SAN FRANCISCO — Ballhalla rose in unison, prepared to explode. Just under six minutes remained when the ball found Cecilia Zandalasini in the left corner.
The previous three minutes had been a rough stretch offensively for Zandalasini. She missed two free throws after getting fouled on a 3-pointer. She followed that by missing a 13-foot turnaround from the left side of the paint, then a missed 26-footer from the right wing.
But this shot? Zandalasini was more open than a highway at midnight. This shot promised redemption. With Golden State down 3, this shot carried the potential for momentum that swings the flow of a game and, thus, these WNBA Finals. It threatened to detonate the fervor in Chase Center until it crumbled on top of the Atlanta Dream.
And Zandalasini, coach Natalie Nakase’s favorite floor spacer, whose shooting form is worthy of a gilded frame, took a rhythm dribble and set her feet.
Then airmailed it. Not even close. Another shot swallowed by the Valkyries’ offensive abyss.
It was one of those nights for the Valkyries. Tiffany Hayes went 1 of 12 before leaving with injury. Gabby Williams needed 22 shots to score 26 points. Zandalasini, Veronica Burton and Kayla Thornton — three starters who at various points deliver offensive punch — combined to shoot 5 of 19 while scoring 16 points below their collective average this postseason.
“Obviously,” Burton said, “we missed a lot of shots. Missed a lot of bunnies. Missed open 3s. I think, initially, we were kind of settling for a lot of 3s.”
But the Valkyries have been here before. Brick City. Where the shots won’t fall, the dribbling increases, and the offense gets stagnant. They’ve visited too many times, actually. They know the potholes and alleys. They know the side streets and which street lights are the longest.
They also know how to get out.
Nothing about this air felt rare despite this being a novel stage. They survived Game 1 with a 68-64 win because this stress was far more familiar than foreign.
On every new plateau they reach, their resolve proves greater. They’re three wins from being champions. They survived another scare at home. All because they’ve long given up on the idea of shooting their way out of slumps. They’d rather fight their way out.
“It kind of just fits into who we are,” Nakase said. “That’s been our identity. We rely on it. We know it’s effort. We know it’s the details. … It’s kind of been our philosophy, especially down the stretch and close games. And you could see that it’s just kind of, ‘Here we go again.’ So it’s the same thing. There’s a lot of familiarity and composure down the stretch.”
The Atlanta defense made sure Golden State would have one of these games. The Dream pressured the ball on the perimeter, disrupting the Valkyries’ motion offense. Atlanta’s defenders fought around screens and rode drives to force tough finishes. They closed out hard on shooters and threw their weight around when crashing the glass.
Atlanta used its athleticism, wingspan and defensive savvy to muck up the Valkyries’ offense. It stymied the Golden State offense. Add in the nerves of the Valkyries’ WNBA Finals debut and the ball seemed heavier, the passes shakier. The rim shrank like an Ozempic waist, and points for the team in purple became scarce.
The Valkyries scored 28 points in the second quarter. They scored 26 points in the second half.
“We had the game right where we wanted it,” Williams said, “because it just came down to getting stops. That’s been our bread and butter all season. So we harp on it so much because we’ve built great defensive habits for these moments.”
As they have so many times before this season, they found themselves trailing and out of rhythm. The stage of the WNBA Finals added to the urgency, for sure, but this still was light compared with being down 16 in a do-or-die Game 3 against Dallas.
They don’t panic because they know this feeling. They’ve spent an entire season getting comfortable with it, fighting to keep their calm when the angst starts to rise with each brick. For Golden State, a struggling offense is a reminder its true calling card is defense and its most championship-worthy trait is resilience.
So when the Valkyries’ offense goes astray, their confidence doesn’t.
“At the end of the day,” Burton said, “we were supercomfortable with where we were, even down 3 with a few minutes left. And I think that is what we’ve become. Like, no lead makes us nervous. No lead makes this feel uncomfortable. Again, we don’t want to get to that position, but we felt in a very good place.”
That good place: down 64-61 with fewer than three minutes remaining. That’s when Burton blocked a floater by Dream guard Allisha Gray. On the ensuing inbounds, Kaila Charles secured the stop by rebounding Jordin Canada’s missed 3.
With points becoming scarce, and the clock dwindling, the Valkyries know where to go for offense. They put the ball in Williams’ hands and clear out.
Atlanta’s defense, though, is formidable, led by Rhyne Howard on the perimeter and Defensive Player of the Year Angel Reese in the back. After a series of screens didn’t work, Williams drove on Howard and drew a foul.
Williams made both free throws. This would be how they win this night. At the free throw line.
No pretty shot. No moment to immortalize. Just 2 points earned from the grind.
Perhaps the biggest 2 came courtesy of a Reese foul, grabbing Williams in transition. The two makes by Williams put Golden State ahead 65-64 with 1:18 remaining. Another foul from Reese led to another Valkyries point as she crashed into Kiah Stokes during a rebound.
Williams put the game on ice with a pair of free throws with 4.1 seconds remaining.
“I told you,” Valkyries owner Joe Lacob said with a wide grin after the game. “She’s the best player in the world.”
Golden State closed on a 7-0 run without making a shot.
The Valkyries shot just 4 of 16 in the fourth quarter. But all of the baskets they made were products of the muscle they’ve developed when their offense wavers.
It was Charles getting a breakaway layup after stealing the rock from Howard. It was a tip-in by Stokes, crashing the glass after a Williams drive. It was a block by Hayes and an outlet pass that led to a Williams fast-break layup.
This was the 21st time this season the Valkyries scored fewer than 80 points. They’ve won 15 of those games.
“You’ve got to find different ways to win,” Burton said. “And it’s just something that we learned. We’ve won from our defense. We will continue to win from our defense. And that’s the beauty about it being our identity is because a lot of times you can’t control what happens. Yeah, we would love to clean some things up offensively and hopefully have a better performance on that side of the basketball. But to be able to still win this game when we obviously (still) can have our best outing on that side is big for us.”
The Valkyries have plenty to fix before Monday’s Game 2. Their shooting, certainly. Their execution. The possessions that often end in desperation heaves. But what they won’t have to fix is their relationship with adversity.
They can handle the potholes of Brick City. They’re comfortable on its bumpy roads. They’re built to win in these streets.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
Atlanta Dream, Golden State Valkyries, WNBA
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