The Guru’s WNBA Report: Collier Hurt in Minnesota Record Wipeout of Las Vegas; Busy Five-Game Sunday Slate With Teams Bunched Below the Lynx; Connecticut Likely Boston Bound in ‘27 off Sale

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

Just one game Saturday was played in the WNBA in which Minnesota (24-5) extended its lead over defending champion New York (17-10) to six games with a league road wipeout win record 111-58 at Las Vegas (14-14) as Kayla McBride was 8-for-10 on shooting 3-pointers before a crowd of 10,488 at Michelob ULTRA Arena.

The eight all came in a row in the first half to tie another league mark as the Aces dropped a half-game to the last playoff spot at eighth behind expansion Golden State (14-13) who will visit Sunday afternoon with Las Vegas completing a back-to-back. The 3-point mark for an entire game is nine.

The win was tempered, however, when leading MVP candidate Napheesa Collier left the game late in the third quarter with a right ankle injury.

Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve, the former La Salle star out of South Jersey, said it was too soon to tell how severe the injury was.

“She was in the locker room with us, but as protocol, tomorrow or whatever chance we get, we’ll continue to evaluate and examine images, all that good stuff,” she said.

Collier, in her seventh season, was the MVP of the recent All-Star last month in Indiana and leads the league with a 23.8 scoring average, just ahead of Las Vegas’ A’ja Wilson (22.1), who won the MVP ahead of Collier last season in which the former UConn star was voted defensive player of the year.

Minnesota’s short road swing continues to Seattle Tuesday and Reeve postgame said it was too early to know if Collier would get imaging done in Las Vegas, fly with the team to Seattle or go back to Minneapolis.

Ironically, Collier’s mishap comes in the wake of the sideline of New York’s Breanna Stewart, who is out with a bone bruise in her right knee until near the playoffs and is a co-founder with Collier of the Unrivaled winter league launched in Miami last winter and will return in January.

The league at the All-Star game announced NIL deals to 14 top collegians, including Southern Cal’s JuJu Watkins, who is rehabilitating from an ACL injury suffered in the NCAA tournament.

In the game, the Associated Press reported, Collier was trailing on a play in which Natisha Hiedeman drove for a layup, and it appeared Collier stepped on teammate Alana Smith’s left foot and immediately fell near the Las Vegas bench.

She tried to get up but sat back on the court in pain and was surrounded by Aces players, including Wilson, to shield her from exposure.

Collier, who scored 18 points, left under her own power, but walking gingerly, slowly moving while favoring her right foot with a Lynx staffer under arm and did not return.

In the game, McBride finished with 24 points and the 53-point road win topped the record held by the 1998 Houston Comets in the second season of the WNBA in which the team won the second of four straight titles.

“I don’t think like that, on someone else’s court the game was over in the third quarter,” Reeve said on queried whether it was necessary to have Collier in the game considering the blowout it had become. “Sometimes these things happen. I get it. People will get on me because I’m sitting in the seat belt. Hopefully, she’ll be ok.”

Minnesota set a franchise record with 17 from deep in 27 attempts, 13-14 in the first half. New York set a record this season shooting 19 twice while Phoenix set a franchise mark at 18.

Jessica Shepard double doubled for the Lynx with 18 points and 14 boards, while Hideman scored 17.

“The game plan was to be ready for a team that had been spending days preparing for us,” Reeve said. “We were locked in on our execution, and, you know, honestly, making shots. Obviously, ‘Mac was terrific in her opportunities. I thought we were terrific in our defensive rebounds, it’s been our identity, we got that done and some thing we had been working on.

“We played great. That was the game plan. Try to play great.”

Las Vegas’ Jewel Loyd had 12 points, while Wilson finished with 10.

The Lynx came out firing from the opening tip connecting on 4-of-5 from deep and jumping to an 18-8 lead that became 35-17 by the end of the period off 6-of-7 threes.

Minnesota hit nine straight beyond the arc before the half leading 67-33 at the break.

“We have to move on,” Las Vegas coach Becky Hammon said. “We have another game tomorrow. We have to win. At halftime, I kind of know we’re not going to come back so you give (the starters) a few minutes.

“Everyone has to have pride, 1 through 10. We didn’t Today, we really drew a buzzsaw,” Hammon mentioned on how each of the three games against Minnesota were worse than the previous one. “They go 13 of 14. You’re not doing that as a group even if we’re swarming at them. You’re first instinct is solid basketball, and we weren’t.”

Looking Ahead

It’s another busy Sunday in a tight race for playoff spots and seeds with five games on the slate before a day off on Monday.

The Las Vegas-Golden State game is at 6 p.m. on the WNBA’s streaming League Pass while Washington (13-14) right behind the last slots at ninth a half-game out, visits Atlanta (17-11) at at 3 p.m. on ESPN3.

While the visiting Mystics are also just a game up on 10th-place Los Angeles (12-15), which is idle, the host Dream are a half-game behind New York and a half-game in front of Phoenix (16-11), which is visiting 11th place Chicago (7-20) at 6 p.m. on League Pass.

The Mercury, which followed a winning stretch in early July, has since been on a skid though still in the upper part of the standings in which fourth place Phoenix is a game behind New York, a half-game behind Atlanta but just a game ahead of Indiana (16-12) and Seattle (16-12) which are tied for fifth.

Those two play Sunday in the Northwest, Seattle coming off a double-overtime 108-106 home loss Friday at the finish while Indiana has won three in a row and the Fever now 8-7 without reigning rookie of the year Caitlin Clark, who will miss her seventh straight game with a groin injury dating to just before the All-Star break.

Overall, her total will reach 14 dating to an early season quad injury and previous groin injury plus being absent for Indiana’s Commissioner’s Cup title win at Minnesota, the All-Star three-point skills contest and the game itself of which she, with the most fan votes for starters, and Minnesota’s Collier were team captains.

New York is at Connecticut at 1 p.m. on League Pass, the second time in three days and on a four-game losing streak following Friday’s loss to the Sun (5-21).

It began with a one-point loss at home to Los Angeles at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn when Stewart went down early in the game and continued through road stops at Dallas, Minnesota in their first game with the Lynx since taking the Finals in October, and then Friday night.

Belgian Emma Messeman, the 2019 Finals MVP with Washington when the Mystics won, after being held out to get acclimated on her arrival, is expected to play against Connecticut.

 Sun Looking to Shine in Boston

Connecticut was making news off the court Saturday with initially the Boston Globe anthen The Associated Press and The Athletic reporting the team has been sold to a group led by NBA Celtics minority owner Steve Pagliuca for a record $325million and likely to move from the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville near New London to begin play in Boston in 2027.

The recently announced expansion additions that went to Cleveland (2028), Detroit (2029), and Philadelphia (by the 76ers and Comcast) went for $250 million, each.

The AP said Pagliuca would also add another $100 million for a practice facility in Beantown.

Golden State began this season and has been the most successful expansion franchise to date for first-year operations while selling out each game (18,404) at the Chase Center in San Francisco, also the home of the NBA Warriors, while also playing .500 ball.

Toronto and Portland will begin next summer. Each new team has ties to NBA ownership.

The sale is pending approval by the league and Board of Governors.

“Relocation decisions are made by the WNBA Board of Governors and not by individual teams,” the league said in a statement.

The Sun has played one game each the last two seasons at TD Garden selling out both in the home of the Celtics and Clark did play last month with Indiana in the game she suffered her current injury.

The popularity of the UConn women’s team, now with an extended record 12 NCAA titles after dethroning South Carolina last April in Tampa, in 2003 spurred the Mohegan Tribe to purchase the NBA-owned Orlando Miracle and move the team north, the first franchise at the time that was not attached to an existing NBA affiliate.

Connecticut became one of the better operations until this season when the winter loss of five starters and 10 of 12 on the roster through trades or free agency caused the plunge in the Sun’s fortunes.

In May the Sun announced it was looking for a potential buyer with the possibility a relocation would be involved.