Mercury 81, Lynx 80: Copper’s Game-winning 3 Caps Off Late Comeback

The Minnesota Lynx returned to action on Friday night in the desert, where they took on a Phoenix Mercury squad that looked very different from the one Napheesa Collier and Co. took down in Minneapolis one week ago.

Mercury star Brittney Griner returned to the lineup, making her 2024 regular season debut after missing the past month with a fractured toe injury she suffered in the team’s preseason game against the Seattle Storm back on May 7. Griner was on a limit of roughly 20 minutes. Versatile 3-and-D wing Bec Allen was activated and in the first five after clearing concussion protocol. With both back, Phoenix for the first time this season played with their their preseason projected starting lineup of Natasha Cloud, Kahleah Copper, Diana Taurasi, Allen and Griner.

Their returns came at an important time, as the WNBA is in the midst of the Commissioner’s Cup — the W’s version of the In-Season Tournament. Each WNBA team plays five games against conference opponents, with the top performing team from each conference facing off in the Commissioner’s Cup Final on Tuesday, June 25. The winner will take home $500,000 spread evenly amongst the roster. Minnesota entered 2-0 in Cup games to lead the West, while Phoenix is 1-1, fourth in the West.

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Phoenix got out to a quick start, earning an early 5-0 lead by way of forcing a pair of Minnesota turnovers. The Lynx struggled to get in the paint in the first few minutes, as the combination of the Mercury’s perimeter switching and Griner’s presence inside dissuaded drives inside.

Alanna Smith and Collier got on the board in the subsequent possessions, scoring Minnesota’s first seven points of the game to even things up midway through the frame. The Lynx’s ball movement, screening and good spacing helped them establish some offensive rhythm after a clunky start.

But like it was in the third quarter of last Friday night’s contest, Minnesota struggled to finish possessions with defensive rebounds. Phoenix secured two offensive rebounds on one possession before Sophie Cunningham knocked down the Mercury’s first 3-pointer of the ballgame, which, paired with strong transition play from Copper, sparked an 8-0 run to take a 17-9 lead six minutes into the first quarter.

Minnesota’s defense struggled to contain Phoenix’s guards on the perimeter, which forced the team into scramble situations that made rebounding even more difficult. Copper exiting late in the first made half-court defense a more manageable task, as the Lynx forced a trio of turnovers that prevented the Mercury lead from reaching double figures.

However, the Lynx offense couldn’t capitalize, scoring zero points off of four Mercury turnovers in the opening frame. Minnesota turned it over six times themselves for five Phoenix points, and shot a highly inefficient 3/9 (33.3%) from 2. The Lynx were outscored 12-2 in the paint, 8-2 in fastbreak points. But Minnesota trailed by just six after one quarter, 21-15, because they made three of their eight 3-pointers, highlighted by a Natisha Hiedeman bomb inside of two seconds to play in the quarter.

Ceci Zandalasini continued her excellent stretch of 3-point shooting, connecting on her first look of the game to get the Lynx off on the right foot early in the second quarter. Collier joined her with a long-range shot to tie things at 23, capping off an extended 11-2 run dating back to the end of the first after a quiet first quarter.

Minnesota’s defense continued their strong play, forcing as many turnovers (two) as they allowed made shots in the first 4:17 of the quarter; the Lynx also did a much better job of rebounding misses, fueling improved transition play that forced some crossmatches and created better scoring looks for the offense.

The two teams then traded challenges midway through the frame. Phoenix Head Coach Nate Tibbetts wanted officials to review a charge call on Copper — her second of the game, both taken by Williams — but was unsuccessful; the Lynx immediately cashed in with yet another 3 — their third of the quarter.

On the ensuing Phoenix possession, Olivia Èpoupa (yet again getting rotation minutes!) fronted an entry pass to Cloud, resulting in an out-of-bounds call that Head Coach Cheryl Reeve correctly disagreed with, earning possession.

Époupa played the final five minutes and change of the second quarter. The French rookie did an excellent job of getting the offense organized and setting the table for several open looks for her teammates, while bringing her usually tremendous defensive energy. Outside of a late weak-side rotation that resulted in a Griner and-1 and a turnover, her presence was a needed boost for the Lynx, especially offensively.

After forcing eight turnovers in the first seven minutes of the second quarter, Minnesota’s interior defense struggled late in the half, though, allowing three layups and three made free throws off of fouls on drives. Those points propelled Phoenix to jump back in front by as many as six with 1:07 left in the second quarter. But the Lynx closed nicely, cutting the Mercury lead down to 38-35 at the break thanks to Kayla McBride’s second triple in the period.

Phoenix outscored Minnesota 22-6 in the paint in the first half, but the Lynx scored 21 points off triples (7/16, 43.8%) to the Mercury’s three (1/9, 11.1%), which was the great equalizer throughout the opening 20 minutes.

Reeve would surely hope her team in the second half could shoot better than 3/12 (25.0%) inside of 14 feet, where the Mercury connects on 11/17 shots (64.7%). Minnesota on the season is shooting 53.2% from the free throw line and closer, second behind the New York Liberty (57.0%).

Another area of improvement? Turnovers. Minnesota turned it over nine times in the first half — an unsurprising figure at this point, as the Lynx are fifth-worst in turnover percentage (18.8%) — but five of them were live-ball turnovers (55.6%). That is, brutally, an improvement upon their season-long live-ball turnover rate of 61.7%, by far the worst in the WNBA.

Smith set a strong tone for the Lynx out of the break, dropping a pair of sweet dimes under the basket for Williams and Collier to keep the score within a possession. But Copper fought right back with five straight points on a personal 5-0 run to give the Mercury some breathing room three minutes in, prompting a Reeve timeout. The 2021 WNBA Finals MVP scored the first eight of the half for Phoenix, nearly equalling the nine points she had in the first half.

Like she did in the first half, McBride delivered precisely when her team needed it most. McBuckets canned a pair of a huge 3s, stole a Cloud pass, and created a pair of free throws for Smith that helped the Lynx re-take a 51-49 lead at the 3:21. How did the former Notre Dame star follow that up? With her sixth 3-pointer of the game, of course, securing a game-high five-point Minnesota lead by way of a 12-0 run. She maintained her activity level on the other end, too, collecting four defensive rebounds and pushing the pace in transition.

Minnesota led 60-54 after three, winning the quarter 25-16. McBride scored 13 of them, nearly outscoring Phoenix by herself. The Lynx held the Mercury to just 5/21 shooting (23.8%), including just 2/14 (14.3%) on 2-point shots.

Taurasi joined the party once the fourth quarter arrived. The WNBA’s all-time leading scorer made a 3 despite getting fouled by Alissa Pili, then made a tough score in the paint for another and-1 in the first 90 seconds of the final frame. Her two scores in the first 1:12 matched the two made field goals she made in the first three quarters, as Taurasi connected on just two of her first 14 shots.

Those five points buoyed the offense for long enough to get Copper back in the game, but the Lynx offense nullified that with efficient scoring in the half-court. Bridget Carleton knocked down her second 3-pointer of the game to pay off a Collier steal and push the Minnesota lead to five. Hiedeman then made her mark, assisting on a Collier score in the lane before draining the biggest shot of the night to that point, a right slot 3 created by a beautiful fastbreak find from McBride to secure a game-high nine-point lead.

Phoenix wouldn’t go away, though, as Copper and Allen knocked down a pair of big 3s to bring it back to six. The Mercury’s ball movement picked up at the right time, helping to better space the floor and open passing lanes for perimeter players to operate in.

But McBuckets kept answering the bell. She drained her eighth 3-pointer of the game, extending her career-high (previously six). McBride became the only WNBA player this season to make eight or more 3s in a game this season, one shy of the league record (nine — Jewell Loyd, Kelsey Mitchell).

Copper kept coming back at the Lynx, scoring seven points for the Mercury in the final 1:10 to keep Phoenix in it until the last possession of the game. After Smith made a beautiful cut off of Collier in the post for a bucket to go up four with 26 seconds left, Copper responded just three seconds later with a enormous triple to cut it to one.

The Mercury waited until less than 10 seconds left to foul, but Carleton missed one of her two free throws, giving Phoenix the ball in the frontcourt, down 80-78 with 5.3 seconds to go. That was more than enough time for Copper to drive a dagger into the Lynx.

A McBride heave at the buzzer fell short, as Minnesota gave away a six-point lead with 80 seconds remaining. The former Chicago Sky star scored the final 10 Phoenix points to complete the comeback in one of the league’s most heroic efforts so far this season. Copper revealed in her postgame interview that the play was drawn up for Taurasi, but the greatest of all-time wanted the Mercury to live or die with the ball in Copper’s hands.

Copper led all scorers with 34, already her fourth 30-point game of the season, with Taurasi (12 points on 4/19 FG) and Griner in her season debut (11 points on 3/6 FG) joining the player of the game in double figures.

McBride led the Lynx with 25 points on a career-high 8/13 from deep, while Collier provided 20 points on 7/19 shooting, 12 rebounds and six assists, playing all 40 minutes. Smith played great as well, adding 12 points, six assists, four rebounds and three stocks.

Phoenix won several key battles — including points in the paint (34-18), free throw scoring (14-9) and attempts (18-11), and offensive rebounds (10-7) — which were enough to take down a Lynx squad that shot 15/34 (44.1%) from beyond the arc and outscored the Mercury 21-10 on the break and 12-8 on second chances. Minnesota also moved the ball very well, assisting on 24 of their 28 made shots (85.7%), improving upon their league-leading 75.1% assist percentage mark.

Minnesota struggled profusely to score consistently from 2, where they shot 13/38 (34.2%), worse than they did from 3. The Lynx, who are connecting on 31.2% of their short mid-range attempts (4-14 feet) this season, failed to connect on any of their 14 looks in that area, a key reason why they lost.

This was a loss that could prove to be especially costly for the Lynx, as a win would’ve moved them to 3-0 in the Commissioner’s Cup, maintaining their spot atop the Western Conference Cup standings, and enabled them to control their own destiny to the Cup Final. Now 2-1, Minnesota will need to defeat both the Seattle Storm (Sunday in Minnesota) and the Las Vegas Aces (Tuesday in Vegas), and the Mercury to lose one of their two final Cup games (at Dallas on Sunday and vs Las Vegas on Thursday).

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Rotation

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Up Next

The Lynx will return home to Minneapolis before hosting the Seattle Storm at Target Center on Sunday at 6 PM for another Commissioner’s Cup matchup. Fans can watch the game on Bally Sports North.

Minnesota is 2-0 against Seattle this season, sweeping a home-and-home to open the 2024 season. The Lynx are 2-1 in the Commissioner’s Cup Western Conference standings while the Storm are 2-0, so Sunday’s tilt could give the winner the inside track to represent the West in the Cup Final on June 25.

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Highlights

Coming soon.