Liberty All-Star Chronicles: Sabrina Ionescu

New York Liberty point guard Sabrina Ionescu continued to defy basketball norms during the WNBA All-Star festivities in Las Vegas last weekend.

The WNBA's smartest move at its 2023 All-Star festivities in Las Vegas might've been to bring back the four-point shot introduced in the prior edition: Sabrina Ionescu might've gotten bored otherwise.

Ionescu, the New York Liberty point guard, literally took it outside during her latest All-Star excursion, following up a downright historic showing in the annual 3-Point Contest with an equally clear long-distance connection in the exhibition game itself. Having had her fill of threes ... sinking 23 of 25 in the final round en route to 37 of a possible 40 points to set a record in both the men's and women's triple competition ... Ionescu worked on her quads, notably sinking four with an extra, extra point on the line in a 143-127 win for a team captained by Liberty teammate Breanna Stewart.

The Vegas jackpots are just the latest landmarks Ionescu has crossed in a Liberty uniform. She expressed her gratefulness to all involved in exclusive comments to All Knicks over the weekend.

"New York's welcomed me with open arms," Ionescu said. "It has helped me through injury and now we're back on this stage where, we're at the top and we're fighting for a championship. You can see the level of commitment from our ownership at BSE Global. The professionalism that they carry themselves with has huge and it's something that I admired and have continued to try and learn from."

The relentlessly competitive Ionescu, of course, was never a threat of leaving Las Vegas early before the job was done. In addition to repping Team Stewart alongside another New Yorker (Courtney Vandersloot), the 25-year-old is continuing to expand her brand across the WNBA, an identity that's reaching an even greater audience. In addition to continued advertising endeavors (fans will recall her WNBA entry being partly heralded by watching Chris Paul turn into a basketball in a State Farm commercial), Ionescu is also set to grace the next edition of the "NBA 2K" simulator franchise, sharing the honor with late mentor Kobe Bryant.

New Yorkers hope that Ionescu has plenty of more Brooklyn games on her docket. After all, the Walnut Creek, California native somehow brought together both factions of New York men's basketball together by offering long-distance tribute to both Jalen Brunson and Mikal Bridges.

"New York has definitely exceeded my expectations," said Ionescu, who inked a contract extension with the Liberty earlier this year. "I'm a West Coast kid through and through and to be able to come to the East Coast as a 23, 24-year-old kid by myself and just kind of immerse myself in the lifestyle of New York, everything that it has to offer and, obviously, New York basketball, has been amazing." 

"It's super fun to see how our fanbase has grown. Being able to say that, for half the year I'm in New York ... It's been pretty fun to kind of just see the growth that I've had on an individual basis with how I've kind of thought of New York as being home away from home."

But All-Star weekend allowed Ionescu to partake in the growing business side of the women's game, one that has taken on a great prescience with more eyes shifting toward their hardwood. Nearly 10 million, for example, tuned in for LSU's collegiate national championship victory over Iowa last spring while Saturday's All-Star Game, shown in prime time on ABC, was reported by ESPN to be the most-watched exhibition since 2007 (peaking at 955,000 viewers).

Ionescu, for example, partnered with American Express during the All-Star weekend and took notice of the increased corporate support she and others gathered in Vegas had garnered.

"It's been huge just their level of commitment in wanting to be a part of our league and a part of us on a team level and individual level," Ionescu said. "It's super exciting to see these corporations have that level of commitment and want to change the game for us."

Thanks to the efforts of Ionescu and countless other stars of both the past and present, corporate support isn't going anywhere.

“Over the past few years, American Express has continued to look for ways to lean in and support women’s sports, like our ongoing partnership with the WNBA and our new partnership with our hometown team, the NY Liberty," Kristina Hunt, Vice President, Sponsorship Assets, Benefits and Operations, American Express said in a statement to All Knicks. "We’re thrilled to continue this journey this weekend and partner with Sabrina Ionescu during one of the biggest events of the season.”

Ionescu fully intends to reap the benefits she has helped sow, planning to make a far-off retirement anything but.

"Obviously, I have a lot more years ahead of me playing, but I think I've been learning along the way," Ionescu said of plans after the hardwood. "I've just been a sponge, only being 25 and learning a lot of things on the business side and how to be a business woman and how to continue to grow my brand and my business at such a young age. 

"It's only going to set me up for the future. I'm excited to see how I continue to just grow as a businesswoman, every single year and how that's going to help me moving forward to life after basketball and whatever it is that I want to do."

Of course, such support is burdened with countless responsibilities on and off the floor. New York leadership, headlined by general manager Jonathan Kolb and CEO Keia Clarke, has made no secret about bringing in players whose character matches their immense skill. 

As a leader well-versed in the New York groove, Ionescu has fulfilled the latter duty en route to serving as one of the faces of the evolving women's basketball world.

One of the things that separates Ionescu's personal brand of leadership is the sense that she's well-versed in expectations: she's been Bryant's protege, the undisputed face of college basketball, and now stands as the godsend for a metropolitan basketball legion eager, if not desperate, to hoist the most valuable brand of hardware its association has to offer. 

Her personal professional path has been anything but smoothly paved: just three games into her WNBA career, Ionescu sustained an ankle injury that limited her to three games in the Bradenton bubble during her rookie year. She was immediately thrust into the starting, leading to nagging ailments partly caused by excessive use. This year's challenge was perhaps the definition of a first-world problem, but could still stand as a sticking point for a competitor of her caliber: unlike last year's All-Star Game, Ionescu was not chosen among the exhibition's opening 10, coming off the bench for Team Stewart in the win. 

Impressing among the reserves, chosen by the league's dozen coaches, was a solid consolation prize that partly alleviated that stress of a trying but potentially endlessly rewarding campaign. 

"I know my worth and I'm happy that the coaches see that as well," Ionescu said in a postgame scrum following the Liberty's win over Phoenix on July 5. "Anytime that you're able to make an all star It's always an honor and humbling experience ... Coming into (this season), it was something that was a goal of mine to be able to come in and do it again and not really take my foot off off the gas and continue to build my career and get better every single game."

From the perspective of her part in the New York braintrust, Ionescu believes that her team has responded to the unique set-up well and that they're ready for the second half of the challenge's first year. 

"I think that's something that we've all just embraced and embodied and not let it change who we are as individuals, (because) we're still having fun," Ionescu said. "We're still learning through mistakes and that's super important, especially when the stakes are so high and there's a lot of pressure. We know that there's going to be adversity and you're going to have to face it the best way that you can. It's something that we continue to work on every single day on an individual basis, but also just as a group."

"The stronger that we are as a whole, the better our team is going to be when those times of adversity hit."

New York's journey continues on Friday night when it heads to Washington to battle the Mystics in the nation's capital (7 p.m. ET, Ion).

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Geoff Magliocchetti is on Twitter @GeoffJMags

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