WNBA: Stewie’s injury and more questions before Liberty-Mercury Game 2

The No. 5-seed New York Liberty stole Game 1 of their first-round matchup against the No. 4-seed Phoenix Mercury, outscoring the home team 11-4 in overtime.

The Liberty now have an early chance to advance as the lower seed on Wednesday (8 p.m. ET, ESPN), but an injured superstar is dulling optimism for the defending champions.

Game 2 will be tale of two potential games

There are two distinctly different basketball games that could be played tonight.

One with the All-World talent Breanna Stewart, and one without. Each team assuredly is hoping for one, but bracing for the other.

Stewie injured her left knee—not the knee that caused her to miss 13 regular-season outings—in overtime of Game 1. She seemed to tweak it amidst a routine one-foot approach while driving baseline, immediately wincing as she elevated. As far as non-contact injuries go, the fact that she returned to the bench and was seen at yesterday’s practice with just a compression sleeve is enough to exhale. A source close to the situation told ESPN that she underwent an MRI yesterday; at practice, head coach Sandy Brondello said that the results came back “relatively clean.” However, expect the Liberty to air on the side of caution if they aren’t 100 percent confident in Stewie’s health.

In the event that Stewie is bound to the sideline, don’t expect Sabrina Ionescu to absorb the vacant shot attempts. She’s already shooting upwards of 15 shots in most playoff games, and jamming her up with a responsibility isn’t healthy. Instead, expect more natural involvement of New York’s ancillary scorers. Jonquel Jones, Natasha Cloud and Kennedy Burke are all capable of inheriting offensive usage. Nyara Sabally and Marine Johannès were healthy scratches in the opening game who can still be trusted on the floor in an adjusted rotation. There is no replacing Stewie’s production, but maybe fans of the movie Moneyball could see the Liberty “re-creating her in the aggregate.”

It should also be noted that New York by no means becomes a bad team without their star wing. Stewie’s role isn’t as pivotal as it once was. She’s taking the fewest shot attempts per game in her entire WNBA career this year, and finished the regular season at her lowest-scoring mark since her rookie campaign (albeit still a monster 18 points per game). As is routinely mentioned on broadcasts, the two-time MVP is shooting only 24 percent from 3 this season. Without Stewie, the Liberty’s advantages certainly flatten out in the face of Phoenix’s frontcourt size, but they don’t limp.

Although we rightfully dwell on them when previewing the series, New York shouldn’t obsess over injury hypotheticals. The Liberty got absolutely dismantled in the margins of Game 1, salvaging a win purely through the poor shooting of Phoenix. New York lost the turnover battle 20-10, and only attempted nine free-throws compared to 72 field goal attempts. They scored two total bench points in 30 minutes of combined play from three reserves. While they shot marginally better than their opponents, their percentages look far from the standard that they set last season. With or without Stewart, the Liberty need to tighten up. They afforded an experienced Mercury team too many chances, and can’t expect the same results if they make a habit of sloppy basketball.

It won’t be easy for Phoenix to fix their shooting woes

Sunday was an afternoon to forget for Satou Sabally.

Shooting an objectionable 2-for-17 from the field and 1-for-10 from 3, she tied the WNBA record for fewest makes on 15-plus attempts in a playoff game. The good news for Mercury fans is that the law of averages would suggest Sabally comes back with an acceptable, if not good, shooting performance on Wednesday. The bad news is that Sabally didn’t just have an “unlucky” game; she’s at the mercy of a poor matchup.

Phoenix boasts two bruising, physical forwards: Sabally and Alyssa Thomas. They both love to prey on size mismatches, which are often available to them because teams generally don’t deploy enough forwards to mark them while keeping professional rebound-chaser Natasha Mack off the offensive glass. Sabally can blow past traditional 4s and 5s and can out-muscle most 3s. Thomas can win downhill against nearly anyone, and is the league’s paramount offensive passing hub. Unfortunately for the Mercury, New York is about the only team who rosters just as many giants. Stewart, Jones and Leonie Fiebich are all 6-foot-4 and up. Jones and Fiebich are both solid bodies who don’t forfeit weight disparities. Stewart isn’t the strongest player, but her infamous 7-foot wingspan allows her to recover to contest shots after getting bumped out of position.

These matchups don’t just manifest on paper or in articles like this. Sabally’s lone interior basket came against Cloud, who couldn’t scramble out of a sloppy mismatch in time. Her only other make was a deep transition 3. She wasn’t able to do anything in the half court against Fiebich or Burke, who New York rightfully trusted with the assignment. Thomas scored 14 points, but the film showed a similar story. Five of her seven baskets were scored against the 5-foot-11 Ionescu. Four of those came from middle ball screens set for Thomas, intentionally hunting the switch onto Sabrina. The fifth came from an offensive rebound putback after Ionescu was once again forced to switch. Her passing was as advertised, but she just doesn’t have a significant scoring advantage when guarded by Jones.

As was mentioned earlier, Phoenix should be commended for winning the margins of the game. They played defense, they valued the basketball and they took the defending champions to overtime. Kahleah Copper and DeWanna Bonner played fine, but just didn’t do enough to make up for two of their top three scorers looking utterly overwhelmed by matchups that they’ll see again. The Mercury are also putting chips on rookie Monique Akoa Makani, asking her to hold her own against two of the league’s most experienced guards in Ionescu and Cloud. Makani played passable defense on Ionescu, but cancelled out her own productivity by shooting 2-for-11 from the floor. She had a great regular season, but rookies are historically untrustworthy in the playoffs.

In a must-win game for Phoenix in enemy territory, keep these three storylines in mind:

No. 5-seed New York Liberty (1-0) vs. No. 4-seed Phoenix Mercury (0-1)