Behind raucous home crowd, Angel Reese, Dream make statement in commanding Game 3 win vs. Valkyries: 'Y’all not taking this from us'

ATLANTA — Angel Reese thrives on perceived disrespect. The mere mention of that to her is disrespectful. She turns, her face shutting off, an “I don’t care” signaling the end of a one-on-one conversation toward the end of shootaround. 

But she does care. Or else she wouldn’t drop an aside that the goals she wrote down at the beginning of the season were ones “that many people may not think I can do.” A shiny new Defensive Player of the Year trophy sat beside her on a black-clothed table. 

Or that “nobody wants [the] Atlanta Dream in it” on the eve of what would become a semifinals sweep of the New York Liberty. Not if it didn’t linger with her. Not if it wasn’t what she herself called a chip on her team’s shoulder, an ordinary if not overused motivator used by the greatest in the world.

Reese is not immune. She lifted LSU to its first NCAA national championship as a squad of overlooked transfers that didn’t face top competition until the tournament. Tigers head coach Kim Mulkey attended Game 3 at State Farm Arena in Atlanta on Wednesday, delivering an embrace and telling her star to go get it again.

She’s in a similar role as the imperative offseason addition, the motor to the previously built bus that finally clicked back on every offensive cylinder in a 97-71 win over the Golden State Valkyries. The Dream lead the series 2-1 and are halfway to the title, as Dream head coach Karl Smesko astutely pointed out, with Game 4 back at State Farm on Saturday (1 p.m. ET). 

In her first WNBA Finals, Reese and the Dream disrespected themselves. Despite leading late on the road inside the most consistently intense arena in the WNBA, they let a victory slip by in the final minutes. They didn’t play their style, and were exposed in the process. The franchise dropped to 0-10 in Finals games. 

It pissed Reese off. 

That was exactly what Reese needed. 

“As soon as she stepped on the court, she was like, I’m going to be the best player on that court tonight,” DeWanna Bonner, the Dream’s August signing, said ahead of shootaround of Reese’s Game 2 performance. 

She did it again in Game 3. With 21 points and 12 rebounds, Reese became the youngest player in Finals history with at least 20 points and 10 rebounds in consecutive games and only the second after three-time Las Vegas Aces champion A’ja Wilson. She also became the youngest, at 24 years old, with three straight double-doubles in the Finals. In Game 3, she added 3 assists and 3 steals, shooting 7 of 12 including both of her 3-point attempts and all five free throws. 

“Angel shows up in every game,” point guard Jordin Canada, a two-time champion, said. “Some people only show up at big games, but she's consistent with that, and she brings her teammates along.” 

Four of the five Atlanta starters scored double digits, joined by Rhyne Howard (16 points), Naz Hillmon (15) and Canada (10), who moved into first all-time in Dream career assists. Allisha Gray had 8 points with 6 assists. Isobel Borlase added 12 off the bench, now tied for first in franchise postseason points for a rookie. Atlanta shot 49.3% from the floor, opening the basket in a way neither team had managed to over the first two games, which never cracked 33%. They were 9 of 22 from 3, with the Valkyries going 12 of 30.

Reese (who else?) laid in the game’s first bucket to kick off the ugliest start to any game of the series, their defensive-minded approaches taken into consideration.  The Valkyries didn’t score until the 5:07 mark, on a free throw, and didn’t make their first bucket until 4:38. It was the second-longest drought to open a Finals game of all time, per Elias. 

She scored a team-high eight points in the first quarter of a 23-15 game. Once the offenses delivered a back-and-forth affair, she hit all three field goal attempts for seven points with four rebounds and a 46-40 lead. 

The real Dream work happens in the third quarter, where they are 63-35 in this series. The Valkyries tied the game for a total of one minute early in the third before the Dream snatched it away for good and left nothing to doubt.  

Reese stared down the Valkyries on the bench, yelling “she can’t f*** with me” when she scored over Valkyries rookie center Aminata Gueye. She swatted shots, snatched rebounds and stomped the floor with a flex. Though she has said she likes the intimacy of the Dream’s standard 3,500-seat Gateway Center Arena, a sold-out 17,099 at State Farm, where there are as many in-game performances as Reese quips to opponents, suits her. 

Between the lines and the buzzer is where Reese does her talking. To thread a conversation with her otherwise can be as tricky as side-stepping through her in the paint or battling her on the boards for a rebound. Or, increasingly, guarding her at the 3-point line. 

It cannot be understated that her improved perimeter game has lifted the third-year forward into a new stratosphere, and served as a key contributor to the Dream’s run at the franchise’s first championship. She hit two more in Game 3, lifting the team’s record to 15-0 when she drills from the arc. 

The Valkyries could fight back all they wanted. That hesitation and drilled open, 25-foot look by Reese with 40.1 seconds left in the first quarter essentially sealed their fate. The second glued it completely shut. The crowd lifted and met her own roar, a crescendo of energy from everyone in blue. 

“When you have a mentality that started from me, where I’m hype all the time and bringing the confidence into everybody, y’all not taking this from us,” Reese said. “And in my heart, I’m not letting you take this from us.” 

Reese is the type of player you’re glad is on your side and not the other. The one who wants all the smoke, and will serve as her own fog machine when needed. In the end, it won’t matter how or what perceived slight or claim brought her here. Two victories from lifting the championship trophy, Reese is well on her way to proving the doubters wrong.