WNBA playoffs: Breanna Stewart embodies the Liberty’s emotional center as they advance to the Finals

LAS VEGAS — Every time the Las Vegas Aces began to crawl back in, Breanna Stewart was there.

Forcing MVP A’ja Wilson into a tough shot and quickly reeling in the rebound. Blocking Jackie Young on the perimeter. Tipping in her own miss to snap a seven-point run heading into halftime. Feeding Sabrina Ionescu and Jonquel Jones to fuel a sharp 3-point shooting matinee.

Marta Xargay, Stewart’s wife, was also there. From her seat underneath the basket, she questioned the lack of calls on the physical play taking place feet from her. She celebrated the Liberty’s ability to keep their heated rival at least one possession away, finally putting it away for good in the fourth quarter.

When the buzzer sounded Sunday on a 76-62 Game 4 semifinal victory that sent the Liberty back to the WNBA Finals, the two clutched each other in a teary embrace.

“It was definitely emotional,” Stewart said.

The day between Games 3 and 4 was the one-year anniversary of father-in-law Josep Xargay’s death, a moment forever intertwined with a postseason performance that fell below Stewart’s standards. The two-time MVP didn’t play well against the Aces in the Finals last season and wanted this year to be different. Redemption fell into her and the Liberty’s lap.

“Marta talked about doing everything that her dad would want us to do and we continue to do that,” Stewart said. “And, you know, I have receipts on the things that were said — the entire team does — but really my mentality today was to go in and get this win for my wife and her dad.”

The Liberty and Aces became immediate rivals last year as the league’s superteams, and though they respect each other, the teams don’t like each other. The heat simmered mostly under the surface in 2023, and Las Vegas had the last say, celebrating its back-to-back championship on the Liberty’s home court at Barclays.

At the championship parade in Las Vegas, Aces head coach Becky Hammon called out Stewart’s poor shooting performance, telling the crowd, “Three-for-17, you need to talk about it.”

It drew ire from fans, especially the past few months as Stewart opened up about the grief of losing her father-in-law during the most important annual stretch of her profession. But until Sunday afternoon, with the task of ousting the two-time defending champions done and over, it wasn’t anything either side addressed as each team kept it mostly to itself.

“We talked a lot of smack last year,” Hammon said, adding later it wasn’t personal. “I’m sure they heard it, and they got to smack us this year.”

Hammon never hesitated to call the Liberty, who locked up the No. 1 seed, the league’s best team this season. Their improvements shone bright at home in Games 1 and 2 when Stewart and then Ionescu individually elevated their play from the Finals. Again in Game 4, the duo took over and made the needed adjustments.

Ionescu found her pockets and scored a game-high 22 points, shooting 50% overall and going 5 of 8 from 3. She shot 3 of 3 from 3 to set the tone in the first quarter and led the Liberty with seven fourth-quarter points in what has become her closer role this series.

Stewart put up a second postseason double-double in a packed stat line of 19 points, 14 rebounds, five assists, four blocks and one steal. She wasn’t highly efficient (8 of 21 from the floor) but impacted the game more by bringing the ball up, locking down guard Kelsey Plum and settling the Liberty in intense moments.

Stewart ended any Aces momentum-shifting runs after calling out the 16 straight points the Aces reeled off in Game 3 as “ridiculous” on the Liberty’s part. The most pivotal moment came in the fourth quarter of a stressful one-possession game.

Young, whose game-opening 3 was the Aces’ only lead, hit a half-court shot at the end of the third quarter that sent the crowd into a frenzy and would have given them the lead back, 54-53. After review, the score was taken off the board because it was after the buzzer. The Liberty gathered during the break, not wanting to take this series back to a Game 5 in New York.

“They made their run,” Stewart said. “Whether they had momentum or not, we were going to take it back.”

Ionescu scored on a cut, and Leonie Fiebich, who dealt with foul trouble, scored her own on a pass from Stewart. Courtney Vandersloot, an asset off the bench after Sandy Brondello moved Ionescu to point guard, drove in for a bucket.

Minutes into the fourth quarter and with a 59-53 lead, Stewart blocked Plum in front of Xargay but was called for a foul. Stewart immediately called for head coach Sandy Brondello to challenge it, the Liberty won (and are 3 for 3 in the semifinals on challenges), and Stewart blocked Plum again on the ensuing Aces possession.

The Liberty poured it on in a 23-11 frame that looked far more like Liberty basketball than the choppy, foul-filled first three quarters. Jones and Fiebich each drew three fouls by halftime. Jones reached four quickly into the third, Fiebich in the final minutes of the quarter, and Jones drew a fifth with 4:49 remaining in the game and the Liberty leading by 14.

That could have sunk the Liberty, missing two starters in their lengthy lineup Hammon has compared to an NBA roster. Instead, Brondello credited Jones with maintaining her “emotional stability” and spacing the floor when she went back into the game. The Liberty edged the Aces in paint points, 30-28, and destroyed them on the glass, 48-27.

Defensively, they helped the Aces to their worst playoff field-goal percentage (32.8%) of the last three years and one of their worst showings from 3-point range (7-of-30, 23.3%). The 62 points were a season low. Wilson (19 points, 10 rebounds, five blocks), Plum (17 points) and reserve Tiffany Hayes (11 points) were the only Aces in double digits.

“At the end of the day, we didn’t have it shooting-wise,” Hammon said. “I thought we had good looks. We missed. And the [giving up] layup thing started happening again in the fourth quarter. If you look at the sheet, you can’t win against a team like that shooting 32%, 23% from 3 and then get absolutely your asses handed to you on the glass.”

The Aces will head into their first offseason under Hammon without a championship parade and now face questions about how they’ll raise another banner.

“We’ve never done exit meetings,” Hammon said. “We’ve done exit partying.”

Signing early extensions became the norm for the Aces superstars, but Plum did not re-sign and is an unrestricted free agent as is Alysha Clark. Kiah Stokes, who missed both games in Las Vegas with a concussion, is on an unprotected contract and hasn’t been an offensive asset.

The roster will look different after the league’s first back-to-back champions in two decades. The Aces fell short of their goal, but remained happy with the fight and challenge.

“Three-peats are hard. It’s hard as hell,” Wilson said. “It’s just one of those things that it seems like everyone is just gunning for you. And every single game is like a back-against-the-wall type of thing. Because you’re going to get everybody’s first punch, you’re going to get everybody’s best punch, and you have to sometimes withstand that. And over the course of 40 minutes and over the course of the season, that’s very hard to do.”

New York slayed the queens, but it’s not yet wearing a crown. There is no great satisfaction to be found here.

“We haven’t done anything yet,” Stewart said, echoing the team’s series-long refrain. “This was a tough series, an emotional series for a number of different reasons, but we’re going to the Finals.”