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      WNBA Finals Preview: Las Vegas Aces and Connecticut Sun Vie for First Title

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      Stars from both teams have been to the finals recently, but neither franchise has ever won a championship. A’ja Wilson of Las Vegas said the “vibe” is different this time.Twenty-three years ago, Becky Hammon and Curt Miller helped lead Colorado State to the round of 16 in the N.C.A.A. Division 1 women’s basketball tournament. Miller was an assistant coach, and Hammon was one of the best players in the country. On Sunday, they’ll match up in the W.N.B.A. finals as opposing coaches, hoping to win their first titles as Hammon’s Las Vegas Aces take on Miller’s Connecticut Sun.“I have an unbelievable personal relationship with Becky,” said Miller, who credits Hammon for his rise in coaching.Hammon, in her first season with the Aces, and Miller, in his seventh with the Sun, go into the finals leading teams with boatloads of success in the W.N.B.A. but without any championship hardware to show for it.The Aces have three former No. 1 draft picks on their roster (A’ja Wilson, Kelsey Plum and Jackie Young) and had four players named to the All-Star team, none of whom were Chelsea Gray, who has been the Aces’ most important player this postseason. On Wednesday, Wilson was named the league’s most valuable player for the second time.Las Vegas Aces guard Chelsea Gray had 31 points and 10 assists in the decisive Game 5 of the semifinals against the Storm.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesThe Aces have had one of the best rosters in the league for years and finished with the best regular-season record in two of the past three seasons — and finished second in the year they didn’t finish first. But the regular-season success hasn’t translated into the postseason.The Aces reached the championship round in 2020. Wilson has said she was mesmerized by the moment and how thrilling it felt to see the finals logo stitched onto her jersey. But she also can’t forget how it felt to be defeated by the Seattle Storm. The Aces never won a game, and the Storm won the final game of the series by 33 points.Wilson and Young are the only Aces who played in the 2020 finals and are still with the team. (Plum and forward Dearica Hamby did not play because of injuries.) Wilson said the “vibe is different” this time, but for the top-seeded Aces to win the matchup against the third-seeded Sun, they’ll need to get out of their own way.“We get sometimes in our own mind because we’re so talented,” Wilson said, adding: “We want to be that superhero. We want to put that cape on and just win it all and not because for selfish reasons, but because we just feel like we want to do that for our team.”That superhero impulse has often led to isolation play, which the Aces can be great at because of their offensive skill. But it hasn’t translated to winning a championship. Throughout the playoffs, Hammon has praised her team for moving away from that style and “choosing each other.”Wilson said, “I think that’s going to be the difference.” She added: “It’s going to take all of us locked in for 40 minutes on the defensive end more so than the offensive end to win a championship.”An arduous semifinal series against the Storm has helped prepare the Aces for the stakes of the finals. Las Vegas won in four games, but each game came down to the final plays. The Aces found ways to respond to everything the Storm threw their way: a corner 3 from Sue Bird that gave Seattle a lead at home with under 2 seconds left in Game 3; a playoff-record-tying 42-point game from Breanna Stewart in Game 4. Somehow, the Aces came away with wins in both games, often paced by Gray and Wilson in crucial moments.“We developed how to take a punch. Like, that can’t be understated,” Hammon said. “In the scheme of games, of series, there’s going to be these moments that are like make-or-break moments, and you got to decide in those moments where you’re going to be, and earlier we took some punches, and I saw us fall apart.”The Aces’ finals opponent has also responded to proverbial punches to get to the championship round.The Sun scored just 8 points in the third quarter of the decisive Game 5 of the semifinals against the Chicago Sky and entered the fourth quarter down 10 points. They responded by outsourcing the defending champions 24-5 in the final quarter to advance to their first finals since 2019. (That year, the Washington Mystics beat the Sun in five games.)The Sun’s Jonquel Jones, Courtney Williams, Brionna Jones and Natisha Hiedeman all played in that 2019 finals series (along with guard Jasmine Thomas, who has been out with an injury since May). This time, they are leaning on the wisdom of one player who wasn’t on that team to guide them to the title that has long eluded them: DeWanna Bonner.The Connecticut franchise has the second-most wins in league history but has never won a title.The Sun have leaned on DeWanna Bonner’s championship experience. She won titles with the Phoenix Mercury in 2009 and 2014.LM Otero/Associated PressBonner, 35, won titles in 2009 and 2014 with the Phoenix Mercury, who she was with for a decade before joining the Sun in 2020. Because of Bonner’s championship experience, her voice is respected in the locker room, and many believe her inspiring leadership in the playoffs is why the Sun are in the finals, Hiedeman said.“Her speeches been on point lately,” Hiedman said, adding: “We’ve been feeding off of that. She’s a champion. She knows what it takes. So she leads the way, and we follow.”After winning Game 1 of the semifinals against the Sky, the Sun dropped two straight games, and they couldn’t slow down Candace Parker. Miller, the Sun coach, had planned a typical film session for their next practice to analyze mistakes, but Bonner told Miller she wanted to speak to the team instead of watching film. And what followed was one of the famous speeches Hiedeman mentioned.Bonner told the team that they seemed nervous when they were playing and that despite their history — the Sky had beat the Sun six straight times coming into the series — they could win the series if they got off to better starts. In Games 4 and 5, the Sun outscored the Sky in the first quarter 54-38, winning both games to close out the series.Miller said Bonner’s speech was “probably the best decision.” He added, “In that moment, D.B. having a heart-to-heart with our team is what they needed, and they’ve absolutely thrived off of it.”Miller continued: “There will be a new champion in this league. There’ll be a first-time franchise champion. There’ll be a new coach. Once again, that will be a first-time champion. And you know that I’m just, I’m really, really excited about the challenge.” More

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      Connecticut Sun Complete Comeback to Reach W.N.B.A. Finals

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      Connecticut forced a decisive Game 5, then beat the reigning champion Sky and set up a finals matchup with the Las Vegas Aces.The Chicago Sky looked like they were on their way to their second straight appearance in the W.N.B.A. finals. They led Connecticut by 9 points with less than five minutes to go in the decisive Game 5, and had held the Sun to just 14 points since halftime. Sky guard Kahleah Copper was dominating, forcing turnovers, flexing her muscles and clapping her hands en route to a game-high 22 points.But that was it for the Sky: They were held scoreless for the final 4 minutes and 46 seconds of the game. The Sun used an 18-0 run to stun the Sky on their home floor, 72-63, and advance to the finals, where they will face the Las Vegas Aces starting Sunday in Las Vegas.The Sun’s win avenges their loss to the Sky in the semifinals last year. It also ends the Chicago’s quest to become the first team to repeat as W.N.B.A. champion since the Los Angeles Sparks in 2001 and 2002.The Sun were paced by double-doubles from Jonquel Jones (15 points and 10 rebounds) and Alyssa Thomas (12 points and 10 rebounds). Sun forward DeWanna Bonner added 15 points and 9 rebounds.Through the first three games of the series, Chicago’s Candace Parker was nearly unstoppable. She averaged 19 points and 11 rebounds to help the Sky get out to a 2-1 series lead. But in Game 4, the Sun neutralized Parker, holding her to just 11 points and 9 rebounds.And on the offensive side of the ball, the Sun dominated Parker and the Sky from the inside. The Sun have one of the tallest and most physical frontcourts in the league with Jonquel Jones (6-foot-6), Bonner (6-foot-4), Brionna Jones (6-foot-3), and Thomas (6-foot-2); they used that to their advantage to score a playoff-record 66 points from the painted area in Game 4. They beat the Sun, 104-80, achieving a franchise playoff record for points scored in a game to tie the series at two games apiece.Early in Game 5, Chicago’s offense was stagnant, with players seeming nervous to shoot the ball close to the basket for fear of being blocked by one of the Sun’s bigs. The Sun ended the first quarter down just 8 points, with Parker scoreless. In the second quarter, Copper took over. She scored 9 points to bring the game to a 40-40 tie to go into halftime with the momentum on the Sky’s side.Parker continued to struggle offensively, but she was dominant on defense, blocking four shots and grabbing three steals. The Sky held the Sun to 8 points in the third and led by 10 points heading into the final quarter. But the Sky would score just 5 points for the remainder of the game, as the Sun scored 24 to silence the Chicago crowd and advance to the finals. More

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      Chelsea Gray Leads the Las Vegas Aces to the W.N.B.A. Finals

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      The first 30-point, 10-assist game in playoff history was punctuated by two crunchtime buckets.SEATTLE — Chelsea Gray had just given the Las Vegas Aces a 3-point lead with a minute left in Game 4 of a W.N.B.A. semifinal series on Tuesday night — enough to give them a quick sigh of relief but not enough to put the game out of reach. Gray backpedaled on defense with a stoic look, and after a Seattle Storm miss, she seemed determined to end the game.She dribbled left, crossed right, then hit a fadeaway jump shot a few steps inside the 3-point line over the outstretched arm of Gabby Williams, a W.N.B.A. All-Defensive first-teamer, to give the Aces a 5-point lead, effectively ending the game. And Gray knew it as she ran back, trading her stoicism for exuberance, yelling in celebration at the Seattle crowd that she had silenced.With 31 points and 10 assists, Gray became the only player to reach both totals in a W.N.B.A. playoff game, an exclamation mark on one of the most dominant playoff performances in league history. After the 97-92 win, and a 3-1 series victory, Las Vegas advanced to the W.N.B.A. finals, where it will meet the Connecticut Sun or the Chicago Sky. (That semifinal series is tied, 2-2, with Game 5 on Thursday in Chicago.)“This is something that’s just in her DNA,” Aces Coach Becky Hammon said. “She is stone cold with the game on the line. And, you know, it’s a luxury. You can just put the ball in her hands and let her go to work. So the smartest thing I could do is just get me and everybody else out of the way and let her go.”Aces forward A’ja Wilson said: “I’ve never ever seen someone honestly live do that and dictate the game and just stay composed in all moments. Like, she’s built for this moment.”Gray has advanced far in the playoffs before, winning a championship with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2016, but on that squad, she was much more of a role player, averaging just 9 points per game in the playoffs. Now 29, Gray has evolved into the most important player on one of the most talented teams in the league. The Aces had four W.N.B.A. All-Stars in the regular season, none of whom were named Chelsea Gray.Hammon said Gray does “everything differently” from other players in the league.“I’m her assistant coach,” Hammon said with a smile, adding: “I want to hear what she has to say. And what she hears and what she thinks, and what she sees out there. And she loves big moments. That’s nothing I taught her.”Gray is averaging 24 points and 7.7 assists per game through six playoff games and making 60 percent of her 3-pointers and 63 percent of her shots overall. Those are career highs in every category for Gray: The only season that comes close is when she averaged 16.5 points and 4.5 assists per game in the playoffs with the Sparks in 2018. And yet Gray said she didn’t feel a noticeable difference.“I approach the game the same way every single time,” she said, adding: “I’m taking the shots that I know I could hit. Maybe there have been a couple of shots where it was like, maybe uncharacteristic, but we work on it every day.”Breanna Stewart, right, had 42 points, but, like the rest of the Storm, could not stop Gray, left.Lindsey Wasson/Associated PressGray’s play style often results in the kind of oh-no-oh-no-oh-yes shots that stun spectators and opposing teams, like the step-back 3 with seven minutes left that she hit over the 6-foot-3 Storm center Tina Charles before the shot clock buzzer sounded. It looked like a heave, but went through the hoop without even touching the rim. Such scores have become normal to her teammates. They watch Gray take ridiculous shots at practice, even some with her feet turned in different directions, that consistently go through the net.“I know that ball is going in every single time,” Wilson said.The fascinating part about Gray’s performances is how she scores and finds her teammates. It’s a league where speed is paramount for guards like her teammate Kelsey Plum, who averaged 20 points in the regular season by blowing by defenders for open layups or using quick crossovers for step-back 3s. Or like Chicago’s Kahleah Copper, who runs out on fast breaks and routinely races past guards to score.Gray is different. She moves downcourt at a somewhat lethargic pace — her feet barely leaving the ground as she commands the offense and keeps defenders at a distance. She creates separation with crossovers that put defenders a step behind her, which is all she needs to use her 5-foot-10, 170-pound frame to muscle them on her way to a crafty finish around the rim. Or she creates a sliver of separation that allows her to get the ball over the arms of a defender.“She’s super methodical,” Storm guard Jewell Loyd said. “She’s super smart, intelligent, understands her body, what she can do, and what she can’t do. She doesn’t do anything that she can’t do. She understands where her spots are on the floor when her team needs a bucket.”Gray’s historic night and the Aces’ victory spoiled the final game of guard Sue Bird’s 21-year career in Seattle, where she won four championships. The Storm lost each game in the final minute or seconds and very likely should have won Game 3. But a defensive lapse let Aces guard Jackie Young send the game into overtime, where Las Vegas pulled away. In Game 4 on Tuesday night, Breanna Stewart’s 42 points, tying a playoff record, weren’t enough.The most significant challenge was “a lot of Chelsea Gray,” Storm Coach Noelle Quinn said, repeating that point for emphasis.“I don’t think anyone on planet Earth can guard her,” Quinn said. “I mean, she was unconscious. We did a lot of things in this series to try to slow her down. But you slow down her scoring, limit her scoring, and she has the ability to pass and playmake. She’s an incredible player.”When Gray is “rocking and rolling,” as she has been in the playoffs, Wilson knows what to do: Get out of her way, she said.And staying out of Gray’s way may be the key for Las Vegas to reach its potential and win its first W.N.B.A. title. More

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      Seattle Storm’s Sue Bird Ends WNBA Career With Playoff Loss

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      Bird, 41, the Seattle Storm guard, had said she would retire after this season. The Storm fell to the Las Vegas Aces in the W.N.B.A. semifinals on Tuesday.Seattle Storm fans wanted one more year. Sue Bird gave it to them.She slicked back her signature ponytail, laced up her custom Nike sneakers and added to her legend with a farewell tour.When the Storm set a W.N.B.A. single-game assists record for the regular season with 37, eight of them were hers. She stretched her formidable margin as the league’s career leader in assists and inched higher on the steals and 3-point lists. She helped the Storm make the playoffs for the 16th time in the 19 seasons she played.And then she was done.The Las Vegas Aces beat the Storm, 97-92, in Game 4 of their semifinal series on Tuesday to advance to the W.N.B.A. finals. For Bird, 41, who had said in June that she would retire after the season, the loss on her home court marked the end of an incredible career. As fans cheered and chanted “Thank you, Sue,” Bird stood on the court and cried.At a postgame news conference, Bird said that she hadn’t wanted to leave the court so that she could “soak it all in.” She started to cry again. “I know the tears don’t look like happy tears, but there’s a lot of happiness,” she said.Bird retires as the W.N.B.A.’s career leader in assists and games played. She had 8 points and 8 assists against the Aces on Tuesday.Lindsey Wasson/Associated PressAces Coach Becky Hammon said it was “bittersweet” to have defeated Bird to end her “fairy-tale” career. Bird had 8 points and 8 assists in the loss.“I kind of feel like the girl that beat Serena,” Hammon said, referring to Ajla Tomljanovic, who beat Serena Williams in her final match at the U.S. Open last week. Williams had said she planned to retire after the tournament.Storm Coach Noelle Quinn, who also played with Bird in Seattle, called Bird “the best point guard to ever play this game.”Bird won four championships with Seattle, the last in 2020. That season showcased the traits that have come to define her: resilience and keen court vision. She missed half of the regular season with injuries. But she proved invaluable during Seattle’s six postseason games. Seattle never lost during that playoff run. Bird set a then-W.N.B.A. record for assists in a playoff game with 16 in Game 1 of the finals against the Aces. Then she had a double-double — 16 points and 10 assists — in Game 2. In the series-clinching Game 3, Bird spent the end of the fourth quarter on the bench laughing with forward Breanna Stewart. The Storm won by 33.“The fact that I’m sitting here, I think I’m having this, like, in-shock moment, because it doesn’t really feel real that we just won and that I was able to contribute in the way that I did,” she said afterward.Much of Bird’s 21-year career has come as a surprise, if only because there wasn’t enough time for someone to accomplish such feats before her. “I really didn’t know what to dream,” Bird told The New York Times last month, “and so to sit here now with all the championships I have, I just feel really satisfied.”The Storm drafted her No. 1 overall in 2002 out of UConn before the W.N.B.A.’s sixth season. She immediately became Seattle’s franchise leader in assists, with 191 that year. She came in second for the Rookie of the Year Award, but she and the player who beat her — Indiana’s Tamika Catchings — became the first rookies ever named to the All-W.N.B.A. first team.Fans celebrated Bird with signs and T-shirts all season.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesAmong parting gifts Bird received was this jacket from the Minnesota Lynx’s Sylvia Fowles, who also retired this season.David Berding/Getty ImagesOver the next 20 years, Bird would pile up honors, including a record 13 W.N.B.A. All-Star selections and five Olympic gold medals with the United States. Last year, she was voted to the W25, the W.N.B.A.’s list of the top 25 players ever as the league celebrated its 25th anniversary.“These athletes have played the game at the highest level on the court — they are scorers and rebounders, assist makers and defensive stoppers, leaders and mentors,” W.N.B.A. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in announcing the W25. She added, “Together, they have transformed the way the game is played, changed the way athletes are viewed, become incredible role models and inspired generations of young, diverse athletes.”Bird, who is engaged to the women’s soccer star Megan Rapinoe, is one of the most visible gay professional athletes. For most of the W.N.B.A.’s history, its most prominent stars were not openly gay, and players have said that they felt pressured to conform to heterosexual standards of femininity. But Bird is among a wave of stars — including Brittney Griner, Seimone Augustus, Elena Delle Donne and Diana Taurasi — who have been open about their sexuality and spoken about L.G.B.T.Q. rights and acceptance.Bird has also used her platform as one of the league’s biggest stars to support social justice causes, especially regarding Black women. And as the W.N.B.A. continues to push for the release of Griner, who has been detained in Russia on drug charges since February, Bird has been vocal.“We all feel rattled by this and just want her home,” Bird said at a news conference with Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, in July.Bird wearing custom Nike sneakers from the signature line of the N.B.A. star Kyrie Irving.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesBird’s off-the-court influence has gone beyond politics to style. She is known for her love of sneakers, and her custom Nikes — from the signature line of the N.B.A. star Kyrie Irving — have “Keep Sue Fresh” printed on them each night.But the core of Bird’s legacy is on the court.“That’s a legendary player right there,” said Aces guard Chelsea Gray, who scored 31 points and fueled Las Vegas’s victory in Bird’s final game.Stewart, who had 42 points in Game 4 for Seattle, said that knowing it would be her last game with Bird was more “devastating” than losing.“That’s what hurts the most,” she said, adding that Bird had been a mentor and friend.Storm guard Jewell Loyd said the Game 4 loss was “obviously not how we wanted to finish for her.”Loyd added, “We’ve been very fortunate to play with a generational player like Sue.”Bird said though her body felt good, she was not having second thoughts about retiring. But she will miss basketball.“There’s going to be nothing like this,” she said.Bird gave fans someone to believe in until the end. Her final points in the W.N.B.A. came on a layup with 21.8 seconds to go on Tuesday and Seattle down by 6. It was reminiscent of a play on Sunday, in Game 3. The Storm turned to her when they were down by 1 point with less than two seconds to go. She sank a 3-pointer and held her follow-through, as her teammates went wild around her. Seattle would lose to the Aces in overtime, but that play was what this final season was for.One more chance to celebrate. One last moment with Bird.Bird hit a 3-pointer in Game 3 of the W.N.B.A. semifinals against the Aces, giving the Storm a 2-point lead with less than two seconds to go.Lindsey Wasson/Associated Press More

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      WNBA Stars to Head Overseas Despite Brittney Griner’s Arrest in Russia

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      Playing for international teams can earn top players more than $1 million. But Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia has complicated the choice to go abroad.As the W.N.B.A. star Jonquel Jones looked ahead to the off-season this year, she couldn’t help but think about her friend Brittney Griner, who has been detained in Russia since February after customs officials arrested her at an airport near Moscow.“Her not being with us, her not being with her team and the W.N.B.A., her family not being able to see her,” Jones said. “Just her being over there and understanding that it could have easily been somebody else on our team and just kind of feeling the weight of that.“When you’re so close to that person it’s a little bit different.”Griner, like Jones, had been in Russia during the W.N.B.A. off-season to supplement her relatively modest salary by playing for some of the highest-paying women’s basketball teams in the world. But for the upcoming off-season, Jones, 28, signed with a Turkish team instead.“What would make me feel comfortable about going back to Russia?” Jones said. “B.G. being home, first and foremost. U.S.A. and Russia relations being better. The war in Ukraine being over with.”Griner, left, during the 2021 EuroLeague semifinal. Her detention has essentially removed Russia as a country W.N.B.A. players are considering for their off-season teams. Erdem Sahin/EPA, via ShutterstockPlaying overseas remains extremely popular for W.N.B.A. players seeking to earn more money or gain more pro experience, but several agents and players told The New York Times that, because of Griner’s ordeal and the war, they did not know of anyone who would be playing in Russia this off-season. The W.N.B.A. said it did not have a complete list of players going abroad because its playoffs are underway.The coronavirus pandemic had already winnowed overseas opportunities for W.N.B.A. players in virus-conscious countries like China and South Korea before the war in Ukraine and Griner’s detention made Russia essentially off limits, too. Players are still opting to go places like Turkey, Israel, Spain, Italy and France.“There’s always going to be some risk involved with being in a foreign country, but there’s risks in your own country as well,” said Jones, who has Bahamian and Bosnian citizenship. “We have a very short or small window to make the type of money that we’re making overseas, so we have to make sure we capitalize on that.”This year’s decision about playing overseas is more fraught because of Griner’s detention, but the personal and financial pressures that have pushed players abroad for years persist. There are political and safety concerns in some parts of the world, but some players need the money, and others would find it hard to pass up a payday that can significantly increase their yearly earnings. For others, going overseas provides extra time to hone one’s craft, and playing time that isn’t available in the W.N.B.A., which has just 144 roster slots across 12 teams and a season that lasts only a few months. Some players simply enjoy being able to work abroad.Griner’s situation has changed the stakes of making that choice.One of the W.N.B.A.’s best-known stars, Griner, 31, was recently convicted of drug possession and smuggling in a Russian court and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony after customs officials said they found hashish oil in her luggage. She is appealing her conviction, and U.S. State Department officials maintain that she was wrongfully detained. American and Russian officials have discussed a prisoner swap to bring Griner home, possibly with other detained Americans.“What would make me feel comfortable about going back to Russia?” Jones said. “B.G. being home, first and foremost.”Zsolt Szigetvary/EPA, via ShutterstockWhen she was arrested, Griner was returning to Russia to join Jones on their team, UMMC Yekaterinburg, for the playoffs. Griner has starred for the W.N.B.A.’s Phoenix Mercury since 2013 and soon after also joined Yekaterinburg, among a handful of clubs owned by oligarchs who pay top salaries for pride and political reasons. Those clubs are not seen as an option right now because of Griner’s detention and the war in Ukraine.“It’s taken some money off the table for some people,” said Mike Cound, an agent who represents dozens of professional women’s basketball players. “It’s lowered the overall average salaries a little bit, but other countries, especially Turkey, have stepped up, upped their money because they realize they can get players they didn’t previously have access to.”What to Know About the Brittney Griner CaseCard 1 of 4What to Know About the Brittney Griner CaseWhat happened? More

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      Sue Bird Became the Legend She Needed: ‘There Was No Real Path’

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      Sue Bird peeked upcourt as she caught the outlet pass. Her Seattle Storm teammate Natasha Howard had streaked ahead of her like a wide receiver, as she usually did whenever Bird was running the offense in transition. Howard realized that she was open beneath the basket and braced herself. Bird, she knew, would find her like always. She just didn’t know how.Bird slithered into the lane, drawing a defender. Then, without looking, she whipped the ball over her head and into Howard’s awaiting palms.“My hands were always ready for Sue when she passed me the ball,” said Howard, now with the Liberty. She added: “That right there, it’s like: ‘Wow, OK, Sue. You got eyes behind your head.’”Bird counts the pass among her favorite assists in her 19 seasons with the Storm. She has plenty of passes to choose from: Bird is the W.N.B.A.’s career leader in assists.“I have a little bit of a Rain Man brain so hold on a second,” she had said as she tried to pick her favorite assist. After a second, she cited the no-look pass to Howard, in 2018, and a between-the-legs pass to a trailing Lauren Jackson in the 2003 All-Star Game. She wasn’t finished.“Oh, there’s also another one to Lauren,” Bird said. “It was in the playoffs against Minnesota. I think it was like 2012 and we were down 3. We needed a 3, and it wasn’t a fancy assist by any means, but we ran a play to perfection. I hit Lauren. She hits the shot.”Those are the kinds of assists that Bird built her reputation on. “The timing around a great pass is so the person you’re passing to doesn’t have to change anything that they’re doing,” Bird said.At 41 years old, Bird is within weeks of the end of her W.N.B.A. career. In June, she announced that she would retire at the end of the season, though most people had expected as much. At the end of the 2021 season, fans chanted “one more year!” at an emotional Bird and kept up the campaign with hashtags on social media for months through the off-season. In January, Bird nodded to the campaign in an Instagram post and wrote “OK.”Her résumé had room for one more season, but just barely. She is a 13-time All-Star and has won four championships. She toppled Ticha Penicheiro’s career assist record of 2,599 five years ago and now has 3,222 regular-season assists in a league-record 578 games.As the assists have piled up, Bird has evolved as a passer.“Every now and then, it can be fancy,” Bird said. “Every now and then, you do have to look the defense off, but for me, it’s just always about trying to read the defense and be one step ahead, so you can find that person.Bird broke the career assists record against the Washington Mystics in 2017. Ned Dishman/NBAE via Getty Images“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve definitely used the no-look more, and when I do a no-look nowadays, I’m not trying to look like Magic Johnson did or something like that. I’m really just trying to look off the defense. I’m just trying to get them to think my eyes are looking somewhere else, so that I can make the play.”No other player is as synced with the league’s infancy and growth, its history and present, as Bird, the consummate floor general who excelled through consistency by delivering the ball to the right person at the right time in the right spot, year after year, decade after decade.“She is the W.N.B.A,” said Crystal Langhorne, who converted 161 of Bird’s passes into buckets, the fourth-most of any teammate behind Jackson (624), Breanna Stewart (345) and Jewell Loyd (217), according to the Elias Sports Bureau. “It’s going to be crazy with a league where she’s not there anymore. Sue is the prototype.”Hearing those types of compliments has been one of the pleasant and unexpected byproducts of announcing her retirement, Bird said.“You just always knew what to expect from me,” Bird said. “Everyone knew if they turned on a Storm game, what they were going to see. So, it’s kind of hard to imagine it not being there, because it’s been there for 20 years.”Bird entered the W.N.B.A. in its sixth season as the top overall pick in the 2002 draft, carrying heavy expectations into Seattle after two N.C.A.A. women’s basketball championships at Connecticut.She made her first pro assist to Adia Barnes, now the women’s basketball coach at Arizona. Barnes, 45, last played professionally 12 years ago and spent several years as a broadcaster before coaching, all while Bird continued stacking one assist after another.“I totally forgot that,” Barnes said of Bird’s first assist, laughing. “I made the shot, so that was a good thing. I don’t remember it, but you can act like I do. Make it sound good, please.”From the left: Bird, Lauren Jackson, Adia Barnes and Betty Lennox in 2004 at a game against the Charlotte Sting. Bird made her first pro assist to Barnes.Jeff Reinking/NBAE via Getty ImagesBarnes does recall Bird’s steadiness from the beginning. The pair often roomed on the road.“She was just a true point guard, and I think what separated Sue is, she’s a connector, so you wanted to play with her.”Barnes won a championship in 2004 with Bird and Jackson, who became a dynamic pick-and-roll pairing, and Bird and Jackson won another in 2010. They left defenses helpless. If a defender ducked under a Jackson screen, Bird could bury a 3. If they doubled Bird, Jackson could drive to the rim or pop out for an open jumper. The ball typically arrived on time.“There was really no way to help it,” Barnes said. “It was just very, very, very hard to guard and they made it look seamless.”Bird said her awareness of angles and spacing was always on, even when walking through a mall.“You’re always moving in a way, seeing things in way that is similar to being on the court,” Bird said. “Obviously, you’re not in a game, so you’re not having to move fast or do things with urgency, but I think you just always move that way when you have that type of vision. That sounds insane. It’s actually not.”Teammates would spot Bird carrying binders and notebooks to study the game. “You don’t really need to ask how she does it,” Howard said. “She just does it.”Receiving a pass from Bird inspired confidence, Langhorne said. Here was one of the game’s greats, entrusting her with the ball and to make the right play.“Even when I was working on my 3s and I wasn’t as confident, if I knew Sue kicked it back to me, I was like: ‘Oh, yeah, shoot it. She’s giving it to you for a reason,’” Langhorne said. “Which I never even really said out loud before.”Injuries forced Jackson to leave the W.N.B.A. in 2012. Bird found her next post partner in Stewart, another Connecticut product who Seattle took with the first overall pick in 2016. The two won championships in 2018 and 2020.Bird won her fourth championship alongside Breanna Stewart, left, in 2020.Octavio Jones for The New York Times“She knows where everyone is supposed to be before sometimes we even do,” Stewart said. “She knows which block I would prefer to get the ball on or which pass is going to get through and which isn’t. Sometimes, when you’re on the basketball court, a player makes a cut and then the pass comes, and sometimes with Sue, the pass comes and then the player makes the cut because she’s seeing the defense sometimes quicker than us.”Bird said Penicheiro, who retired in 2012, and the Chicago Sky’s Courtney Vandersloot are among the point guards she has most enjoyed watching because “they’re really fun.” Vandersloot recently passed Lindsay Whalen to become third on the W.N.B.A.’s career assists list. She’s the active player closest to tying Bird — and she’s still more than 800 assists away.Bird broke Penicheiro’s record with her 2,600th assist to a cutting Carolyn Swords in 2017.“It was actually a pretty nice pass, and she deserves it. And records are meant to be broken, and if anybody breaks your record, you want it to be a player like Sue Bird,” Penicheiro said.“Everybody loves Sue,” she added. “If she was an ass, it’d be easier to go against her and try to stick it to her, but she’s too nice and I am, too.”Even one assist from Bird is a moment to remember. Thirteen players received one assist from Bird, according to Elias. The list includes Courtney Paris, who regarded Bird as one of her favorite players growing up and spent most of her W.N.B.A. career on alert as an opponent who had the unenviable task of trying to play team defense against her.“The second you go to help, she’s going to find the smallest piece of space to get the ball to whoever needs to get it,” Paris said.Bird said she accomplished everything she wanted to in the league.A.J. Olmscheid/Associated PressParis joined the Storm in 2018 and did not play often in her two seasons in Seattle as her playing career wound down. Paris did not remember the type of pass she received from Bird or how she scored, but she recalled being excited over the sequence.“It was a full circle moment from watching her when I was a younger player,” Paris said.Ashley Walker, another member of the one-assist from Bird club, who played with Seattle in 2009, was similarly appreciative.“She’s one of the pioneers,” Walker said. “She’s someone that people look up to, and she did it with such grace, such confidence. And it’s just amazing to know that I’m a part of that experience and I actually get a chance to say: ‘I caught a pass from Sue Bird. What did you do?’”Bird has also made her mark during the postseason with her assists. She set a playoff record with 14 assists in a 2004 Western Conference finals game against Sacramento, then broke it with 16 in Game 1 of the 2020 finals against Las Vegas. Vandersloot broke that postseason record last year, with 18 assists against Connecticut.The chapter is closing on one of the W.N.B.A.’s most memorable careers. Bird said she accomplished everything she wanted to in the league, establishing goals in the moment.“The easy analogy here is, who does everybody chase in the N.B.A.? Michael Jordan,” Bird said. “Because Michael Jordan played a full career. He won six rings. So, six rings became the standard. In our league, when I got into the league, that didn’t really exist.”She continued: “There was no real path to follow, because nobody had that 20-year career yet. So, I really didn’t know what to dream, and so to sit here now with all the championships I have, I just feel really satisfied.”Now a young player — Bird named Arike Ogunbowale of the Dallas Wings as an example — can model the milestones in the careers of players such as Maya Moore and Diana Taurasi.Many, of course, will look at Bird’s illustrious career.“I think there is something that motivates you in that way, but at the same time, forging your own path, I enjoyed that as well,” Bird said. “I’m not sure. Maybe having something to chase is better. Maybe there’s more pressure.”Lindsey Wasson for The New York Times More

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      A Chaotic Sprint to the Finish for the W.N.B.A. Season

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      Six teams are fighting for the final three playoff spots with only one week left.The Chicago Sky, the reigning champions, are assured of one of the top two spots in the upcoming W.N.B.A. playoffs. The rebuilding Indiana Fever are the only team out of contention. Everything else is up for grabs.The final week of the W.N.B.A.’s regular season should be a showcase of the parity and chaos the league has seen all season. Six of the league’s 12 teams are battling for the final three playoff spots, and the teams that have already clinched are still jockeying for seeding.At the top of the standings, the Sky are 25-8 and hold a two-game lead in the race for the No. 1 seed. Chicago can fall no further than a No. 2 seed after a win Sunday over the Connecticut Sun, but it will still need to hold off the Las Vegas Aces, who spoiled Sue Bird’s final regular-season game at Climate Pledge Arena with a win over the Seattle Storm. Chicago and Las Vegas face off Thursday in their final regular-season meeting.The Sun are solidly in the third spot but could still overtake the Aces for the No. 2 seed. A bigger battle is brewing below them, though, as Seattle and the Washington Mystics fight for home-court advantage in what is nearly certain to be the playoff matchup between the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds. The Storm are at a scheduling disadvantage, with games on the road against Chicago and Las Vegas around a trip to Minneapolis. The Mystics, meanwhile, finish with two games against the last-place Fever and play their final regular-season game at home.The Chicago Sky have clinched one of the top two spots in the playoffs.Michael Reaves/Getty ImagesOf the teams hoping to clinch one of the final playoff spots, the Dallas Wings were in the best shape entering Monday, holding a 16-16 record with four games remaining — all against teams that sit below them in the standings. Marina Mabrey’s 31 points helped Dallas clinch a berth with an 86-77 win Monday night against the Liberty.Below the Wings, though, the race is wide open. With three games left for each, the Atlanta Dream and Phoenix Mercury are tied at 14-19, though the Dream own the head-to-head tiebreaker. The Liberty are now 13-20 with three games left, and the Minnesota Lynx and Los Angeles Sparks are also hanging on at 13-20.The Dream, the Mercury and the Liberty have all been without key players down the stretch. Atlanta guard Tiffany Hayes has missed three games with an ankle injury, while Phoenix announced Monday that Diana Taurasi would miss the rest of the regular season with a quad injury. For Saturday’s game with Phoenix, the Liberty had finally gotten healthy as Betnijah Laney returned to action two months after knee surgery, but forward Natasha Howard went down with an ankle injury.Those injuries could leave the door open for the ninth-place Lynx: They hold the season tiebreakers over Phoenix and the Liberty, and they play the Mercury in a must-win game Wednesday. But the rest of Minnesota’s schedule is daunting, with games at home against Seattle and on the road against Connecticut. In its favor is the comeback of Napheesa Collier, who returned Sunday less than three months after giving birth. (A motivating factor for her was the chance to play again with Sylvia Fowles, who is retiring at the end of the season.)Finally, the Sparks may face the most difficult path to a playoff berth, for reasons on and off the court. Los Angeles had been in position for the No. 6 seed after a July 21 win over the Dream. But with drama swirling as the four-time All-Star Liz Cambage left the team, the Sparks dropped six games in a row to fall to 11th place.A win Sunday against the Mystics kept their hopes alive. But they must play back-to-back games this week against the third-place Sun before finishing up against the surging Wings. And making matters worse, the Sparks were caught up in a travel nightmare while trying to leave Washington.Dallas Wings guard Arike Ogunbowale going against Natasha Cloud of the Washington Mystics.Rebecca Slezak/The Dallas Morning News, via Associated PressAfter their flight was delayed and then canceled, some members of the Sparks spent the night in the airport when there weren’t enough hotel rooms for all players. Nneka Ogwumike, a former league M.V.P., said in a video posted on Twitter, “It’s the first time in my 11 seasons that I’ve ever had to sleep in the airport.” More

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      Sylvia Fowles Is as Dominant as Sue Bird. Why Isn’t She Better Known?

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      Sylvia Fowles has been as dominant on the court as Sue Bird, but only one of them is a household name, our columnist writes.Sylvia Fowles is one of the most successful American athletes ever.Four Olympic gold medals with the U.S. national women’s basketball team. Two W.N.B.A. titles with the Minnesota Lynx.Eight W.N.B.A. All-Star teams. One league Most Valuable Player Award. She is the league’s greatest rebounder and its career leader in field-goal percentage.Fowles won big in college at Louisiana State. In Europe. In Russia. In China.How much of the above did you know before reading this, especially those of you who don’t pay great attention to women’s basketball? Most likely not much, and that’s a shame because you’ve missed out on greatness.How good is Fowles?“The best-all-time classic center in the history of our league,” said Cheryl Reeve, who has coached Fowles since 2015 with the Lynx and the Olympic team.“Better than 99 percent of players that have ever played,” said Maya Moore, who competed with and against Fowles for years. Moore recalled Fowles’s mix of graceful power and emotional intelligence and the warm vibe she is known for: “Syl is the embodiment of a perfect teammate.”Before the current season, Fowles, 36, announced that she planned to retire, her remarkably strong, lithe frame having taken a ferocious pounding over a lifetime of achievement. Unless there is a drastic shake-up in the playoff picture, next Sunday’s game, when Minnesota visits the Connecticut Sun, will most likely be the last of her decorated 15-year W.N.B.A. career.Fowles is not the only W.N.B.A. all-timer set to end her playing days when the curtains close this season. After 21 years as the point guard for the Seattle Storm, Sue Bird will be gone, too.Even if you’re a casual sports fan who does not follow the women’s game, it’s a good bet you know Bird. She came to the league out of the University of Connecticut as the girl next door who could hoop with the best and exits it as much a household name as the W.N.B.A. has had.Fowles is just as good a player. Better, say many experts. Yet outside the respect earned from her peers and followers of women’s basketball, she has operated in the shadows.Fowles told me last week that she had to learn not to let the lack of fame bother her. “I have had to get to that space of not caring,” she said, noting it took about half of her career to come to terms with being as overlooked as a player of her caliber can be.Fowles said she has never been featured on national magazine covers or been the focus of ad campaigns from large-scale companies. She can walk through major airports unrecognized, other than the gawking looks from strangers marveling at a stunning, 6-foot-6 woman strolling through the concourse.“It has been frustrating to do everything right and be so consistent throughout the years and not get the credit,” Fowles said. “But at some point, you also have to let it go because if I held on to it, I would walk around being angry.”Bird and Fowles are peers in every meaningful sense of the word. They are basketball greats whose careers primarily overlapped. They became friends while playing together in Russia during Fowles’s early years as a professional player and have remained so.Fowles and Bird hugged before their teams played Wednesday. The two became friends early in their careers playing in a Russian basketball league.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesBut there is a yawning gap between their sponsorship deals, popularity, name recognition and even their post-career broadcast opportunities. This is partly a function of typical sports dynamics. Point guards get more publicity than low-post players. Bird is comfortable in front of the camera. Fowles is low-key.The gap also exists because of societal disparities magnified in sports, where only a small number of women catch the spotlight. When I spoke with Bird, she did not hesitate to enumerate them.Bird is an out, proud lesbian, but she recognized that, to some, “I pass as a straight woman.” She continued, noting that she is also white, “small and, therefore, not intimidating, compared to Syl, who is Black, dark-skinned and of a certain stature, yeah, that is 100 percent at play here.”Fowles acknowledged as much, but didn’t seem in the mood to dissect it.“You think you’re supposed to do everything right, and then when you do everything right, that you’ll get noticed,” she said. “But for multiple reasons, that’s not the case.”Fowles’s voice trailed.“Why do I have to work twice as hard just to get noticed?”She wished for a better future: that the next generations of greats who look like her will be far better known, that the W.N.B.A. will find a way to promote all of its players. “Eighty percent of us are Black women, and you have to figure out how to market those Black women,” she said. “I don’t think we do that quite well.”Fowles has done what she can to pave the way for those changes. She has performed in a way that will stand the test of time. “I’m proud of myself that I have been the same person from 2008 to 2022,” she said. “I’m not a pushover. I’m a leader, and not a follower. I stand up and speak on things that I believe.”In her last season, playing the role of on-court coach to a young and struggling Lynx team, she was averaging nearly 15 points and almost 10 rebounds per game through Minnesota’s 81-71 win Sunday over Atlanta.The fight for respect will now fall to other players as Fowles sets off for a profession that fits perfectly with a personality Bird described as motherly.For years, Fowles has studied to be an undertaker when not battling on the hardwood. You read that right — an undertaker. The back story: She has been entranced by funerals and their emotional resonance since she attended her grandmother’s memorial as a child. She sees worth in ensuring that the loved ones of the recently deceased know everything was handled right, to the end, with profound care.So one of the most remarkable women’s basketball players is retiring to help bury the dead? Indeed. It’s an incredible story that too few people know about.And that is a problem. More