making with our turnovers, we allowed them to get into transition and no one can stop her, regardless of who she's playing in the whole of the WNBA. She just did a great job getting there. We need to keep her in the half court. We need to keep her out of the restricted area and that means we need good shot selection."
Liberty veteran Rebecca Allen is far and away the longest-tenured member of the current New York group, the lone remnant of the franchise's Madison Square Garden days in her seventh metropolitan campaign. Having worked through four different New York coaches, three full-time homes, and numerous character-building losses, Allen has been a witness to a rebuild that the Liberty feel is almost over, a belief purely on display when it hired an accomplished championship winner like Brondello to serve at the helm.
Allen made it clear that the Liberty team that took to the court at Wintrust Arena on Saturday was not the team she's helped cultivate.
"It wasn't us, ultimately," Allen declared. "I think that we showed (in Game 1) what we can do, how we can play, how we can execute. Whether you want to focus on (Saturday's) game or the first one, that's your choice. We know the team that we can come out to be. That second game is not us. It's not going to us. We're going to make sure that we step up like the way we did that first game."
The aforementioned Game 1 win ensured that New York would host its first-ever Brooklyn-based postseason game since the Brooklyn Nets' ownership group took over in 2019. The WNBA's new playoff format ensures any do-or-die deciders will be hosted by the lower seeds.
Had they won on Saturday, the Liberty would've been guaranteed at least one hometown showing in the best-of-five semifinals but the dream is instead realized through Game 3 against the Sky on Tuesday night at Barclays Center (9 p.m. ET, ESPN).
Even with this franchise milestone, it's hard to argue that momentum doesn't rest on the visitors' bench as they seek to become the WNBA's first repeat champions since the 2001-02 Los Angeles Sparks. New York will need whatever vestiges of positive momentum it can get beyond what could potentially be a sizable, raucous crowd in Brooklyn looking to build on long-sought basketball momentum: hours before tip-off, the Liberty's brothers announced that Kevin Durant would return for the 2022-23 NBA season.
Conventional wisdom suggests the cursed film from Saturday would be the last source of such inspiration. All-Star Natasha Howard, however, suggests otherwise.
"We were (ticked) off after that game. Watching film, individually and collectively, we were mad at the way we played," Howard, previously a two-time WNBA champion said. "Yeah, we have a chip on our shoulder but this (next) game is a do or die. The winner takes all. But at the end of the day, we're looking on the things that we control and not dwell on the game on Saturday, how we lost. We're just focusing on what to do now."
The Liberty have been a resilient group all season and it'll take one more effort as such to keep the affair rolling. This was a team, after all, that started 1-7, dealt with losing its star attraction (2021 All-Star Betnijah Laney) for over 20 games, and still grappled its way into the Association's top. A general disregard for history has played a big part in that: Allen has been reluctant to compare this team to her experiences with the Liberty's most recent glory days, a stretch that included 66 wins over her first three seasons.
On the bench, Brondello was on the wrong end of the Sky's ultimate triumph last season, coaching the Phoenix Mercury to a runner-up effort. Though the Sky are mostly built the same from last year's group (with the Liberty taking away two components in starter Stefanie Dolson and assistant coach/Brondello's husband Olaf Lange), she's not basing a game plan around her regrets from that doomed four-game set in the desert.
The metropolitan mantra of "Why Not Us?", coined by Sabrina Ionescu, has sustained the team as it presses forward. New York is focused on the final word of that fateful triumvirate, not only in a team and camaraderie sense but in maintaining their focus on the now and not letting their fortunes be defined by history ... no matter how recent it might be.
"I'm not looking in the past. This is very much now the moment and we've we're lucky enough, right now, to have been able to play this team three times in a row so we know what to expect," Allen said. "We know that it's going to be a very physical game. It's ultimately going to be who wants it more, who's going to play harder. So I think it's all about always playing in the moment and knowing the scout, knowing your role, and then just playing every possession hard."
"Together is the key word for us. We're going to have to do it together and it's going to take all of us in 40 minutes, no matter how many minutes each person plays."
Geoff Magliocchetti is on Twitter @GeoffJMags
