The Guru’s WNBA Roundup: Las Vegas Completes 2-0 Sweep of Golden State Gaining Ground at the Bottom Push to Make Playoffs

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

There is a two-part race in the WNBA playoff race stretch drive.

The gridlock running from the high end for home court advantage in the opening and semifinal rounds is just a 3.5 game spread between the defending WNBA champion New York Liberty (19-10) in second and the sixth-place tie between Seattle (16-14) and Las Vegas (16-14).

At the very top with a wide 5.5 lead Minnesota (25-5) is dismissed from this opening narrative but with two notations.

The Lynx must navigate the next several weeks without MVP frontrunner Napheesa Collier who suffered a sprained ankle in Saturday’s wipeout win at Las Vegas.

And though the New Yorkers are without Breanna Stewart until the playoffs draw near due to a bone bruise on her right knee, free-agent and past WNBA standout Emma Meesseman is now two games into the fold and beginning Sunday (12:30 p.m., ABC/ESPN+) first at  home in the Barclays Center in Brooklyn and continuing over a compacted period of three games after the recent loss in Minneapolis, the Liberty have an opportunity to draw closer to the Lynx they beat last October at the end in overtime in the decisive Game 5 for their first title in the 28-year history of the franchise.

In the second part of the hunt for official placements on September 11th at the end of the regular season, concluding a record 44-game schedule, the distance between fifth place Indiana (17-13) and 10th place Washington (13-16) is 3.5 games among six teams to squeeze into four spots in the eight-team field.

Wednesday night featured just one game on the WNBA slate, and it centered on two teams that would not have thought to be part of the lower six when the season opened.

One has become the better late than be lottery bound Las Vegas Aces, a team over the last three seasons that won back-to-back titles and last summer was in the semifinals, who made it a 2-0 sweep the last four days over expansion Golden State 78-72 with a road triumph before 18,064 Valkyries fans at the Chase Center in San Francisco.

The crowd extended the season-long sellout every game at the shared home with the NBA Warriors for a team that is trying to be the first to make the playoffs in its initial season of operation.

The outcome enabled the Aces, who have been playing jump rope on both sides of the cutoff, to catch Seattle and move within a game of Indiana and 2.5 of Atlanta (18-11) and Phoenix (18-11) and put a 1.5 lead on Golden State (14-15) and two in front of Los Angeles (13-15), which has been surging in recent weeks.

Reigning MVP A’ja Wilson scored 27 points while Jackie Young and Jewell Loyd each scored 14 points as the Aces followed Sunday’s win at home, which a day earlier was the scene of Las Vegas on the underside of Minnesota’s 111-58 victory that set a WNBA road record for winning differential.

It wasn’t easy, however.

After ending the third quarter on a 13-4 run for a 64-54 lead the offense for the Aces went cold in the opening four minutes of the final period and the Valkyries drew within three before Las Vegas untracked with a 5-0 spurt featured by Loyd’s make from deep.

The visitors held on and Wilson, who was 8-11 from the field and a perfect 11-11 at the line, wrapped it up with a pair of foul shots with 34.9 left.

The former South Carolina star also reached 500 career blocks to become 10th in league history.

“Executing the game plan at a higher level. More attention to detail,” Aces coach Becky Hammon said of her team’s improvement on defense. “Staying on top of those little things like pick up points. Sounds like a little thing but it really sets the stage for your defense.

“We did a little better job on the glass tonight. The last time this team really got away from us on the glass. Little things like that. Blocking out. They’ve been very locked in,” she continued.

“There were very big implications for both teams. Fourth game tiebreaker scenarios. Both teams are really hungry to start building some momentum.”

Golden State has had to readjust since All-Star Kayla Thornton, the leading scorer, recently suffered a season-ending injury.

Tiffany Hayes scored 14 points, Janelle Salaun collected 13 points, and Carla Leite and Kaila Charles each scored 11.

The Aces went ahead for good 51-48 on Young’s shot beyond the arc late in the third quarter though the home team got close once more off the visitors’ fourth quarter dry spell.

“The game came down to it ended in six points,” said Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase. “In terms of free throws, it also matters when they’re getting called. So if the Aces are shooting 16 percent in the fourth quarter and they’re getting five more free throws that’s very convenient.

“So I’m just saying the calls have to be consistent. If Jackie Young is shooting a jumper and now we touch her, that’s fine. But if Carla Leite is shooting a jumper and gets touched by Jewell, you got to tell me what is the reason (no call). You know what I mean? You guys saw the game. It was the same shot and the consistency of the calls were not the same.

“I thought our girls did a great job considering the physicality.”

Las Vegas next hosts Seattle Friday at 10 p.m. part of Friday’s three-game ION package that includes Washington at Minnesota and New York at Dallas (8-22) both at 7:30 p.m.

Golden State hosts Los Angeles at 8:30 p.m. Saturday the same night Indiana hosts Chicago (8-21) at 8 p.m. on CBS on the league’s two-game slate.

Indiana, first, has a key game at Phoenix Thursday at 10 p.m. on the second part of an Amazon Prime Video doubleheader as the Fever’s Caitlin Clark, the reigning rookie of the year, continues to be sidelined with a groin injury.

Earlier Atlanta is at Chicago while the WNBA’s streaming League Pass will air Los Angeles hosting last place Connecticut (5-23) at 10 p.m.