Two years removed from winning it all, the New York Liberty have slipped to the No. 8 seed and will be on the road for Game 1 of their first-round matchup against the top-seeded Minnesota Lynx.
The Lynx were the best team in the WNBA, by a decent margin, but lost two of three to the Liberty in the regular season. Breanna Stewart absolutely cooked Minnesota in those matchups, averaging 25.7 points, 8.0 rebounds, 2.7 assists, 1.7 steals and 1.0 blocks. However, Napheesa Collier only appeared in one of those games for Minnesota. She's likely to be Stewart's primary defender in this series and has the talent to make her work at both ends of the floor.
The other big question is what the Lynx will get from Olivia Miles in this series. She just finished one of the greatest rookie seasons in WNBA history and is a dark horse MVP candidate. Miles put up big numbers in the three games against New York but only shot 32.0 percent from the field and 28.6 percent from beyond the arc. She's the engine for everything they do on offense and they'll need her to be much more efficient if they're going to avoid an upset.
Both teams have star power, depth and two-versatility. Don't let the Liberty's regular-season record fool you — they can give the Lynx plenty of problems and Game 1 should be an epic start to this best-of-three series.
Score
Live game tracker and play-by-play
Box score: Liberty vs. Lynx player stats and team stats
Game leaders
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