As someone who covered Veronica Burton during her college career at Northwestern, I would be remiss not to bring up how she has stepped up for the Valkyries in the past two games. In Game 5, she scored 13 points and blocked four shots, tying the record set by Diana Taurasi in 2009 for the most blocks by a guard in a game.
Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase called her the “best point guard in the league”.
A refresh on the action in Game 5 as we get closer to Game 6’s tip-off:
Related: Golden State Valkyries one win from WNBA title after Game 5 win over Atlanta Dream
And a plug for our WNBA 30 newsletter, helmed by the fantastic Jordan Robinson, who is one of the best out there at covering the league. If you’re not already subscribed, make sure you sign up so you can read her thoughts once this series wraps up:
Related: Sign up for WNBA 30: a limited run women’s basketball newsletter
The Dream have said that even with the matinee tip-off, this game will be a sellout. More than 10,000 tickets were sold in the first 90 minutes they were put on sale.
The Hawks-Cavaliers game tonight was pushed from 7pm ET to 8pm ET, so there will be enough time to switch the court from Dream to Hawks branding.
It’s still probably going to be a bit of a tight turnaround, especially if accounting for a title celebration.
“I still believe in our team. I still believe that we can win this and one game at a time,” Angel Reese said after the Dream’s Game 5 loss. “We’re just going to take it one game at a time and just get back to who we are.”
Reese has been incredible at points of this series – specifically in Games 2 and 3, when she had 30 and 21 points respectively as the Dream won both games. But she’s been kept quiet in the past two. She had eight points and nine rebounds in Game 4, followed by seven points and 15 boards in Game 5. It was the first time this entire season that she’d scored in single digits in back-to-back-games.
“It doesn’t matter what time [Game 6] is. At the end of the day, we just need 94 feet, two hoops in each other,” Valkyries center Kiah Stokes said. “It’s a close-out game. Atlanta is a great team and we don’t want to give them basically any life. So as much as we love ‘Ballhalla,’ we don’t want to come back here. So we need to go in with the mentality that we have to win. It’s do or die.”
When the Guardian staff made our predictions for the finals, Stokes was a near-unanimous pick for the player most likely to break out in this series. That was a smart call: she has been a defensive force, with three or more blocks in all five games. She also added 13 points in Game 5, tying Veronica Burton for Golden State’s team high. Chants of “MVP” broke out for Stokes at Chase Center on Monday.
Preamble
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of Game 6 of the WNBA finals! Yes, it’s not even noon ET on a Thursday, and we’re getting ready for a potential championship-clincher. If you’re on the US west coast, you’re probably enjoying basketball with your breakfast. If you’re in Europe, you may be getting ready for dinner. If you’re still up in the middle of the night/morning in Australia, cheers to you.
Why is a game of this magnitude being played at midday on a weekday? The Atlanta Dream’s normal home, Gateway Center Arena, seats only about 3,500 people. The Dream have played all of their playoff games through their historic run to the finals at the Atlanta Hawks’ State Farm Arena, which fits more than 17,000 fans. The Hawks have a game later tonight, and all of the relevant parties – the WNBA, NBA, the Dream and the Golden State Valkyries – spent the weekend working out a solution. The Dream said this was the best option, but also that their concerns to find a suitable venue ahead of time did not receive adequate attention.
Schedule
Best-of-seven series. All times US Eastern Daylight Time (EDT).
Sat 17 Oct Game 1: Golden State 68, Atlanta 64
Mon 19 Oct Game 2: Atlanta 79, Golden State 65
Wed 21 Oct Game 3: Atlanta 97, Golden State 71
Sat 24 Oct Game 4: Golden State 67, Atlanta 62
Mon 26 Oct Game 5: Golden State 64, Atlanta 55
Thu 29 Oct Game 6: Golden State at Atlanta, 12.30pm (USA/CNBC)
Sat 31 Oct Game 7: Atlanta at Golden State, 8pm* (USA/CNBC)
*-if necessary
How to watch
In the US, the series will air on NBC, USA Network and CNBC, with all games streaming on Peacock. In the UK, it will be carried by Sky Sports. In Australia, fans can watch through WNBA League Pass, with selected coverage also available through ESPN.
It’s unfortunate that this scheduling snafu took up a lot of the airspace the past few days around what has been a pretty fantastic finals. The Valkyries – in just year two of existence as an expansion franchise – have a 3-2 series lead. Kiah Stokes’s star turn in Games 3 and 4 put Golden State in position to seal the deal today. But Atlanta won’t go quietly: their star Angel Reese has been quiet the past two games of the series, but if she can find the form of her standout performances from Games 2 and 3, this could be a different story. A Dream win would send the series back to Golden State for a Game 7 on Saturday.
When the Bay Area was awarded an expansion team three years ago, Valkyries owner Joe Lacob made the bold promise of a championship within their first five years. Let’s see if that vision comes true today.
Tipoff is 12.30pm ET (5.30pm BST). More to come!
Updated
Ella will be here shortly. In the meantime here’s the latest on what led to today’s surprise matinee.
Related: Dream say WNBA finals concerns went unheeded as teams prepare for 12.30pm Thursday start
