Hello, hoopheads! I often struggle when asked things like what has been the best game of the season so far, with my brain more naturally grouping things in tiers as opposed to ranked lists. By that token, I can’t say with any strong conviction that the first meeting this season between the Golden State Valkyries and Minnesota Lynx was the best game, but it was definitely on a pretty short list of games that felt like I was watching two high-level teams play at a high level. The Lynx’s loss to the Las Vegas Aces during Commissioner’s Cup play also comes to mind, as does the New York Liberty’s Cup win over the Atlanta Dream. Wherever it ranks, that initial Lynx-Valkyries thriller was certainly among the best games, so we should be in for a solid Friday night of hoops if only because they’ll be squaring off again (and at Ballhalla this time). The Lynx-Valks rematch will be getting the bulk of my attention today, but first a few words on the Dream and Indiana Fever, who played another of those high-level matchups in the only game on last night’s schedule.
Atlanta ultimately prevailed by a 108-101 margin last night, improving to 10-4 and snapping the Fever’s four-game win streak, but not before Indiana erased a 10-point fourth-quarter deficit. The Dream would then outscore the Fever 13-6 after it was tied at 95 with 3:16 to play, with Allisha Gray, Rhyne Howard and Angel Reese each scoring 4 points during that game-ending spurt. Reese finished as the top scorer on the night with 21 points and 11 rebounds on a tidy 8-for-14 from the field, although she did have four turnovers, while the other four Atlanta starters (Gray, Howard, Jordin Canada and Naz Hillmon) all scored in the 16-to-18-point range as the Dream’s offense sure seems to have left its early-season slump behind. Atlanta’s offensive rating of 124.1 points per 100 possessions according to Her Hoop Stats was the highest posted by a Fever opponent so far and the Dream’s sixth time putting up a rating of at least 106.2 in their last eight games, something they did only once in their first six outings. The Dream now sit fourth in both offensive rating (106.8 points per 100 possessions) and defensive rating (100.0 points allowed per 100 possessions) according to HHS, with the end of the floor they’re better known for having caught up thanks to one of the defense’s less stingy nights. Indiana got 20-point outings from Caitlin Clark (26 points, 8-for-17 FG, 7 assists, 5 turnovers), Kelsey Mitchell (26 points, 10-for-15 FG) and Aliyah Boston (23 points, 8-for-15 FG, 8 rebound, 3 assists, 3 blocks) and another efficient 12-point effort from a hot shooter whose name you can read elsewhere. The Fever, however, fell to 2-6 when allowing their opponents to post offensive ratings of at least 100 points per 100 possessions and 0-4 when allowing opponents to put up ratings of at least 110.
And now, on to tonight’s main event, as the Minnesota Lynx (12-3) visit the Golden State Valkyries (10-5) (10:00 ET, ION/League Pass) looking to guarantee they maintain sole possession of first place in the WNBA standings (the Liberty can tie the Lynx should they lose). Minnesota held off Golden State by an 87-84 margin when they played in Minneapolis 15 days ago in a Commissioner’s Cup game, with Cecilia Zandalasini’s potential game-tying 3-pointer at the buzzer falling no good and letting Lynx star Courtney Williams off the hook for missing a free throw that could’ve made it a four-point game moments earlier. Rookie of the Year Olivia Miles was the best player on the floor in that game, something that has been the case a stunning amount of the time this season, and I say that as someone who always expected big things for her in the WNBA. Miles scored 28 points on 9-for-16 from the field, setting the WNBA rookie record with 8 makes from deep on 11 attempts and dishing out 7 assists with just 1 turnover. On top of all that, Miles had 3 blocks, and those unsurprisingly made her the first WNBA player with 8 triples and 3 blocks in a game (including playoffs), There are only five instances of a MNBA player putting up 8 threes, 7 assists and 3 blocks in a game, including playoffs, even with their extra 8 minutes, and one of those instances required double-overtime. The men who’ve done it include the likes of Vince Carter, Luka Doncic, James Harden and Damian Lillard. Many players other than Miles played well in the first meeting between the Lynx and Valks, but it was really the Olivia Miles Show, so let’s move on.
Minnesota may have taken out some frustrations from its loss to the Aces, which snapped an eight-game Lynx win streak and ultimately kept them out of the Commissioner’s Cup title game, while pasting the last two opponents in Cup play by a combined 49 points. The more recent of those wins was a 16-point blowout of the Los Angeles Sparks on Wednesday night in Hollywood behind the Rookie of the Year’s career-high 31 points on 12-for-15 from the field. Miles has scored at least 19 points in six of her last seven games, averaging an absurd 23.1 points per game in that span, while her team-high scoring average of 19 ppg is 9th in the league for the season. She’s also sitting in the top-10 in the league in assists per game, tied for 8th averaging 5.7 helpers. The only other players in the top-10 in both ppg and apg with a minimum of five games played so far are Clark, Paige Bueckers and Kelsey Plum.
Miles’ outstanding play is one of the main reasons the Lynx have surged into the top spot in offensive rating with a mark of 111.6 points per 100 possessions according to Her Hoop Stats, just shy of two-and-a-half points per 100 possessions better than Las Vegas (109.2). Minnesota’s lead in defensive rating (95.3 points allowed per 100 possessions) is even larger, with Golden State now second at 99.1 after Atlanta fell a couple spots last night. There’s no doubt the Lynx have been the best team so far, but it is fair to note that they’ve looked quite a bit less dominant in four games so far against teams in the top five in the standings — which goes down to Golden State — than they have in their other 11 games. Minnesota is 2-2 against Atlanta (1-1), Golden State (1-0) and Las Vegas, with a scoring margin of +14 points (+3.5 points per game), all of which comes from a 15-point win over the Dream in the teams’ second early-season matchup in Minnesota. By contrast, the Lynx have gone 10-1 with a +187 margin (+17 ppg) against everyone who doesn’t have 10 wins yet.
Golden State’s won four in a row since falling to the Lynx and Aces by a total of eight points over a three-day span in Commissioner’s Cup play, both on the road and coming down to the final seconds. The Valkyries actually let the game against the Aces slip away down the stretch, and the Lynx would probably be hosting the Commissioner’s Cup final if that hadn’t happened, so perhaps they’ll have frustrations to take out on the Valkyries like they did on the Portland Fire and the Sparks. Golden State’s last two wins were both fairly one-sided affairs at Ballhalla, first by 20 points against the in-state rival Sparks and then by 11 against the Dallas Wings. Depending on your view of the Wings, however, this is either the first or second game of a very tough stretch of schedule (I would say it’s the second game). Golden State heads back to Las Vegas on Sunday, then returns to Ballhalla for a three-game homestand against Atlanta (twice) and New York, after which the Valkyries head to Atlanta to face the Dream for the third time in four games. They then close out the first half of the season with three more games on the eastern seaboard and, seemingly just as a fuck you from the league, start the second half with a singleton road game at Indiana (or the end of a five-game road trip with a five-day gap for All-Star between games four and five, if you choose to look at it as such).
That grind will be a real test for the Valks, whose 2nd-ranked defense is accompanied by the 6th-best offensive rating at 106.5 points per 100 possessions. I do, however, believe it’s best to think of everyone from 4th (106.8) through 9th (104.6) in offensive rating as an amorphous blob. All of them — Atlanta, Dallas, Golden State, Toronto, Indiana and Los Angeles, in their current order — are solid offensive teams who aren’t quite on the level of Minnesota, Las Vegas or New York (3rd, 108.4) but whose specific ranking in that 4-through-9 doesn’t mean much. As someone who picked Atlanta to win the title, I think the Dream have the potential to sit in that top tier, but they haven’t quite gotten above the blob yet even though they’re trending that way.
While I’ll always think of Golden State as Veronica Valkyrie’s (Burton’s) team, I’d be remiss not to mention that the team’s marquee free-agent signing Gabby Williams has been on a heater of late, most recently scoring 25 points in the win over Dallas. She’s averaging 22.4 points per game during a five-game streak with at least 16 points in each, including three 25-point games, and she’s 11-for-30 (36.7%) from deep in that span while hitting multiple 3-pointers in four of the five games. That’s only one shy of the number of times Williams made multiple shots from deep in her first 10 games with Golden State, although she was a bit more accurate (38.5%) during that not-quite-as-prolific shooting stretch before this hot streak.
Tonight’s undercard features a pair of games, most notably my New York Liberty (11-4) looking for a ninth straight win as they host the Washington Mystics (6-7) (7:30 ET, ION/League Pass). New York was far from dominant in Wednesday’s one-point triumph at Chicago, needing a game-winning layup from Sabrina Ionescu on the team’s final possession and then one of Sky rookie Sydney Taylor’s only misses on a huge night, but the Libs can set a new league-wide season-long win streak with a ninth in a row to go one win further than the Lynx recently did. The Liberty have beaten the Mystics twice already, first in an overtime win in D.C. on Mother’s Day when the Liberty were very shorthanded and then a 22-point rout five days ago in Brooklyn, where they’ll play again tonight, when the Liberty were at full strength for the first time this season. They technically haven’t had a second such game yet, as Betnijah Laney-Hamilton sat out on Wednesday after receiving a planned injection in her surgically-repaired knee, and she’s questionable again for tonight. Still, the fact that the team is doing things like planning absences to help key players manage lingering issues should tell you how much less shorthanded they are than when a pair of hardship signings had to play in the first meeting. Washington is looking for its first consecutive wins of the season after bouncing back from Sunday’s rout in Brooklyn by beating the Connecticut Sun (2-14), who host the Toronto Tempo (7-8) (7:30 ET, ION/League Pass) in tonight’s other early game. I hope Canada’s Team thrashes the Sun much like its men’s soccer team did Qatar yesterday, but without the part where someone on Canada’s Team suffers a gruesome injury due to a cheap shot. Don’t be dirty, Sun, even though you suck.