SantaFeToday.com Santa Fe’s Hometown News
By Arnie Leshin
Breanna Stewart again named WNBA’s Most Valuable Player, nothing new, but her New York Liberty team is in trouble after losing Sunday’s opener of the best-of-five Eastern Conference semifinals to visiting third place Connecticut.
Lose again tonight at home, and first place New York becomes down 0-2 and heads to Connecticut for back-to-back games. The deciding game five would be played at the Liberty, but there might not be one if Stewart’s team suffers another loss like the dismal 78-63 opener.
Second-seeded New York, winning a first-time playoff series, began by taking two of three from runner-up Washington, 90-75, and 90-85 in overtime, but Connecticut was a different story.
In the Western Conference semis, No. 1 seeded Las Vegas, is in better shape after opening at home by rolling over visiting No. 4 Dallas, 97-83, and is home again tonight. This then moves to a pair of games at Dallas. Vegas opened with two-of-three wins over the No. 8 Chicago Sky, 87-59, and 92-70.
Born with Baldwin as her family name, the versatile 6-foot-4 Stewart’s regular season brought a 29.0-point scoring average, 9.5 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 46.5 shooting from the field, 63 blocks and 58 steals. Her total points were 915, and her high game was 40 points versus Washington.
From the suburbs of Syracuse, she choose to play for perennial power University of Connecticut and let it to four straight national championships. She is the mother of one child.
