Lynx Coach Throws Shade at Liberty Signing
Future matchups between the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx will have a little more bite to them.
Lynx head coach perhaps added a little more fuel to the budding fire between her squad and the Liberty on Tuesday: asked by Madeline Kenney of the New York Post about the Liberty's latest reported signing, that of accomplished veteran Emma Meesseman, Reeve quickly quipped that "[Meesseman] made the wrong choice.”
The comment comes a day before the Liberty and Lynx do battle at Target Center on Wednesday night (8 p.m. ET, ESPN). It's the first time the two sides have officially seen each other since the fantastic five they staged last fall in the WNBA Finals, which yielded the Liberty's first professional championship.
Both Reeve and Lynx fans have hardly hidden their lividness over the memorable final of that series, a 67-62 Liberty victory at Barclays Center that got the championship party started. Reeve expressed her displeasure with officiating immediately after, going as far as to say the title was "stolen" from her group.
The addition of Meesseman, which is not yet official as she works through the visa application process, likely backs the predictions of those who believe a rematch between New York and Minnesota is set to be staged this fall. Meesseman, the 2019 WNBA Finals MVP, was said to be the the target in a bidding war between last year's finalists, one the Liberty may have won thanks in part to good bit of familiarity (i.e. fellow Washington Mystics champion Natasha Cloud).
The Liberty and Lynx currently top the WNBA leaderboard, with the latter up on New York by four games entering Wednesday's game. The two have forged an intriguing rivalry over the two WNBA seasons, which also saw the Lynx down New York in last summer's Commissioner's Cup final staged at UBS Arena.
Despite her Meesseman shade, Reeve did offer compliments for Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello, revealing that their relationship goes back to their shared time in the Miami Sol organization, where Reeve scouted the then-backcourt threat. Today, both Brondello and Reeve stand among the winningest coaches in WNBA history.
"She has a light way about her, she doesn’t get to stressed or she doesn’t appear to be," Reeve said, per Kenney. "Us Americans are very different or maybe this one is very different. Sandy had a way of getting the best out of people."
Geoff Magliocchetti is a veteran sportswriter who contributes to a variety of sites on the "On SI" network. In addition to the Yankees/Mets, Geoff also covers the New York Knicks, New York Liberty, and New York Giants and has previously written about the New York Jets, Buffalo Bills, Staten Island Yankees, and NASCAR.