The Phoenix Mercury are headed to the WNBA Finals, while the Indiana Fever force a Game 5

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There were two WNBA semifinal games with opposing results on Sunday.

The No. 4-seed Phoenix Mercury took care of business, defeating the No. 1-seed Minnesota Lynx 86-81 to make the 2025 WNBA Finals, and the No. 6-seed Indiana Fever once again avoided elimination, beating the No. 1-seed Las Vegas Aces 90-83 to force a winner-take-all Game 5.

The Mercury got it done with Alyssa Thomas being very close to another triple-double. She had 23 points, eight rebounds and 10 assists. Satou Sabally added 21 points, and DeWanna Bonnner contributed 13 points from off the bench.

For the Fever, their trio was stupendous. Aliyah Boston led the way with 24 points and 14 rebounds. Kelsey Mitchell scored a game-high 25 points, and Odyssey Sims scored 18 points on 6-for-9 shooting. With the victory, Indiana has forced a Game 5 in Las Vegas on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Phoenix will get four days of rest as the WNBA Finals begin on Friday.

The joy of victory, the agony of defeat

Watching sports can be a euphoric and miserable experience, and often for the same reason: There is an undeniable outcome we must come to terms with.

In other mediums, such as film or music, your delusion can deny reality. If you love an album and everyone else hates it, you don’t have to admit you were wrong. You can simply continue to enjoy it and reject the consensus. Sports do not allow such mercy. There are winners and losers. You can contextualize that, but in the end, the score is the score, and someone, ultimately, didn’t get the job done.

In the Mercury-Lynx series, Minnesota is the team that has to deal with the disappointment of defeat. They’ll also have plenty of reasons to hold their head up high and chalk up this postseason exit to a series of unfortunate events. The Lynx can think that if DiJonai Carrington and Napheesa Collier didn’t get hurt, they would’ve won. Minnesota can argue, and their head coach Cheryl Reeve certainly did, that poor officiating led to them losing Game 3, in addition to contributing to Collier’s ultimate injury. The Lynx can even say that had Reeve not been suspended, they would’ve been able to win Game 4, even with Collier out.

However, that’s giving one team all the benefit of the doubt and assuming a best-case scenario. The injuries are certainly unfortunate for the Lynx, but they are a part of the game, and all teams face the same risk. Reeve went off, and it cost her team. And regardless of what anyone says, the Mercury consistently outplayed the Lynx and won this series.

Still, two-straight seasons ending in disappointing fashion certainly stings. And when you feel like the only luck you had was bad luck, it adds salt to the wounds. When Kayla McBride, who scored 31 points in the Game 4 loss, spoke after the game, she was in tears discussing how valiantly her team fought to try to pull out the win.

It’s never fun to lose, and when you are left wondering, “What if?,” it’s a hard pill to swallow. Yet the facts are, the Lynx didn’t win the series. The better team during these four games was the Mercury, and that‘s why they have more games left on their 2025 calendar.

No one saw the Mercury doing what they just did. Plenty of experts ranked them lowly in the preseason rankings, and many had them losing to the Liberty in the opening round. Now, they are four wins away from a championship.

This series against the Lynx wasn’t easy. They had to comeback from a 14-point deficit in Game 4 to win. And remember Game 2, when they were down by 20 and found a way to earn the overtime victory.

For the Mercury, this season and series was all about proving the doubters wrong.

Thomas was a top MVP candidate, but didn’t win the award. Now, she just helped defeat the top seed in the WNBA. Bonner left the Fever midseason to rejoin the Mercury. While many found the move to be an odd one, now she’s about to play in the WNBA Finals. Sabally was traded in the offseason to Phoenix, and now she’s about to play in the most important games of her career. Nate Tibbets was hired as the head coach for the Mercury after the 2023 season, a hiring that provoked a lot of conversations and criticism regarding the process.

Well, the Mercury have let their game do the talking, and they can rejoice in being one of the last two teams standing.

The Aliyah Boston game

Throughout this series, Boston has had the challenge of directly competing against A’ja Wilson. It hasn’t been a one-on-one scenario all of the time, but the two bigs are often battling for interior dominance, trying to shift the advantage their way.

As Wilson is the MVP and arguably the best player in the WNBA, this matchup could have been an aspect of this series where Indiana just had to concede they’d lose. No team shuts down or beats Wilson individually.

But in Game 4, Boston proved that she can keep up with the Aces’ superstar. Boston shot 7-for-15 from the field, had a team-high five assists and was not only able to get to the line, but was also elite, going 10-for-13 from the charity stripe. Now, that’s more trips to the free throw line than the entire Las Vegas team, but that’s what happens when you stay aggressive and drive to the paint as much as possible. Boston stayed inside all afternoon long, demonstrating a high level of dominance and discipline to get to her spots as she attempted only one long 2-pointer.

It’s easy to forget due to the arrival of and attention on Caitlin Clark, but Boston was Indiana’s first rookie phenom. She was an All-Star right away, and while she still has room to grow before she reaches her prime, Boston is already one of the best players in the WNBA.

In Game 4, she gave the best performance of her young career, and because of that, the Fever are one win away from their first WNBA Finals appearance since 2015.

Now, Game 5 will be the toughest challenge the Fever have faced yet. Can they put it all together and take down the battle-tested Aces on the road in the hostile environment that is Michelob ULTRA Arena?

It seems foolish to doubt Indiana now, but Las Vegas will still be the favorite. They are at home, have a healthy roster, and even with the Game 4 loss, they have to like their chances. Indiana still has to feel pretty good, though. Boston is coming off her best game of the series, Mitchell is playing great and so is Sims. No one expected them to get this far, but they are rallying together and embracing the underdog role.

Regardless of the result in Game 5, expect the same emotions we got in Game 4 of the Mercury-Lynx series. One team will be celebrating and feeling joy, the other will be angry, frustrated and still walking away thinking they should’ve won. But only one team between Indiana and Las Vegas will actually win, and that team will face the Mercury with the WNBA championship up for grabs beginning on Friday.

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