Tina Charles leads the suddenly hot Connecticut Sun into New York to meet the suddenly struggling Liberty on Monday night.
Connecticut (9-27) has pulled out of the WNBA basement, and its three-game winning streak — albeit modest — is the second-longest active streak in the WNBA (behind the Las Vegas Aces’ 10-game streak). A season marked by off-the-court issues, including a contested franchise sale, has finally stabilized for the Sun.
“I think this entire season we stuck with each other, and I think that’s part of the reason we were able to come out of this,” Sun guard Marina Mabrey said after her team’s win over Chicago on Saturday. “We never turned on each other. When we were sad, we were sad all together and now we’re able to celebrate together.”
Charles set a league record against the Sky with the 200th double-double of her career. The 36-year-old eight-time All-Star leads the Sun with 16.3 points per game and has averaged 18.6 over her last five.
“I think we just had a new team, we are completely rebuilding and sometimes it takes a long time,” Mabrey said. “We are finding an identity and that’s important for the future of the franchise.”
The future for the Liberty has become uncertain. After starting 9-0, New York (22-15) has fallen to fifth place in the league. They’re still safely in a playoff spot, but the Liberty have lost four of their last five.
Injuries are the biggest reason. New York has been without superstar Breanna Stewart since July 26 with a knee injury and Sabrina Ionescu missed the team’s loss to Atlanta Saturday with an ankle injury.
“It’s more about what she can tolerate, so we’ll take it one game at a time,” Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said about Ionescu’s injury after the Dream loss.
Stewart has targeted a return by the end of the regular season, but there’s no official word on Ionescu.
Without Stewart and Ionescu, the Liberty were held to a season-low 62 points in the loss to Atlanta. They committed 14 turnovers.
“Our defense might be OK, but we don’t finish it off. We’re on the struggle bus, we know that,” Liberty center Jonquel Jones said. “We have to bring the appropriate energy, effort, trust.”
New York has won two of the previous three meetings this season, including an 87-78 win at Connecticut on Aug. 3.
–Field Level Media
