Viva Las Vegas, the Aces are still alive.
The Liberty were unable to vanquish the two-time defending champions Friday night in their first chance to secure a return to the WNBA Finals.
With a chance to sweep the best-of-five league semis against the team that knocked them out in the championship round one year ago, the Liberty fell to league MVP A’ja Wilson and the Aces, 95-81, at Michelob ULTRA Arena.
Sabrina Ionescu, who led the Liberty with 24 points in Game 2, missed her first five shots and finished with just four points on 1-of-7 shooting with five turnovers.
Breanna Stewart scored 19 points to lead the Liberty, who will get another chance to close out the series on the road Sunday afternoon, with a potential decisive Game 5 slated for Tuesday at Barclays Center, if necessary.
Wilson registered 19 points and 14 rebounds for the Aces, who have won 12 straight postseason home games, with Jackie Young netting 24 and Kelsey Plum adding 20.
“Anyone play poker?” Vegas coach Becky Hammon asked before the game. “You gonna fold pocket aces? We’re the Aces. We’re not gonna fold.”
Hammon, a Hall of Famer who played the first eight of her 16 WNBA seasons in New York, said earlier this week that her players “quite frankly haven’t had the edge all year … and this is why three-peating is hard.”
The Libs were the No. 2 seed in the playoffs last year, dropping the first two games of the finals in Vegas before losing the series in four games.
Liberty coach Sandy Brondello has called last year’s loss “a scar” and “a reminder” of what could have been.
“That’s our motivation and learning from what it felt like [last year],” Brondello said before Friday’s game. “That’s a great motivation, isn’t it? Like, we had opportunities. Could’ve, should’ve, didn’t. So now it’s on us to make sure we bring that energy.”
The league-leading Liberty actually posted the same 16-4 record both at Barclays Center and on the road during the regular season, plus four straight home wins to open the playoffs against the Atlanta Dream and the Aces.
They won both of their visits to Las Vegas during the regular season.
“I’ve seen zero complacency with the Liberty this year,” Hammon said. “So in a way, I kind of don’t care what they were last year. This year, they are tough.
“They’ve been the best team all year. I think they’ve been the most non-complacent team all year. Kudos to them for working on things they had to work on, even as individuals. Things that we exploited last year, they went and got better at. … They added some length, which I think has been a game-changer. So I don’t care what they were last year. They’re really freaking good this year.”
Still, Ionescu missed all four of her shots and was blanked in the first half, which featured 18 lead changes and ended with the Aces holding a 52-49 lead.
Stewart had 14 points at intermission, one more than Wilson, although Jonquel Jones picked up three fouls for the Liberty.
Plum buried a couple of 3-pointers as the Aces pulled away with a 17-0 run in the third to extend their advantage to 73-53, with the Liberty missing 12 consecutive shots and going nearly eight minutes without scoring at one point in the quarter.
Ionescu finally got on the scoresheet one minute into the fourth, but the Aces extended their lead to as many as 25 to ensure at least one more home game for a chance to send the series back to Brooklyn.