Liberty Can't Let Moral Victories Become the Norm

"It's easy to fight back when you're down. I think that this is disappointing collectively," Stewart said after the latest loss. "Yeah, there can be bright spots and whatever. But like, we have three games left and we're not where we need to be. It's frustrating and it's tough, but I know that our team is going to continue to show up every day and and fight for where we want to be. So we have another road game in Seattle, and we go there and we get better."

The night started off decent enough for New York, which enjoyed an early flurry from a masked Natasha Cloud coming off a slight nose fracture. It led by three early in the second by a 21-5 run from the expansion Valkyries created a lasting lead that inflated to as high as 24 before Rebekah Gardner's defensive crackdown brought at least some form of metropolitan stability.

"It's the story of, basically, our season right now," Stewart said. "When we have to take the ball out of the net, we struggle a little bit. We gave up 26 points [in the second quarter] and our spacing was a little bit bad. Sometimes we have good looks we just miss, but like to put ourselves in a hole like that is unacceptable."

Even then, mistakes and discomfort ruled the day for the seafoam savants, who yielded 14 points off six turnovers during the scary second. Trailing by only 10 at the onset of the fourth, back-to-back turnovers negated a chance to slice the deficit to two possessions and derailed metropolitan momentum before it could truly get rolling, relegating the group to yet another moral victory.

"We're not happy that we lost the game at all. I just like the fight in the second half," head coach Brondello said. "We made this team feel uncomfortable, to give up a really good team only give them 26 points [in the second half], it shows what we're capable of if we commit to playing really hard on that defensive end ... We want to do that right from the beginning. We talked about getting paint touches and getting downhill, how to exploit their congestion and their defense. I think we were just too passive [in the first half]."

"Good" losses have peppered the Liberty schedule, whether they come in the form of respectable efforts while shorthanded (i.e. a 100-93 defeat in their first of four Finals rematches with the Lynx, about two weeks before an A'ja Wilson created a heist in Las Vegas) or comebacks that fall just short. Standings and, more importantly, the playoff bracket only have one form of judgement in the form of the scoreboard, which accounts for all 40 minutes of play rather than certain scintillating stretches.

With the loss, the Liberty (24-17) has dropped four-of-six since securing a potential momentum-swinging victory over the Minnesota Lynx in the last of four WNBA Finals rematches. Perhaps indicative of how moral victories have come to define this stretch, the Liberty earned a playoff spot on Tuesday in the most bittersweet of fashions, as an Indiana loss to Phoenix proved to be the ticket-puncher. It was a double-edged gift, as it dragged the fifth-place Liberty 2.5 games away from No. 4 Phoenix for home court advantage in a potential first-round series.

There's something to be said about the undying optimism that seems to linger within the organization: head coach Sandy Brondello still believes that her squad is a dreaded opponent for any first-round foe when at full strength and the energetic emergences of Gardner and a returning Cloud at least hint at postseason magic from unlikely heroines that come to define the playoffs (i.e. Nyara Sabally's Finals breakout last fall).

But if moral victories counted, New York would have some well-earned company next to the 2024 championship banner forever hanging from Barclays Center's rafters. With three games left on the docket before a first-round challenge awaits, the team is well-aware that victories in the heart have to show up on the scoreboard if they have any intention of a staging a repeat cause.