The Guru’s WNBA Playoff Roundup: New York Gets Routed by Phoenix Forcing Game 3 Friday night; Top-Seed Minnesota Rally Clips Golden State Ending the Expansion Cinderella Season

 By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

NEW YORK — The topsy turvy Game 2 action of the best-of-three first round of the WNBA playoffs continued Wednesday night here at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn where the defending champion, but fifth seed, New York Liberty got women handled 86-60 by fourth-seed Phoenix before a sellout crowd of 17,017 to tie the series 1-1 and send it back to Arizona at 9 p.m. Friday night on ESPN2.

 Meanwhile, out West eighth-seed Golden State had its road to more expansion team history end in bittersweet fashion, clipped 75-74 by top-seed Minnesota before a crowd of 18,543 at the SAP Center, a 50-mile trip south to San Jose, that was slightly larger than the 18,064 fans who set a league record filling the Chase Center in San Francisco for all 22 home games.

The winning Lynx become the first team to advance, moving on to the semifinals against Friday night’s winner, which if New York recovers from the Mercury drubbing would be a rematch of last season’s thrilling best-of-five finals won by the Liberty 3-2 last October at the finish in overtime for the organization’s first title in their 28 year history dating to the WNBA inaugural summer of 1997.

The participants in the other semifinal will be decided off Thursday’s Games 3 doubleheader on ESPN2 when third seed Atlanta is back home at 7:30 p.m. hosting six-seed Indiana, which dominated the Dream Tuesday night in Indianapolis, before two-seed Las Vegas at 9:30 p.m. tries to recover from six-seed Seattle’s stunning comeback from a 14-point deficit late in the that Game 2 in the Northwest closing out the Aces with a 16-4 run at the finish.

As for Wednesday’s action, it was a decided thrill for the winners and tough for the losers, especially the Valkyries, whose day started with Natalie Nakase, a former UCLA player who was an assistant on Las Vegas’ two WNBA champions, becoming the first from an expansion team to be named WNBA coach of the year from its national media panel.

Akase earlier in the week also won a similar award from the Associated Press.

Here at mid-evening, Phoenix’s back against the wall lasted on quarter, the two teams tied 25-25 after the first ten minutes, and then the Mercury lowered the boom with a 26-12 rout in the next period and continued to outscore the Liberty 18-10 and 17-13 in the third and fourth quarters.

New York had been in excellent position after Sunday’s upset in overtime that enabled the Liberty to return home and go for a 2-0 sweep, but it was not to be, even with two-time MVP Breanna Stewart deciding to play after an MRI showed no structural damage to her left knee, which got hurt in Sunday’s game.

Satou Sabally and Alyssa Thomas each scored 15 points for Phoenix, while North Philly’s Kahleah Copper out of Rutgers and previously Chicago in the NBA scored 14 points as did reserve DeWanna Bonner.

“It was just amazing to see everyone come out and play 100 percent because we don’t want to be done yet,” Sabally said.

Phoenix came into the game attributing as much as Sunday’s loss to missed shots the Mercury normally sink as opposed to anything New York had done defensively.

“I’ve been impressed with our defense, the second half Sunday night and the last three quarters here tonight,” said Phoenix coach Nate Tibbetts, who before the game and after said he was a proponent of the format change in the first round to a 1-1-1, even though his team didn’t take advantage of the home advantage in Game 1.

“I think every team in the playoffs deserves at least one home game to play in front of its fans. I just love our competitive spirit. Give our group credit. They really bought in.

“When we rebound and guard, we can go,” he said of the huge transition advantage. “That’s when (Alyssa Thomas) is at her best.”

This time it was the Liberty who couldn’t find the mark, missing their first 12 shots of the third period and looking like the team that fell 3-1 in the season series with the Mercury, though the slew of New York injuries across the season was a factor in those setbacks.

“We’re a way better team than we showed tonight, so it’s disappointing,” said New York coach Sandy Brondello, who has coaching Phoenix to a title in her resume besides last season’s achievement by New York. “We turned the ball over and gave them easy baskets in transition and just went away from what was working for us, the first game. But we know what we need to do, so it’s just going back and that’s it, it’s an elimination game.

“We just got to stay confident. We’ll focus on being better. It’s disappointing playing like that in front of our home fans, but we’re still alive so we’re going to go out there and and win a game in Phoenix.”

Emma Meesseman scored 11 to top the home team.

“We just have to go out there and play like our season’s on the line, because it is, and so is theirs,” said Sabrina Ionescu. “It’s going to come down to so who can bring the best 40 minutes of basketball and hopefully, that’s us.”

New York games usually draw their share of celebrities and Spike Lee, Tracee Ellis Ross, and recent Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame inductee Sue Bird, now manager of USA Basketball’s senior women’s team, were some of the notables drawing loud cheers from the crowd when they appeared on the Jumbotron.

Just like Tuesday, for all the surprise that occurred in the opening games, it was the nightcaps that had all the drama.

No Fairy Tale Finish For the Expansion Wonders Getting Ejected by Minnesota

On Wednesday, Golden State wasn’t lacking in ambience after being forced to give up the Chase Center due to a scheduling conflict that was in place well before the Bay Area landed the first WNBA expansion team since Atlanta.

The Valkyries, besides attendance in the overall achievement category that has made them the most valued of the 13 WNBA teams, set records for most expansion team wins and first expansion team to earn a postseason qualification. For most of the night they were well on the way to be the first to earn a playoff triumph, jumping to a 27-19 lead after the first period and winning the next two to hit the final ten minutes ahead 63-49, just three less than their largest 17-point advantage a few minutes earlier.

The Lynx then came to life showing why they dominated the record 44-game schedule in the regular season.

They played the fourth quarter with a passion leading to MVP candidate Napheesa Collier to put the Lynx ahead with an 18-foot shot with 1:24 left in regulation.

“I would say, just the desperation we played with,” said Collier of the finish. “Knowing we were down by a lot at that point and we only had ten minutes to get it back. Just playing. ‘Coach (Cheryl Reeve) said there’s nothing I can draw up for you. You’re just going to have to go out there and play.

“(Golden State) scouted all our plays. It’s a playoff series. So just go out there and play. I thought we did a really good job of just being aggressive in that fourth quarter.”

But Golden State following a Lynx shot clock violation with four seconds left had a chance but was unable to get a storybook finish when Cecilia Zandalasini missed a jumper.

Collier was 10-for-16 from the field, scoring 14 of her 24 points in the second half after collecting 20 in Sunday’s win, while Kayla McBride scored 18 points.

Golden State’s Veronica Burton, named Most Improved Player by both the AP and the WNBA national panel, scored 13 points with nine assists, and reserve Monique Billings scored 15 points.

“Obviously, that’s a very tough way to go out,” said Burton, who played her collegiate ball at Northwestern. “When you have a lead the majority of the game. I think we’ve had a few games like that this year so it stings even more. But really, just soaking this all in. This was an incredible experience. This was an incredible team.”

Nakase talked about her season-ending scene in the locker room afterwards.

“So proud, so proud,” she said. “That’s the first thing I said. Number one, I said, ‘Get your f… heads up.’ They were down, and I said, ‘I want everyone’s eye contact. I wanna feel every single person right now. Your emotions, your heart, I want everything.’

“They all looked up, and I just told them how proud I was. To have that place rocking tonight, to have that Ballhalla mentality, to be able to go toe to toe with the number one team, I was so proud,” she said.