Liberty title, epic WNBA Finals fitting end to transcendent season

NEW YORK -- As the seconds ticked down in Game 5 of the WNBA Finals on Sunday night, Breanna Stewart dribbled the ball over half court. At the long-awaited buzzer, she found Jonquel Jones for an embrace as their teammates rushed the floor.

The New York Liberty had finally done it.

Sabrina Ionescu, the franchise's longest tenured player, collapsed on the Liberty logo, her hands covering her face in euphoria. Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" blared as confetti rained down from the rafters.

It was a fitting end to a 2024 WNBA season that catapulted the WNBA into a new era of growth and cultural relevance, one that commissioner Cathy Engelbert called "the most transformational year in the WNBA's history." It featured standout individual performances -- A'ja Wilson won her third MVP with one of the most dominant seasons in league history; Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese dazzled with sensational rookie campaigns -- and leaguewide growth. The WNBA enjoyed its most watched regular season in 24 years, its highest attendance in 22 years and its most-viewed playoffs in 25 years.

In the end, the top two teams in the league facing off in the first winner-take-all overtime Game 5 of the WNBA Finals was the only conclusion for this transcendent season -- especially when one of the league's three remaining original franchises, arguably its most iconic, had the last word when the final whistle blew Sunday.

A season that featured plenty of firsts ended with the Liberty franchise earning an elusive first of its own, finally shedding the distinction of being the only WNBA original franchise without a title and able to clinch a championship on its own floor.

"To be able to bring a championship to New York, first ever in franchise history, it's an incredible feeling," Stewart said. "I literally can't wait to continue to celebrate with the city because I know it's going to be bonkers."

New York's championship -- clinched with franchise greats Teresa Weatherspoon and Sue Wicks courtside -- was an exorcism 28 seasons in the making, ending a run of frustration that began with the Liberty's initial ill-fated title run in 1997 and coursed through the decades since. It was punctuated by Weatherspoon's legendary half-court shot to win Game 2 in 1999, only to lose the title the following day; five total empty Finals trips; five other losses in the Eastern Conference finals; even a 2-20 record as recently as 2020. Going into last season, the Liberty were coming off five consecutive losing campaigns.

Then in a single offseason, New York flipped the script, becoming the first team in league history to use free agency to assemble a superteam -- and an automatic contender -- by bringing in two former MVPs in Jones and Stewart and one of the league's greatest point guards in Courtney Vandersloot. Most would have deemed last year's runner-up Finals finish a success for a newly assembled squad. Instead, the Liberty's 2023 outcome left them with what they called a "scar."

Still, they didn't enter the season as the favorites. The Las Vegas Aces opened 2024 as the top pick to complete the league's first three-peat of the millennium, while teams like the Phoenix Mercury and Seattle Storm executed big offseason moves in hopes of keeping up. Clark and the Indiana Fever made noise with their first playoff berth since 2016.

But New York asserted itself early, kept a stronghold on the top spot in the standings and steadily maintained its status as the best team in the league.

As the Liberty surged, the city took notice. In a summer brimming with record-breaking crowds, Barclays Center averaged the second-best attendance in the league (12,730), just two years after ranking eighth (5,327) and five after infamously hosting games in White Plains at the Westchester County Center. The regular season was only a sampling of what awaited in the postseason, as these were the highest-attended Finals in league history.

The fans were in for a show. The Liberty were better from a basketball standpoint than 2023, particularly thanks to the addition of German rookie Leonie Fiebich -- but they also developed a deeper chemistry and stronger collective will. Weekly culture meetings led by players and with guidance from mental performance coach Paddy Steinfort allowed the players to challenge and say hard things to each other, and know none of it was personal.

Through the playoffs, the Liberty figured out how to fight through adversity together, knocking off the two-time defending champ in the semis, overcoming a disastrous 0-1 start to the Finals after blowing a 15-point Game 1 lead with 5 minutes to go and prevailing in a grueling Game 5 despite scoring just 10 points in the first quarter and facing a 12-point deficit.

It was the fulfillment of the vision Jones and Stewart imagined when they decided to join forces in New York heading into the 2023 season.

"We talked about it so much, about coming together and what we envisioned of what we wanted to do in New York, and what we could do, to be able to pull it off and accomplish a dream," Jones said. "It's so freaking hard to do. It just means a lot."

Added Stewart: "Me, JJ, Sloot, we all came together to win a championship. Last year we lost in the Finals. But look at us, now we're here."

To do so, New York played more like a super team than a superteam.

With Ionescu and Stewart shooting a combined 5-for-34, the players around them stepped up. No one more so than Jones, the 2021 MVP who kept the Liberty in it with a team-high 17 points. The former No. 6 pick, who left her home country of the Bahamas to play high school basketball in Maryland, earned her first championship after falling short in three other Finals appearances.

"She led us," Stewart said of Jones, who was named Finals MVP. "Her dominance in the paint, on the boards, help-side defense. Everything that we needed, she was there. She had to wait awhile to get to this point, to get to the Finals to win a championship. But the wait was worth it."

Reserve forward Kayla Thornton helped change the game with her defensive energy. Fiebich scored four points toward the end of regulation and hit the first shot of overtime. "Whoever scores first in overtime usually wins," Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said postgame. "I was confident after that."

An unexpected hero emerged in Nyara Sabally, who embodied the definition of staying ready when your number is called. Brondello inserted the reserve center into the lineup in the third quarter -- playing a rarely used jumbo lineup of Jones, Stewart and Sabally that swung the momentum in New York's favor. Sabally finished with 13 points off the bench, including nine in the third.

"She has that X factor," Brondello said. "Her ability to make one-on-one plays, to rebound the ball, to play great defense. ... I know she's had a lot of adversity over her career, but the biggest game of her career, and she really rose to the occasion."

And even on an off shooting night (4-for-15), Stewart dedicated herself to helping her team win regardless of whether she was scoring. She corralled 15 rebounds, dished 4 assists, blocked 3 shots.

And she made the biggest play of the night: After missing a pair of free throws with 38.2 seconds left in regulation, she made her next two with 5.2 seconds remaining after drawing a foul on Alanna Smith. The two-time league MVP then iced the game with another pair from the charity stripe in overtime with 10.1 seconds left.

In a year with new faces and new energy surrounding the sport, Stewart -- at 30 already arguably the winningest player in women's basketball history -- won again, fulfilling her goal of bringing a title to her home state after the biggest free agency move in league history.

"My first WNBA game I ever went to was at MSG, was the Liberty," Stewart said. "And to have that be full circle was amazing.

"Throughout my whole day, everybody was texting me, 'How are you? Are you ready?' ... And I was calm. I was ready because I knew that no matter what, the city was going to have our back, and they showed up and they showed out, and they continued to be there for us when we need. I'm so proud of this team but so happy to be able to bring the first championship here because the city deserves it."

Momentum is snowballing for the WNBA heading into 2025. The league's first expansion team since 2008 will debut next spring in Golden State, with new franchises in Toronto and Portland arriving in 2026. Longer playoffs are on the way. The league just signed a long-term $2.2 billion media deal, and a groundbreaking collective bargaining agreement could soon be in the works. Teams like New York and Las Vegas, which have combined to win the past three titles, have set a new standard for what's expected from ownership investment.

But with its core all but guaranteed to return for another run, the Liberty aren't done yet.

"Hey, let's not stop at one, though," Brondello said. "Let's go for two."