The New York Liberty advanced to their second straight WNBA Finals and will face the second-seeded Western Conference champion Minnesota Lynx.
Minnesota eliminated the Connecticut Sun with an 88-77 Game 5 victory on Tuesday night. Napheesa Collier led the Lynx in the deciding win with 27 points and 11 rebounds to clinch the team's first trip to the finals since 2017, when the franchise won its fourth title in seven years.
The Liberty ended the two-year championship run for the Las Vegas Aces, winning the semifinal series in four games. Sabrina Ionescu, who leads New York in scoring this postseason, had a team-high 22 points while Breanna Stewart added 19 points and 14 rebounds in the 76-62 deciding victory on Sunday night.
New York has finished as WNBA runners-up five times, including last season.
Below are our experts’ picks and predictions for Thursday night’s series opener.
New York has a great deal of momentum following the elimination of the Aces, but this spread is ignoring recent history with the Lynx. Minnesota took three of four games from New York this season, including a Commissioner's Cup Final victory in June. This is not a team that will shy away from the big stage.
As good as the Liberty have been at home – they are 20-5 straight up – they are just 7-17-1 against the spread there, including 2-7-1 in their last 10 games at the Barclays Center.
Conversely, Minnesota is 16-7 on the road, including an 88-79 victory at New York last month. The Lynx are 4-1 ATS in their last five road games and 15-7 ATS in their last 22 contests overall.
Look for the Lynx to cover the +6.0 spread as underdogs in the Finals opener on Thursday.
This is Game 1 of the Finals, so both teams will come out firing. These teams feature plenty of star power with Collier, Courtney Williams and Kayla McBride up against Stewart, Ionescu and Jonquel Jones, so the adrenaline will be pumping in front of a packed crowd.
New York has played to the Over in four of its last five games, while Minnesota has done the same in five of its last seven.
Look for both those trends to continue and for the Lynx and Liberty to total Over 159.0 points in the Finals opener.
Stewart has had another solid postseason, averaging 20 points and 8.5 rebounds. But, through two postseason series, she has only scored 21 points or more once in six games.
Adding to that, Stewart only averaged slightly more than 16 points in last year’s Finals, scoring just 10 points in the deciding game as her team fell to Vegas.
However, Stewart did average nearly 25 points in four contests against the Lynx this season. That includes a monster 38-point, 18-rebound performance on September 15th, the last time these two teams met.
While Stewart may struggle to match those exploits on Thursday, she is more than capable of going Over 20.5 points.
Collier finished fifth in the WNBA in scoring this season with 20.4 points per game. In the postseason, Collier has displayed similar consistency, averaging 27.1 points in seven contests.
After exploding for 38 points in Game 1 and 42 points in Game 2 of a two-game sweep over the Atlanta Dream in the first round, Collier started the semifinal series against Connecticut slowly, totaling 28 points in the first two games. She bounced right back to her 27-point average in the final three contests though.
The Liberty are one of the few sides that have tempered Collier’s scoring prowess this year.
She averaged just over 17 points in four games against New York this season with a high of 21, which is relatively low by her lofty standards. This is her first Finals game in six seasons though, and we expect Collier to rise to the spotlight.
Minnesota Lynx | +220 ML |
New York Liberty | -270 ML |
Spread | NY Liberty -6.0 |
Total Points | O/U 159.0 |
Napheesa Collier (Minnesota Lynx) | O/U 21.5 |
Kayla McBride (Minnesota Lynx) | O/U 13.5 |
Courtney Williams (Minnesota Lynx) | O/U 12.5 |
Brianna Stewart (New York Liberty) | O/U 20.5 |
Sabrina Ionescu (New York Liberty) | O/U 17.5 |
Jonquel Jones (New York Liberty) | O/U 13.5 |
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This article was written by a partner sports writer via Spotlight Sports Group. All odds displayed on this page were correct at the time of writing and are subject to withdrawal or change at any time.