After spending the last several weeks as teammates en route to a nail-biting 67-66 gold medal game victory over Team France, six of the world’s greatest talents in women’s basketball met in a matchup between two of the WNBA’s best teams on Saturday.
The New York Liberty, led by Team USA standouts Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu, punched their ticket to the postseason by vanquishing four of their former Olympic colleagues on the Las Vegas Aces— All-WNBA center A’ja Wilson, plus All-Star guards Jackie Young, Chelsea Gray and Kelsey Plum — in a 79-67 road win.
Read More: Team USA Women’s Basketball Avoids Disaster, Holds Off France to Win Gold Medal
The Aces actualy started the game off more robustly than did the Liberty, outscoring New York 28-24 in the contest’s opening quarter. But an 18-8 response put New York on top at the halftime break, 42-36, and New York continued to assert itself in the second half.
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Offensively, Ionescu was New York’s scoring standout. The 5-foot-11 shooting guard scored 23 points on 9-of-21 shooting (3-of-10 from long range) and 2-of-2 foul line shooting, while pulling down six boards, dishing out three dimes, and swiping one steal. Stewart chipped in 18 points on 7-of-16 shooting, seven rebounds, two blocks, two steals, and one assist. 6-foot-6 center Jonquel Jones notched a 10-point, 17-rebound double-double, while also dishing out seven assists.
The Liberty and Aces are two of the most loaded teams in the league. Stewart, a 6-foot-4 Liberty power forward out of UConn, is the league’s reigning MVP. Jones, the 2021 MVP, and two-time All-WNBA wing Ionescu, still just 26, were all named to the All-Star team this season. Five-time All-Star point guard Courtney Vandersloot, another likely Hall of Famer, is also on the Liberty.
All four Team USA Aces also made the 2024 WNBA All-Star squad. Wilson, like Stewart, is a two-time champion and a two-time league MVP. The two bigs are co-favorites for the honor yet again this season, and could very likely square off against each other in the 2024 Finals much as they did in 2023.
Wilson scored a game-high 24 points on 8-of-15 shooting from the floor, while also pulling down a game-high 11 rebounds, blocking three shots, and stealing three more.
The Liberty enjoyed advantages in field goal shooting (40.5 percent to 36.9 percent) and rebounding 46-30. Four New York players scored in double figures, compared to just three for Las Vegas.
By icing Las Vegas today and improving to a league-best 23-4 record, the Liberty have become the first WNBA squad to secure a playoff berth, per ESPN. The Aces, meanwhile, dropped to a still-respectable 16-9 record (8-6 at home). Last year’s Liberty went 32-8, a franchise best at the time. This year’s iteration has a chance at besting that total.
Last year’s Aces, meanwhile, went a near-impossible 34-6. That result is obviously out the window in 2024, but Gray missed much of the early part of the season, adversely impacting Las Vegas’ start. The Aces are hoping to win a third straight championship this year, but the Liberty have emerged as the team likeliest to stop such a dominant run. They proved again Saturday that they’re more than up to that challenge.
