Ionescu, Liberty Dominate Dallas For 31st Win

Football season has just begun but the New York Liberty already secured a sweep of Dallas.

Paced by a brilliant first quarter for Sabrina Ionescu, the Liberty completed a season sweep of the Dallas Wings with a 99-67 victory in Arlington. Between 16 points of her own and dishing off assists to Betnijah Laney-Hamilton and Courtney Vandersloot, Ionescu played a direct role in 21 of the Liberty’s 25 scoring entries in the opening period.

With the win, the Liberty (31-6) reduced their official magic number to clinch homecourt advantage throughout the upcoming WNBA Playoffs to one. They can officially clinch the top seed on the bracket with another win or if the second place Minnesota Lynx lose to Chicago on Friday. The two teams are slated to battle on Sunday afternoon at Barclays Center (3 p.m. ET, WWOR).

The Liberty avoided any semblance of a trap game thanks to Ionescu’s early outburst: they led by 10 at the end of the first period and, save for a couple of brief couple of cutdowns to eight at the onset of the second, they kept the double-figure advantage throughout the evening, making it permanent when Vandersloot successfully converted an and-one opportunity at 7:22.

With her early tally, which ended up at a team-best 20, Ionescu got several landmarks out of the way quickly: she passed Crystal Robinson to become the fifth-leading scorer in franchise history. Her first of four three-pointers, sunk just 22 seconds into the game to open scoring, also gave her 60 games with at least one, just six short of the WNBA record set by Ivory Latta.

The only other Dallas threat came in the third quarter, when a series of quick tallies in transition cut the lead to 14 early in the third. A quick timeout from head coach Sandy Brondello, however, quickly restored seafoam sanity, One 17-9 run later more or less broke Dallas’ will and allowed the Liberty to empty its bench and expand its largest leads of the evening.

One of the Liberty’s points of emphasis was containing North Texas’ leading scorer in Arike Ogunbowale. New York contained the reigning WNBA All-Star Game MVP to 11 points on 3-of-13 from the field and shutting down the thought of a comeback. Despite the struggles, Ogunbowale did leave College Park Center with a little bit of history.

With her 11, Ogunbowale passed Deanna Nolan to become the leading scorer in Wings franchise history, which began under the branding of the Detroit Shock in 1998. Ogunbowale was the Wings’ leading scorer on Thursday alongside reserve Maddy Siegrist. Already eliminated from playoff contention, Dallas (9-28) shot only 37 percent from the field, including 4-of-18 from three-point range. Half of that tally, which was earned by Ionescu alone, was sunk by Sevgi Uzun.

Equally inspiring on the Liberty ledgers was a 17-point outing from Betnijah Laney-Hamilton, once again back in the starting five after leaving Sunday’s win in Las Vegas early with a knee injury. Vandersloot (5-of-7) and Breanna Stewart each had 11 while Jonquel Jones paired eight with seven rebounds. The game’s one-sided nature saw all but one New Yorker get on the scoresheet, as the seafoam reserves put up 32 points.

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