WNBA Finals: Mercury remain confident after crunch-time struggles spoil historic 3-point shooting in Game 1

The Phoenix Mercury had a chance to sneak a road win on Friday, but ultimately fell, 89-86, to the Las Vegas Aces in Game 1 of the WNBA Finals. Game 2 of the best-of-seven series is set for Sunday at 3 p.m. ET.

The Mercury have been in this position before, as they lost the first game in both the first round and semifinals. This, Kahleah Copper said postgame, has taught Phoenix how to bounce back stronger.

“Obviously that it doesn’t matter. Not that it doesn’t matter, but it’s OK,” she said when asked about what her team has learned. “This is a long series. I think the takeaway from those other first ones, the mindset was ‘back to the drawing board.’ We had the utmost confidence in our locker room and in our coaches to make the adjustments. Now it’s the same thing.”

Phoenix was locked in on both sides of the ball for most the night. The Mercury defense gave the Aces plenty of issues, and they reached uncharted territory on offense with 14 3-pointers – the most in any Game 1 in WNBA Finals history. It would have been logical to predict a Phoenix victory based on how hot they were from beyond the arc, but the Aces stole the momentum late in the game.

Copper gave Phoenix five 3-pointers in the first two quarters, which tied Diana Taurasi for most 3s in a WNBA Finals half. She finished the night with a team-high 21 points, but most of that productivity happened in the first half, being held to just three points in the second. Part of it was the Aces going from man-to-man defense in the first half to zone in the second.

The Aces took a 78-77 lead as the clock read 6:46 in the fourth quarter after a 3-pointer by Dana Evans, who gave her team 21 points off the bench. However, the game remained close and wasn’t really decided until the last minute.

A driving layup by Alyssa Thomas cut Phoenix’s deficit to 87-86 with 52 seconds remaining. She then made a strong defensive play against Aces star A’ja Wilson with under 30 seconds left and got herself to the free throw line. Unfortunately for her team, she missed both attempts. 

On the next possession, Copper fouled Aces guard Jackie Young, who made both free throws. The Mercury called a full timeout and Mercury head coach Nate Tibbetts said they planned to give Copper a chance to send the game to overtime, but Las Vegas’ defense spoiled that plan. Instead, Satou Sabally was forced into a desperation shot from behind the arc, which wasn’t close.

“We have to play better defense,” Sabally said postgame. “Just go back to what we do best and I think the results will show that we are the better team. But I’m really not too down on myself. This game is [over]. We’ll go back, we’ll practice tomorrow. We’ll walk through our mistakes and find better solutions for some things. We’ll just come back on Sunday and win the game.” 

Sabally ended the night with 19 points, while Thomas flirted with a triple-double as she picked up 15 points, 10 rebounds and nine assists. Although falling behind 0-1 isn’t ideal, the Mercury are still feeling confident in their chances.

“You always want to get one early and we put ourselves in a position [to win],” Tibbetts said. “These are two of the best teams. That’s why we are the last two standing. We talked about it earlier. We’ve made some of these plays down the stretch. We didn’t make them tonight. But we’ll be ready on Sunday.”