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Fortunately for the Phoenix Mercury, this is the first-ever best-of-seven WNBA Finals.
If the series were still best-of-five, the Mercury would be done, down an insurmountable 0-2 deficit to the Las Vegas Aces. Instead, the No. 4-seed Mercury have up to five more games to overcome the No. 2-seed Aces and win the franchise’s first title since 2014.
That was the sentiment expressed by Alyssa Thomas at Tuesday’s media availability. She said, “There’s no panic, no pressure. That’s the beauty of a seven-game series. If we’re sitting at five games, it’s basically elimination.” The Mercury star then insisted:
We love an underdog story. We love when people count us out. Of course, we put a tall task in front of us being down two [to] nothing, but there’s still a lot of basketball left to play. [It’s just been] two of a seven-game series. Still a lot of confidence here.
In Wednesday night’s Game 3, which tips off at 8 p.m. ET (ESPN) in Phoenix, the Mercury must translate that attitude into a winning outcome. And that process begins with Thomas.
Through two Finals games, the perennial MVP candidate whose arrival in the Valley transformed the Mercury into a title contender has been below her high standard, averaging 12.5 points, eight rebounds and seven assists per game. In Phoenix’s five wins over the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx in the first two rounds of the playoffs, Thomas posted averages of 19.6 points, 8.4 rebounds and nine assists per game.
It might seem unfair to ask more of Thomas, who is tasked with guarding A’ja Wilson, the now four-time MVP, on one end, all while being guarded by Wilson, the three-time Defensive Player of the Year, on the other end. Yet, that’s the star burden Thomas bears; great players must become greater when the moment demands it. The Mercury are at that moment, where one more loss would doom their championship dreams.
The Mercury as a whole, however, need to put in the intention and effort required to position Thomas to be at better than her best.
That begins on the defensive end, where they have failed to get the stops required to activate their transition offense, where Thomas is at her most deadly. The Aces can be prone the sloppiness. They averaged 13 turnovers per game during the regular season, a number that has spiked to almost 15 in their three postseason losses. Phoenix has only been able to induce Vegas into an average of 10 giveaways through two Finals games. In contrast, the Liberty turned it over more than 15 times per game against the Mercury, while the Lynx coughed up an average of 13 turnovers.
That absence of defense-to-offense aggression, exacerbated by the more than eight offensive rebounds per game the Mercury have relented, which also exceeds the number grabbed by the Liberty and Lynx, have stunted Phoenix’s most dangerous source of offense.
In the half court, Phoenix also needs to re-empower Thomas. As Josh Felton detailed, the Mercury tortured the Liberty when AT operated as the pick-and-roll ball handler, picking on weak defenders and creating open 3s. While Thomas now is being guarded by a great defender in Wilson, the Aces, overall, are not a great defense with, as Josh also noted before the Finals, plenty of small and/or slower guards that Thomas and the Mercury can target, which they did successfully in the first half of Game 1. Getting into such actions, rather than having Satou Sabally too-eagerly launch 3s or Kahleah Copper work in isolation, is a superior offensive strategy that, importantly, will demand that the Aces put in more physical and mental effort on that end of the floor.
Of course, the Mercury’s shooters have to make the 3s that Thomas creates. Another 5-for-28 performance from behind the arc, as Phoenix experienced in Game 2, is unacceptable.
Like Thomas, head coach Nate Tibbetts conveyed confidence in his group’s ability rectify where and how they’ve come up short through two Finals games, saying during media availability:
We need to be better defensively. We haven’t done a good enough job getting stops. And then offensively, we just haven’t had an understanding of what we’re looking for as a group. And I think collectively, today was a good day to watch some film and regroup a little bit.
But just as much as improved schemes, strategies and execuction, the Mercury need to rediscover the “underdog” and “count us out” spirit that Thomas referenced. When demolishing the Liberty’s title defense and stampeding over the Lynx’s championship ambitions, the Mercury eagerly assumed the villain role, condescendingly preening over their opponents as they upset them. Against the Aces, such a swagger has been non-existent.
The re-emergence of that attitudinal edge is necessary for the Mercury win Game 3. And once again, it all start with AT.
