A year after falling short in the finals, the New York Liberty clinched the No. 1 seed for the upcoming WNBA playoffs.
The Liberty (32-7) secured the top spot Tuesday night by beating the Washington Mystics 87-71. This is the first time New York claimed the No. 1 seed since the 2015 WNBA playoffs, which used a different format with top seeds from the Eastern and Western Conferences.
Despite their prestige as one of only four remaining WNBA original franchises, the Liberty are aiming to earn their first championship. They’ve finished as runners-up five times (1997, 1999, 2000, 2002 and 2023).
“It was one of our goals that we set out — trying to get that home-court advantage,” Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said postgame. “We still have to take care of our business in the playoffs. … We have a great arena. We have great fans, so we want to play in front of our fans as much as we can.”
To grab home-court advantage during the postseason, New York first had to acknowledge its scars from last year’s WNBA Finals.
As the No. 2 seed, the Liberty and their star-studded roster lost the finals in four games to the Las Vegas Aces, with the ending — an air-balled Courtney Vandersloot jumper — silencing fans who eagerly anticipated a decisive fifth contest.
An offseason of…
