RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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Take a deep breath. After a fast and furious August featuring last-second game-winners, record-breaking performances and a little too much spiciness on and off the court, the WNBA will press pause for the next 16 days for the FIBA World Cup.
With four games remaining for each team during the regular season, let’s take a look at where we stand.
Playoff field is set
There hasn’t been much intrigue for weeks as to which teams will advance to the postseason, and the Dallas Wings ended any drama by clinching the final playoff spot last week. Although the Phoenix Mercury, Chicago Sky, Los Angeles Sparks and — to some extent — the expansion Portland Fire and Toronto Tempo harbored postseason hopes entering the 2026 season, the eight playoff teams this year will be the Atlanta Dream, Wings, Golden State Valkyries, Indiana Fever, Las Vegas Aces, Minnesota Lynx, New York Liberty and Washington Mystics.
Those team names were listed in alphabetical order with the seeding order still dramatically in flux. As indicated in The Athletic ’s playoff projection bracket, the top three seeds are relatively certain: The Lynx are the odds-on favorite (94 percent likelihood) to secure the No. 1 seed, the Valkyries are in position to be the No. 2 seed, and the Aces are right behind them. Beyond that, no team has more than a 40 percent chance of landing at any particular slot. In fact, one of the most curious findings in the projection bracket is that the Dream are the most likely team to finish fourth and fifth, but they obviously can’t play each other in the first round of the postseason.
With so much at stake in the final four games of the season, every game between playoff teams takes on greater importance. Golden State, Las Vegas and Dallas are free and clear of any more postseason previews, but here are the six remaining:
Friday, Sept. 18 : New York at Minnesota
Sunday, Sept. 20 : Washington at Indiana
Monday, Sept. 21 : Atlanta at New York
Tuesday, Sept. 22 : Minnesota at Indiana
Wednesday, Sept. 23 : Atlanta at New York
Thursday, Sept. 24 : Indiana at Minnesota
The Lynx need to win at least one of those games (assuming they also beat the Connecticut Sun) to secure the No. 1 seed and homecourt advantage through the playoffs. Three wins could get New York into the top four and a first-round Game 1 at Barclays Center, and Atlanta probably needs to split with the Liberty to stay in the 4-5 matchup.
Several tiebreakers remain in flux. Indiana’s tiebreakers against New York, Washington and the Dream all have yet to be decided, so there will be no rest before the playoffs tip off.
Who is the championship favorite?
The Lynx have been the top seed for most of the season but head into the break losers of two in a row with Olivia Miles nicked up yet again. She also just had only the second zero assist game of her career, the first coming in a 32-point blowout over Toronto that was a little less consequential.
Minnesota is not nearly as bulletproof as one would expect a top seed to be. Since the All-Star break, the Lynx have the league’s second-best record, but only the fourth-best net rating. Their offense was bottled up against Golden State and their defense suffered against Atlanta. Leaks have been springing for some time in Minnesota.
Perhaps it’s not a surprise, then, that the Lynx have been usurped as the title favorite, per our projection bracket. That honor now goes to the Valkyries, coming off a week when they won on the road in Minnesota and New York. Golden State’s defense has been phenomenal all year, and their offense has perked up lately, in part thanks to the drives of Tiffany Hayes. No one can keep her out of the paint.
The Valkyries would be a unique title winner. It’s rare for a WNBA champion to be without a single no-brainer MVP candidate. In the last 17 years, only the 2021 Sky didn’t have a first-team All-WNBA player.
Maybe the Aces should still be considered a title favorite with their prodigious top-end talent. Even without NaLyssa Smith , Las Vegas has a roster full of proven playoff performers, a head coach with a 10-1 record in playoff series and A’ja Wilson, who is the best player alive. Then again, if the Aces matched up with the Liberty in the first round, an early exit against a team that can take advantage of its lack of size wouldn’t exactly be surprising.
The Fever have the best offense in WNBA history, and this league has historically rewarded offense over defense. Kelsey Mitchell and Caitlin Clark can go on heaters that many other teams can’t keep up with, but Indiana’s offense can sometimes be bogged down by full-court pressure.
I tend to believe there is no championship favorite at this point. Expansion of the league by 25 percent in the last two seasons has created a little too much parity, giving several teams an opportunity to emerge victorious this postseason.
Prepare for an epic tank-off
The pandemic years are long behind us, but the issue of college eligibility hasn’t yet been settled. The NCAA’s new five-in-five rule means that the 2027 draft class won’t be decided until much closer to April, since all of the best prospects can choose to return to college for one more season.
The uncertainty of who could be available hasn’t stopped several franchises from, let’s just say, incentivizing their odds of landing a top pick by accumulating as many losses as possible. As a result, the lottery standings are almost as compelling as the playoff race.
Four games remain between a pair of non-playoff teams, and two of them stand out. The first is on Sept. 20 between Portland and Los Angeles. Neither team has let go of the rope to end the season; both collected surprising wins against playoff-bound opponents last week and have looked a cut better than the rest of their lottery-destined peers. To wit: Carla Leite proved wholly deserving of her first invite to a major senior tournament for France by dropping 26 points and six assists in a rout over Atlanta. Mean...
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