The Liberty defense forced 23 turnovers and made a WNBA record 19 three-pointers as New York dominated the Sky, 99-74, on Thursday night in Chicago.
Ten Liberty players scored a point and five scored in double figures as New York improved to 2-0 on the early season.
Here are the takeaways...
-The Liberty starters got off to a hot start, going up by double-digits by outworking and outrebounding the Sky. Jonquel Jones was especially dominant in the post against Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso. Jones posted eight points on 3-of-3 shooting and three blocks in the first.
Liberty coach Sandy Brondello chose to put out a rotation of Sabrina Ionescu and four reserves (Marine Johannes, Nyara Sabally, Kennedy Burke, Rebekah Gardner) to see how they would gel. It didn’t go that well as the Sky reserves, led by Rebecca Allen and rookie Hailey Van Lith, slowed down the Liberty pace and were aggressive to the rim, drawing foul after foul. They would cut the Liberty's lead to five heading into the second quarter.
-Chicago started with the second frame with the reserves that cut into the Liberty lead, but New York went with the group of Breanna Stewart, Natasha Cloud, Jones, Gardner and Johannes, and the defensive intensity immediately increased. The guards, in particular, were jumping passing lanes and running up the court with ease.
The Liberty’s lead would see-saw from 13 to six as each team would go on runs built on forcing turnovers. New York would use a 15-0 run to build a 21-point lead thanks to multiple players and the Sky had no answer offensively. New York outscored the Sky, 25-9, in the second quarter.
Ionescu and Stewart led the Liberty with 12 points each going into halftime. But the story is the defense and ball movement. The Liberty out-assisted Chicago, 14-4 -- Cloud dishing six of them -- and the Sky turned the ball over 15 times, and New York capitalized with 18 points off of them.
-The Sky started the second half with an 8-0 run thanks to a couple of threes, but they could have extended that run but missed some open threes while the Liberty were having trouble sinking shots. A technical foul on Reese for arguing with the refs helped turn the tide as New York would find their range, with Jones and Johannes sinking threes of their own as they built their lead up to a game-high 24 points late in the third quarter and went into the final frame up 75-54.
-Cloud would put this game way out of reach with three three-pointers to put the Liberty lead to 30, and the Sky could not cut into it enough to make this a game. The first-year Liberty guard had a team-high 18 points on 6-of-10 shooting (4-of-5 from three) to go along with her eight assists and four rebounds.
Brondello would pull her starters and go with her second and third wave of rotation players to close out this game with five minutes to go.
-After making just four three-pointers in the season opener against the Aces, the Liberty made 19 on Thursday, breaking a franchise and WNBA record for made threes in a game.
-Reese went scoreless on 0-for-5 shooting in the first half and that cold streak would reach 0-for-8 (including 0-for-4 from the free-throw line). She would make her first points of the game with six minutes remaining in the game by sinking both free throws. The second-year player would come down with 11 rebounds.
Courtney Vandersloot had a good game, scoring a team-high 14 points, dishing three assists and coming down with two rebounds in her first game against her former team.
Game MVP: Natasha Cloud
Cloud was the facilitator in the first half and then the scorer in the second. She now has 17 assists in the first two games. She did it all for New York.