SI:AM | Aces Win a Thriller to Capture Second Straight WNBA Title

Plus, the Astros rough up Max Scherzer to get back in the ALCS.

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. I can’t say I’m surprised James Harden is trying to force his way out of another city.

In today’s SI:AM:

🏆 The Aces make it two in a row

😔 Scherzer’s rough night

🏀 The Lakers’ plans for AD

The first repeat champion in two decades

In the much-anticipated matchup of WNBA superteams, it was the Aces who proved they’re still head and shoulders above the rest of the league with a resounding victory over the Liberty to secure their second straight championship.

The last WNBA team to win back-to-back titles was the Houston Comets, who won the first four league championships from 1997 to 2000. The league and its playoff structure are far different now, which makes Las Vegas’s repeat even more remarkable. (Clare Brennan was in Brooklyn for the clinching game and wrote about the Aces’ budding dynasty.)

Las Vegas was the best team all regular season, winning 28 of its first 31 games and finishing with a record of 34–6. The Liberty weren’t far behind at 32–8. Both teams cruised through the first two rounds of the playoffs to set up the Finals matchup fans had been waiting to see for months.

The Aces are an established power. This is the fourth year in a row that they’ve finished in the top two of the regular-season standings. The Liberty were newcomers—a superteam assembled last offseason. New York added Breanna Stewart, who won the MVP this year, Courtney Vandersloot and Jonquel Jones to support incumbent star Sabrina Ionescu. The result was the best regular season in franchise history and its first Finals appearance since 2002.

But the tantalizing matchup of the league’s two best teams failed to live up to the hype. The first two games of the series in Vegas were blowout victories for the Aces (99–82 and 104–76), then the Liberty cruised to victory in Game 3 in Brooklyn, 87–73.

Game 4 was a totally different story, though. The Liberty looked like they might force a decisive Game 5 after Ionescu’s clutch pull-up jumper cut the Vegas lead to one with 41 seconds to play. After an equally clutch block by Jones, New York had the ball with an opportunity to hold it for the last shot. The Liberty got the ball in the hands of Stewart, but the MVP was stifled by the lockdown defense of Alysha Clark and forced to get rid of the ball. The game ended with Vandersloot badly missing a three-pointer from the corner. (Clark dedicated the title win to her late father after the game.)

The Aces made winning the championship look easy. The Liberty were constructed specifically with games and series like this in mind. They were instant title contenders but were severely outmatched in the Finals.

The Aces proved over the course of those four games that they’re still the class of the WNBA, and made a statement about the merits of building a dynasty versus trying to quickly cobble together a championship roster. Las Vegas’s core of A’ja Wilson, Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young and Chelsea Gray have been together for years. (It helps that the Aces had some lean years before their arrival and were able to draft Plum, Wilson and Young with the No. 1 pick in consecutive years.) Those four are under contract for next year, too, so they’ll have a chance to make it three in a row. The Liberty will be a strong contender next year, but this series showed that the Aces are still clearly the team to beat.

The best of Sports Illustrated

Kevin Jairaj/USA TODAY Sports

• Max Scherzer got rocked in Game 3 in the ALCS, and Tom Verducci believes the decision to start him may have opened the door for the Astros to come back.
• Lakers coach Darvin Ham turned heads with his comments last week encouraging Anthony Davis to take more threes, but Chris Herring explains why Ham was right to push his star player to hoist more deep shots.
• Kevin Sweeney’s men’s college basketball conference preview series continues with the Big Ten.
• Christian McCaffrey and Kyle Shanahan are looking to replicate the success their fathers, Ed and Mike, had together with the Broncos. Greg Bishop has more on the connection between the two families.
• James Harden skipped Sixers practice as he continues to seek a trade out of Philadelphia.
• Amid rumors that he might return to Barcelona or go to Saudi Arabia, Lionel Messi said he will not leave Inter Miami on loan this winter.
• Neymar tore his ACL in a game for Brazil.
• Former Raiders pass rusher Chandler Jones was arrested for the second time in less than a month.

The top five...

… things I saw last night:

5. A goalie goal in the AHL.

4. Stephen Curry’s game-winner from long range.

3. Reilly Smith’s perfect assist to Evgeni Malkin.

2. Victor Wembanyama’s behind-the-back, no-look pass while jumping.

1. Leody Taveras’s flawless home run robbery.

SIQ

One of the most infamous plays in Mets history occurred on this day in 2006 when Carlos Beltrán struck out looking on a curveball from which Cardinals pitcher to end Game 7 of the NLCS?

• Jason Isringhausen
• Chris Carpenter
• Braden Looper
• Adam Wainwright

Yesterday’s SIQ: Who recorded the first official quadruple double in NBA history?

• Scottie Pippen
• Hakeem Olajuwon
• Nate Thurmond
• Draymond Green

Answer: Nate Thurmond. He did so in his first game as a member of the Bulls, on Oct. 18, 1974. Thurmond, a Hall of Famer who spent his first 11 professional seasons with the Warriors, was acquired by Chicago late in the offseason, and his debut game was one to remember.

Thurmond had 22 points, 14 rebounds, 13 assists and 12 blocks in a 120–115 overtime win against the Hawks. It was the first time in NBA history that a player had put up double digits in four statistical categories.

The caveat here is that blocks and steals did not become official statistics in the NBA until the 1973–74 season, the year before Thurmond’s big game. (Wilt Chamberlain had retired by then.

Thurmond was the first of four players to record a quadruple double. The others are Alvin Robertson (20 points, 11 rebounds, 10 assists and 10 steals on Feb. 18, 1986), Hakeem Olajuwon (18 points, 16 rebounds, 10 assists and 11 blocks on March 29, 1990) and David Robinson (34 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists and 10 blocks on Feb. 17, 1994).