New York Liberty win 2024 WNBA Finals to capture first championship

New York clinched its first-ever title on Sunday, overcoming a sloppy first half to beat Minnesota 67-62 in overtime. The Liberty leaned on their defense, even as nearly every player who saw the court was visibly gassed long before regulation ended, and forced the Lynx to lean on scorers other than star Napheesa Collier to win. Despite Sabrina Ionescu shooting just 1-for-19, Breanna Stewart recorded 13 points, 15 rebounds, four assists and three blocks, while Jonquel Jones and Nyara Sabally combined for 30 points in the frontcourt on 10-for-17 shooting from the field.

Collier led Minnesota with 22 points, seven rebounds, two assists and two blocks, while Kayla McBride added 21 points, five rebounds, five assists and and four steals.

The Liberty became the last of the league’s original franchises to win a championship, after losing winner-take-all games against the Houston Comets in 1997 and 1999 and losing in four games to the Las Vegas Aces in 2023. Stars from those ’90s New York teams, including Teresa Weatherspoon and Sue Wicks, were part of the Liberty’s record-breaking sellout crowd and were in tears as the streamers came down, announcing the first basketball championship for New York City since 1973.

“I‘ve been manifesting this moment for a while. And there’s no feeling like it,” said Stewart. “To be able to bring a championship to New York, first ever in franchise history — it’s an incredible feeling and I can’t wait to continue to celebrate with the City. ‘Cause it’ll be bonkers.”

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The end of the most dramatic Finals in league history came down to familiar storylines: Could Collier will an entire team over the finish line? Could Stewart make two free throws in a row? Could Ionescu make something happen? Could Courtney Williams revive her Game 1 heroics?

Collier answered the first question with three isolation buckets down the stretch, two of them coming against Stewart. Stewart and Ionescu answered the other two questions by missing a pair of free throws and a potential go-ahead 3-pointer with 30 seconds to go. And then Stewart forced a Collier miss and went to the line with 5.2 seconds to go, trailing 60-58. It was nearly the same scenario as in Game 1, when she went 1-for-2 from the line to eventually lose in overtime.

Stewart made both, capping off the WNBA’s breakout season with a winner-take-all overtime, the first time in league history a Finals series had multiple games extend past regulation, per Across The Timeline. And Ionescu opened the extra frame by assisting on a three from Leonie Fiebich.

“Five seconds to go, [Stewart] said, ‘I’m going to make ‘em.’ I’m like, ‘good,’” said Brondello. “I was praying, but it worked.”

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Williams answered the final question by missing Minnesota’s first three shots of overtime. And when Sandy Brondello went back to her jumbo lineup, featuring Stewart at the three and Sabally alongside Jones, to ensure Collier wasn’t going to beat the Liberty, the Lynx were finally out of answers.

“[Scoring got harder late in the game] probably because I was getting held a little bit,” said Collier. “I was getting a lot of shots and they tightened up their defense, they brought people in rotation or were doubling. They were upping the pressure and it just got harder.”

The tone was set from the first minutes of the game: Nothing was going to be easy. Before the first timeout, Ionescu hit the side of the backboard, Stewart and Collier had both airballed open short jumpers, Betnijah Laney-Hamilton and Alanna Smith both had layups rim out, and routine jump shots were front-rimming. At the end of the longest regular season in WNBA history, every starter was running on fumes.

Minnesota’s ability to maintain its offensive structure had already won it a road game in this series and powered it through early struggles to a 19-10 lead after the first quarter. Where Ionescu kept hunting her own shot despite going 0-for-5, the Lynx kept the ball moving.

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Minnesota simply kept it in a gear that New York couldn’t match. Even when they struggled to get good looks, the Lynx kept making quick passes and attacking off the catch, moving as one fluid system. The Liberty instead played as a collection of individual parts, taking a beat to think every time they caught the ball. And that was enough for Minnesota’s defense to make its rotations and send help.

A couple of Lynx runs in the early going — 8-2 to open the game, 10-2 across the end of the first and beginning of the second quarters — gave them enough breathing room for the extended droughts that feature in any winner-take-all championship game. Both teams went scoreless over a 2.5-minute stretch in the mid-second, and New York went on a 7-2 run over the final three minutes of the first half to close the gap to 34-27 Minnesota.

“I didn’t think we were playing with the right amount of urgency [at halftime], things were a little too easy for them,” Brondello said. “I encouraged them a little: ‘Hey, let’s go, 20 more minutes.’ And then I told them about the big lineup.”

The Lynx’s droughts continued into the third quarter. Minnesota scored just 2 points over a nearly four-minute stretch once Smith went to the bench, and the Liberty turned to a level of size and strength that the Lynx couldn’t match. Jones scored 5 points out of a pair of post touches, and Brondello turned to a jumbo lineup, forcing Minnesota into mismatches on the roll and in the post. Sabally scored 9 points in just over three minutes to close the third quarter, giving New York a 3-point lead heading into the final frame.

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The structural advantage the Lynx had on offense in the first half melted away as the second half wore on. Collier’s midrange shots started front-rimming instead of going in. Smith couldn’t take advantage of Liberty rotations anymore and went to the locker room after being thrown down on an offensive foul by Jones. The ball died in Williams’ hands, with her shooting 2-for-14 and recording more turnovers than assists.

None of that made New York’s offense any better, but it did mean that it had successfully dragged Minnesota down into the rock fight it had been waging all night. The two teams were within one possession for the first six-and-a-half minutes of the fourth quarter — until Ionescu hit the Liberty’s first 3-pointer of the night, her first make after missing her first 13 shots.

“It’s a journey … I think it’s been fun,” said Brondello. “Hey, let’s not stop at one, though. Let’s go for two.”