Why winning a WNBA championship meant more than just hardware and pride for the New York Liberty

It all came down to pivotal free throws from Breanna Stewart, an MVP performance from Jonquel Jones, 13 points and seven rebounds from Leonie Fiebich, Kayla Thornton being as physical and tough defensively as she possibly could, and an x-factor type performance from Nyara Sabally that probably wasn’t on the bingo card of many. 

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The Minnesota Lynx began the game playing their relentless defense that in turn made the Liberty come out tight and at times uninspired. New York missed good looks and bad looks while still somehow never being down by more than 12 points. Ionescu and Stewart shot a combined 5-for-34 (less than 15%) in what was another slog for two of the Liberty stars after more of the same in Game 4. 

Two of the best 3-point shooting teams during the 2024 WNBA season shot a combined 5-for-42 from deep in a game that just wasn’t very pretty and arguably decided by who was most physical rather than who made the most shots. 

“Man, that was ugly,” Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello said. “But we found a way to win. I’m really proud of our team, how resilient we were, how we stuck together and how we continue to trust each other. That was our word today, just trust the process. We found a way to win.”

Winning a WNBA championship, something that now is no longer elusive for the New York Liberty but rather a reality, means more to this franchise than just adding a trophy to a case or celebrating the great basketball that the team played all season long. This was messy instead of pretty for the Liberty. Sheer will carried them over talent. Their defense gave them the outcome they wanted rather than the outcome that haunted them.

This championship victory for the players, coaches and executives inside the Liberty franchise represents all they’ve had to overcome and the validation of their patience in pursuit of their mission. The Liberty finally winning their first championship in 28 years was a result of players, coaches and front office members staying true to who they are and using tough personal and professional battles to motivate them. But it also symbolized the franchise’s desire to be a part of writing a new history that uplifts the legacy of women’s basketball, a sport that in the past has been disregarded and under appreciated for so long.

Following an exuberant celebration alongside many bottles of Moët champagne, Coach Brondello explained what was different about winning her second championship in New York, 10 years after she won her first in Phoenix. She discussed how evenly matched the series against the No. 2 seed Minnesota Lynx was, rather than the series she played in against the Chicago Sky that gave her the 2014 championship. She noted how the 2024 New York Liberty were connected as a team in similar ways to the Mercury team she coached a decade ago. But then she said something that explains why this championship was very different from the one she earned 10 years ago. 

“I never strayed away from who I am as a coach,” she said. In New York she could get creative with lineups and hold players accountable. Inserting Sabally into the game alongside Jones, Stewart, Fiebich and Ionescu was a risk in Game 5 that paid off and paid off well. She made what Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve called the most impactful adjustment in the 2024 playoffs by moving Fiebich to the starting five and bringing Vandersloot off the bench. In New York, being herself was welcomed rather than what lost her a job. That’s why this title meant a lot to Brondello. 

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Thornton, who was subbed into the game early because Betnijah Laney-Hamilton struggled to guard Lynx forward Napheesa Collier on switches, has also thrived in New York by just being herself. Thornton spent most of her WNBA career in Dallas playing for a franchise that struggled to pack arenas. 

The women’s basketball community didn’t realize how hilarious Thornton was until this year, between her undeniable love of Papa John’s Pizza and the pranks she played on her teammates. She bought fake spiders and cockroaches on Amazon to fool players and Liberty staff. Thornton won a WNBA championship on her birthday on an evening she’ll never forget. “I don’t think the feelings have hit yet,” Thornton said postgame. “That champagne’s hit, but I don’t think that feelings have hit [yet].”

The feelings for Ionescu hit, and hit early before the celebration began. When the final buzzer went off and the initial confetti fell down from the ceiling of Barclays Center, Ionescu plopped onto the Liberty logo at half court, screamed and laid back with her hands covering her face. 

She did it. Ionescu won a title, something that she couldn’t compete for in March 2020 when the world was hit by a global pandemic. She returned to Oregon for her final season in college only for the NCAA tournament to be cancelled. She became a champion for the franchise that picked her No. 1 overall, and she became a champion after suffering what could have been a career-defining injury during her rookie season. And she endured a lot of loss in a very short span of time. “There were a lot of tears tonight,” she said. All of that is why. 

“Now to know that four years later I’ve had the best year of my life,” Ionescu said. “I can’t put it into words. I got married. And I was able to win a gold medal. Now I’m a champion. It’s the gratification of knowing that hard times don’t last.”

That gratification doesn’t only apply to Ionescu. Sabally, whose breakout performance shocked the world, had played at most 16 minutes during this postseason prior to Sunday night. Sabally was a highly touted prospect from Oregon like Ionescu and her older sister Satou. But the difference? Multiple knee surgeries kept her from playing healthily, and Liberty general manager Jonathan Kolb drafted her while knowing that she’d need another surgery before beginning her career as a pro. Even this season, it was a challenge for Sabally to stay on the court. She endured a back injury this past June and was out until right before the Olympics, where she and Fiebich played meaningful roles on the German national team.

In one evening, Sabally transformed from the sophomore with oodles of potential to the player that the Liberty would have lost without. Her performance birthed a new Liberty fan chant — the crowd chanted each syllable of her last name like this: Sab-al-ly. 

When the Liberty began their celebration on center court before Commissioner Cathy Engelbert presented the franchise with the championship hardware, Sabally hugged her family and jumped up and down. Moments later she was approached by Laney-Hamilton’s mother Yolanda for a hug and a chat that lasted almost 10 seconds. A member of the Liberty’s “Timeless Torches” 40+ dance troop looked on during the interaction in awe. He kept saying out loud through tears that if Sabally hadn’t come in, the Liberty wouldn’t have won the game. 

“I think what’s incredible about [Sabally] is if you look back at the semifinal series, she didn’t really play,” Stewart said postgame. “Then she stayed ready and knew that in the Finals, her time will come and she continued to stick with it … We needed a spark and she was that.”

The hard times for Vandersloot and the 2024 MVP Jones were inescapable this season. Vandersloot lost her mother Jan to multiple myeloma in the middle of the regular season. Vandersloot reflected upon what going through the “hardest year and summer of her life” means alongside winning New York City its first WNBA championship. The Liberty instructed Vandersloot to take as much time as she needed to be with her mother during her final days and then to mourn. 

But the now two-time WNBA champion wanted to finish what she came to New York for, and it’s what Jan would have wanted as well. What Jan also wanted was for her daughter to be taken care of, and treated like a proper professional athlete.

“I know that she always wanted me to be taken care of,” Vandersloot told reporters postgame. “That was the biggest reason why she wanted me to come here [from the Chicago Sky]. She knew that the New York Liberty would do that. So that satisfaction for us to come here and finish the job, me and mom, man we’re both happy.” 

Jan wanted what was best for her daughter rather than what was in her own best interests. Vandersloot mirrored her mother’s spirit during this postseason when she accepted a role coming off the bench. Just like her mother, she put the betterment of someone else — in this case a whole team — over her own desires.

The grief didn’t stop there for the Liberty. Jones also had a loved one pass during the regular season. She attended a funeral after the Commissioner’s Cup championship back in the Bahamas after her youth coach passed away. That was just another emotional hurdle to deal with in addition to her internal heartbreak from losing in three WNBA Finals in five years. 

With 1.2 seconds left in regulation on Sunday night, Jones found her way into Stewart’s arms while the clock expired. She sobbed while holding onto Stewart, crying in her ear. Jones didn’t say one word to Stewart, but at the same time she didn’t have to. The message from one MVP to another was well received. The two had manifested this dream and on Sunday night they had turned it into actuality. Before they played together in Russia, Jones had watched Stewart from afar, observing her win title after title and competing at the highest level collegiately and in the pros. 

“It really just means a lot to be able to win with her and to watch the way that she approaches the game every day,” Jones said about Stewart. “The way that she leads our team, because she is our leader and we look to her in tough moments. So it just really means a lot to have everything come together and to be able to win together.”

Once Stewart and Jones embraced, Kolb found Jones while she was squeezing Laney-Hamilton. Kolb said to her: “You won, you won. You did it.” Her tears flowed over again and now Kolb’s tear ducts watered after the gravity of the moment hit him. 

Kolb began this journey with the Liberty 2019 before any of the current players were even on the roster. He began plugging away year by year trying to construct the roster that he believed could deliver the city of New York its first basketball championship in almost 50 years. 

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He drafted Ionescu, and sold Laney-Hamilton, Jones, Vandersloot and Stewart on the idea that they could help bring the first championship to an original WNBA franchise in one of the nation’s most iconic cities. While Jones and Vandersloot didn’t have a connection to New York initially, making history and doing it alongside other great players in conjunction with some of the best amenities and care in the WNBA was enough. 

For Laney-Hamilton, Brooklyn and New York City were places she grew up calling a second home. It was her great aunt Jessie Green who took her around to museums and Broadway shows as a way to introduce her to New York culture. Laney-Hamilton adores the life she lives in New York and has taken it upon herself to share it with her niece JJ. While Laney-Hamilton didn’t grow up as a New Yorker, she’s always felt like an honorary one. 

Stewart, however, was born and raised in the state, and was attracted to the idea of being a catalyst to help her home state win after all the women’s basketball heartbreak. Before Sunday night, the Liberty were 0-5 in the WNBA finals. With Liberty players of the past in attendance on Sunday night, including Sue Wicks and Teresa Weatherspoon, this was just as much for them as it was for her. 

“We fought through because we wanted to bring it home for this city and this crowd,” Stewart said to Holly Rowe with tears in her eyes and her daughter Ruby on her hip. “This crowd is amazing.”

Howard Megdal and Rob Knox contributed reporting to this piece.