MINNEAPOLIS — Breanna Stewart has continuously said she needs to make up for her Finals flop last year — which saw her shoot 3-for-17 and unable to get off the final shot of the decisive Game 4 to the Aces.
Ahead of Game 3 against the Lynx, she noted there is still more to be unlocked in her offensive game after contributing 18 and then 21 points in the first two games of the WNBA Finals.
It came on Wednesday at Target Center in the form of a 30-point and 11-rebound night, in which 22 of those points were scored in the second half to ignite the Liberty’s come-from-behind, 80-77 win over the Lynx, moving to within one win of their first WNBA title.
“I think that we were all just kind of waiting for our moment, waiting for the script to flip a little bit,” Stewart said afterward. “[The Lynx] talked about the first five minutes going to come out punching. They punched us in the face in the first quarter, and we continued to wear them down. … For me, I was just kind of like I was motivated, I was mad, and I liked my matchups that I had and really kind of attacking that to make sure that we could get this back into where we needed to be for it to be a ballgame.”
The third-quarter turnaround was fueled by Stewart, who scored 14 of the Liberty’s 26 points in the frame.
She consistently went to the rim to draw whistles and eventually had a three-point play after drawing a foul from Lynx guard Courtney Williams to earn a 62-61 crawl back into the final quarter.
Stewart, who was announced Wednesday afternoon as All-WNBA First Team for the sixth time, bested her former UConn college teammate Napheesa Collier in the paint, collecting 11 rebounds and four blocks to Collier’s nine and one.
One of Stewart’s blocks came against Collier, who was named the 2024 Defensive Player of the Year.
The two-time MVP had just eight points in the first half after the Liberty — for the first time in this finals series — trailed until the fourth quarter.
They fell behind by as many as 15 points, due largely to 11 early turnovers that the Lynx turned into 14 points in the first half.
“We don’t win this game without Stewie,” said Sabrina Ionescu, who tallied 13 points and nailed the game-winning 3-point dagger from 28 feet in the final seconds. “I mean, what she was able to do, just continue to chip away. … Yeah, there’s nothing I can say. Like [my] shot is nice, but that doesn’t go against what she’s able to do for us tonight and how she was able to just will us back into the game.”
