00:00Welcome back to another edition of Liberty Lately.
00:02Dexter Henry with the wonderful Madeline Kenney.
00:05We are back after the fever break.
00:07How are you doing?
00:08I'm doing well.
00:09I'm excited.
00:10Yeah, I'm excited.
00:11We're in the stretch run where now, at the time of us talking,
00:14the Liberty have one game left in their regular season
00:16here at the Barclays Center on Monday evening.
00:20They fell to the Atlanta Dream 95-84.
00:24This was a game in which the Liberty, they were in it.
00:26And then the second quarter, end of that happened in the third quarter,
00:30and they weren't.
00:31What were your major takeaways from this one?
00:33Yeah, it felt like they were, it was a really physical game for starters.
00:36And Angel Reese after the game kind of said that she could see how tired
00:40the Liberty were come third quarter and that they were just intentional
00:43about trying to get the Liberty to be running and kind of wear them down.
00:48And I think that that's something that the Dream were really successful in
00:50was taking advantage of the gift the schedule gave Atlanta in particular,
00:55knowing that Liberty are playing on a back end of a back-to-back,
00:59and they were in Toronto the night prior.
01:02But it felt like things started to shift late in the second quarter.
01:06That, they could have gone into halftime tied,
01:09but then Duana Bonner gets the putback bucket and the and one.
01:13It's a three-point deficit.
01:14And then that momentum carried into the third quarter.
01:17Yeah, and you saw really the game change from there.
01:19The Liberty were outscored by eight in the third quarter,
01:22and things change.
01:23When you look at this game, because we've talked about this all season long,
01:26we've had concerns about the Liberty's defense.
01:29You saw some of that in this game.
01:31Did the concerns come back up to you, or was it more of,
01:34hey, this was more of a schedule loss with the back-to-back coming from Toronto?
01:38Because Liberty have played pretty well coming out of the break.
01:40I don't even know if I want to call it a scheduling loss,
01:42because you know the Liberty were heading into this game wanting to win,
01:45because the fact that they didn't win tonight means that they will not have
01:49the potential to have home court advantage in the first round.
01:52So the highest that they can be in the seating is fifth place,
01:54but could also fall all the way down to eighth.
01:57So there's a lot of uncertainty.
01:58There's no seats that are established.
02:00But I do think that the defense was one of those things where
02:04it felt like they had really good moments where they were executing really well.
02:08But I do think that that fatigue started to set in a little bit.
02:11But a lot of the problems, too, were just like turnovers,
02:15like live ball turnovers leading into like leak outs and run outs.
02:19And so I think that's kind of where the dream were able to capitalize
02:22on the Liberty's mistakes and the fatigue,
02:26because when they were able to get into like the half court,
02:29it seemed like they were, you know, pretty, pretty,
02:31they did a good job, I would say, overall.
02:33Yeah, they did.
02:34Liberty sloppy of the ball in this one, 11 turnovers.
02:37Atlanta got a bunch of points off of that.
02:39Atlanta, they took the ball really well in this one.
02:40They only had three turnovers.
02:43Now these teams will play each other again on Wednesday night
02:46in the regular season finale.
02:47But before we get to that, you talked about the seeding.
02:50Liberty cannot finish higher than fifth in terms of playoff seeding.
02:54So you're starting to think about what these possible first-round matchups
02:57could look like for them.
02:58What do you think is the best possible first-round matchup for the Liberty
03:02about the opponents they could play here?
03:04I know this sounds crazy, but I do think the Las Vegas Aces
03:08is a team that I wouldn't hate to see the Liberty play
03:11just because for whatever reason that's a type of like matchup
03:13that the Liberty continue to like get up for.
03:16It's a matchup that kind of leans in favor a little bit with the Liberty,
03:20especially not with Melissa Smith out.
03:21So I think that that kind of changes the dynamic of that series
03:25and with Aces can, you know, Aces are always going to be the team to beat
03:29come playoffs, come the postseason time.
03:32And I think the Aces could be a good matchup.
03:36Minnesota, sneakily.
03:37I was wondering if you were going to say that,
03:39especially coming off of Friday.
03:40Especially coming off of Friday.
03:42I mean, the thing is that like the Liberty are going to go
03:45as far as Brianna Stewart takes them.
03:46And that's not to say that the whole onus is on her
03:49to carry this team to the finish line.
03:51But, you know, she really sets the tone.
03:53And what you really need to see is like Sabrina Unescu
03:56to kind of rediscover her shooting stroke
03:58and limit some of the unforced errors
04:03that she kind of got herself into in trouble with today
04:06against the Dream.
04:07And JJ, you know, I thought she was really great
04:09against Angel Reese overall.
04:11That was a fun matchup to watch.
04:13And there was a lot of mutual respect there.
04:15They both got two fouls early
04:17and kind of seemed to be jawing at each other a little bit.
04:20But it was all in good competition.
04:23Yeah, it was all in good competition.
04:24I'm not trying to make drama out of it.
04:26But, yeah, I think that those are the two teams, surprisingly,
04:30that I wouldn't hate to see the Liberty face.
04:32I was wondering if you would say the Lynx,
04:34especially how well they played them on Friday night.
04:36Aces, they've obviously played well this season,
04:38beat them here in the Commissions Cup game.
04:40So a lot of interesting things there.
04:42I don't think people would be shocked
04:43because they're at the top of the standings now.
04:45Liberty, looking like they're going to be
04:47at the bottom of the standings, we're still going to see.
04:49Speaking of that, as we close here, Wednesday night,
04:52finale in this home-and-home series,
04:54or I should say baseball series, you kind of say,
04:57here for the Liberty,
04:59here where they'll play the dream again,
05:00here at the Barclays Center.
05:02How do you think the Liberty should approach this?
05:04Because after the game,
05:05we heard the players talking about
05:06wanting to get ready for the postseason.
05:08John Cole Jones said this.
05:08Bionna Stewart said this.
05:10And it sounds like, look,
05:11we want to go out and win this game,
05:13get the best seed possible.
05:14Do you think they're going to approach it like that?
05:15And is that the right way for them to approach this?
05:18Yes and yes.
05:18I don't think there's any way that you can approach this game
05:21other than we need to get a win,
05:23we need to set the right tone heading into the postseason.
05:26And I think beating a team that's really good
05:28and deep as Atlanta is,
05:31I mean, they had five players finishing,
05:34double-digit scoring.
05:35DeWanna Bonner had like 17 points off the bench.
05:37Like, you know,
05:38the dream have a lot of different weapons that they can use.
05:42And so I think the Liberty being able to beat them
05:46and still some more confidence,
05:47get this place rocking,
05:49get people excited for the postseason,
05:50even though there's already so much excitement out there.
05:53I think that that's the way you got to approach it.
05:56And I think, you know,
05:57you know that Brianna Stewart's going to show up.
05:59That's just who she is.
06:00She's always going to show up.
06:01She's been ready for the playoffs since she went to Berlin.
06:03Like, she's been firing all cylinders this entire month.
06:07And so I think, yeah,
06:10it's just going to be coming together
06:11and making sure that they're executing at a high level,
06:14limiting the turnovers that are like unforced errors, you know?
06:19Like, there were so many passes that were into, like,
06:23like lanes that you saw the dream were already ace,
06:27you know what I mean?
06:27Like, interspending.
06:28Yeah, and so I think, you know,
06:30just being a little bit smarter with the ball
06:31and handling it a little bit better,
06:33that can lead to a lot more success
06:35and cut down on some of those turnovers.
06:36Because, again, when you do have those light bulb turnovers,
06:39it puts you in a really tough position to try to recover.
06:42Yeah, it really does hurt the Liberty tonight
06:45against the Dream 95-84 loss here at the Barclays Center.
06:49Maddie and I will be back here at the Barclays Center
06:51on Wednesday to talk more about that
06:53after the regular season.
06:54Family, unbelievably, we'll be through 44 games.
06:56Feels like just the other day,
06:58we were doing the season preview
07:00and starting the season,
07:01and now we're going to be here at the end.
07:03So it's going to be very interesting.
07:04We also have great stuff coming for you later in the week.
07:06We'll be doing a playoff preview.
07:08That's going to be really fun.
07:09We'll have some special guests with us.
07:11I think that's going to be good.
07:12I'm excited.
07:12I'm very excited for this.
07:13It's going to be a fun one.
07:14We'll be in studio together for that one.
07:16So that's going to do it from here
07:17at the Barclays Center with Liberty Fall
07:19to the Dream 95-84.
07:21We will see you guys on Wednesday.
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