The New York Liberty made their early reputation as the WNBA Finals' kick-me sign. They came to the Finals, they saw the Finals, and the Finals stood on their necks. They lost seven of the eight Finals games they played, and then they Dolaned up the next two decades. Seems harsh, true, until you look at their quick playoff exits. They won just enough to make you watch them, and then before you fully engaged, they disengaged.
But history is made for editing, and one thing the Liberty has never been is the indisputably best team in the league. (Well, that's maybe not true. They had the league's best record in 2015 and lost in the conference final to the team with the fifth-best record.)
This time, though, they were the ones with the best record, facing the team with the historical throw-weight, and did all the ownage. In winning Game 4 of the first-to-three series, 76-62, the Libs made their statement in the fourth quarter of a road playoff game, against the team that craptalked them in their own victory parade a year ago. They won the fourth quarter, 23-11, squeezing the Aces defensively the way champions do when they're ready to be, well, champions. In a season full of craptalk both within and without, this was the most fitting way for New York to vanquish one demon and prepare for the next.
Remembering Aces coach Becky Hammon's championship parade drive-by of Liberty star Breanna Stewart's miserable shooting in the title game a year ago was a nice sidelight, but mostly this was your typical WNBA playoff result: the team that wins the most keeps winning the most. In the last 15 years, the team with the best regular-season record has won the title 11 times; full-on ownage typically starts on Day One. New York has been that team, and this feels like Peak Libs—for the more snide among us, a team worthy of its mascot.
Even Hammon acknowledged game to the people who brought the most game. “We talked our crap, they heard and they get to talk their crap,” she said in full hat/tip mode. “It's part of the game. It's not personal. I can talk crap all I want. At the end of the day, I have mad respect for Sandy [Brondello]. Sandy coached me. Me and Sandy go way back. Sab, Stewie, I have mad respect for those players. I think Stewie is phenomenal.”
But there is still history's ass to be kicked, and New York has been here before without providing much in the way of footwork. They have been regarded as the dominators who haven't yet figured out how to dominate. As Stewart said with her normal jaw-first, no-nonsense demeanor, “We haven't done anything yet. This was a tough series, an emotional series for a number of different reasons. But we're going to the finals and we're hosting Game 1 and Game 2. We're ready to go. Just the feeling of not satisfied."
Nor should they be. As we said, history is there for the editing, but the edits have to be made first. The Liberty have been in five Finals and their aggregate record is 2-10. They have a better record in their franchise lifetime (since 1997) than either the Knicks or Nets do in a similar span, but they all have the same number of rings. But the rules remain the same: When you make history, you get to determine how much history you want to cover. And Minnesota and Connecticut still have their own crap to talk.
