The New York Liberty won’t have seven-time All-Star forward Breanna Stewart available when they face the Dallas Wings on Monday night to start a four-game road trip.
It’s unclear how much time Stewart will miss, but it appears her absence will be short term after she suffered an injury to her lower right leg during the opening minutes of a 101-99 home loss to the Los Angeles Sparks on Saturday.
The defending WNBA champions can afford to look at the long game. The Liberty (17-7) are just 8-7 after starting the season 9-0, but they still have the second-best record in the league behind the Minnesota Lynx (22-5).
“We want to put together 40 minutes of great basketball,” All-Star guard Sabrina Ionescu said. “We want to do it now, but also we understand that we’re still learning and figuring out what works and what doesn’t, and we’ve got to make sure that we set the standard of knowing what it takes to put 40 minutes of basketball together by the time that October comes around.”
New York fell behind by as many as 15 points after Stewart departed, but it came back to tie the score late before Rickea Jackson’s buzzer-beating layup provided the final margin.
“I have full trust in our team that by the time we really need to buckle down and put 40 minutes together, we will understand what it takes to do that,” Ionescu said.
Ionescu leads the Liberty in scoring average (19.3) and steals (1.5), with Stewart, a two-time WNBA Most Valuable Player (2018, 2023), second in scoring (18.3) and tops on the team in rebounds (6.5) and blocks (1.4) per game.
The Wings (7-19) are coming off a 106-80 loss to the visiting Las Vegas Aces on Sunday afternoon. Head coach Chris Koclanes gave All-Star rookie guard Paige Bueckers, the team leader in scoring average (18.1) and assists (5.6), the day off in anticipation of completing a back-to-back with Monday’s game, which is part of a stretch of five games in seven days.
Dallas allowed its highest point total of the season to the Aces.
“It’s defense first and foremost,” Koclanes said of the key to breaking out of a stretch of six losses in seven games. “We need more consistency on both ends of the floor, but we need to know that we’re going to give ourselves a chance every night on the defensive end and right now that just hasn’t been the case. That starts with pride and being able to dig down and guard.”
–Field Level Media
