The Late Pieces Steal Both WNBA Semifinal Openers

The Atlanta Dream beat the New York Liberty 92-82 on Sunday in Game 1 of the WNBA semifinals, then Golden State beat Las Vegas 71-60. The higher seeds are up 1-0, and the people who actually closed both games were not the ones the previews lingered on.

Allisha Gray lasted 11 minutes. Jewell Loyd lasted 17. Veronica Burton sat for the last 16 and a half. DeWanna Bonner, Jordin Canada, Aminata Gueye, Kaitlyn Chen and Kiah Stokes filled the holes, and Wednesday now runs through those same names.

Jordin Canada and DeWanna Bonner Covered for Allisha Gray

Canada scored 25 points on 9-for-14 shooting, 20 of them after halftime, and added five steals and four assists. Bonner, in her eighth game since an Aug. 27 signing, came off the bench for 23 points and nine rebounds on 10-for-18 shooting and did not turn the ball over in 30 minutes. Together they scored 48 points after Gray, the Dream’s 19.0-point leading scorer, left with a left hand injury.

New York led 40-37 at the break. Bonner would not say what she told the group in the locker room, only “Maybe after the series.” Canada filled in the rest.

DB got into us at halftime, I’ll just say that. We knew we didn’t play our best in the first half.

Jordin Canada, Dream guard, after Game 1

She had three fouls by halftime and finished with five. Coach Karl Smesko left her in. Canada made two late threes when New York had cut a 16-point lead to five, then a driving layup that set the final 10-point margin. The WNBA said she became the sixth player in postseason history with 25 or more points and five or more steals in one game.

Bonner is 39 and has played a league-record 101 playoff games. Smesko said she guarded people who have been MVPs, shifted to spots she had barely practiced, and still “made it” when Atlanta needed a play. Angel Reese added 17 points, seven rebounds, four steals and three blocks. Rhyne Howard played all 40 minutes for 16 points, eight rebounds and eight assists on 5-for-20 shooting. Naz Hillmon played 37 minutes and did not score.

Sabrina Ionescu led New York with 27 points on 10-for-20 shooting and finished with one assist and five turnovers. Breanna Stewart scored 19. Jonquel Jones had 12 points, 11 rebounds and five blocks. The Liberty bench scored six.

THE DREAM TAKE GAME 1 OF THE SEMIS AT HOME 🚨

The @AtlantaDream defeat the Liberty 92-82 to take a 1-0 series lead.

Jordin Canada: 25 PTS | 4 AST | 5 STL | 4 3PM
DeWanna Bonner: 23 PTS | 9 REB | 2 AST | 2 STL | 3 3PM
Angel Reese: 17 PTS | 7 REB | 4 STL | 3 BLK
Rhyne Howard: 16… pic.twitter.com/ERnGPznuiG

— WNBA (@WNBA) October 4, 2026

Nine Steals in One Quarter Flipped New York

Atlanta, which led the league in forced turnovers during the season, turned a three-point deficit into a 69-55 lead in 10 minutes. New York scored 15 in the third and 27 in the fourth and still could not get the stops to finish the comeback.

THE THIRD QUARTER IN ATLANTA

• The steals: Atlanta had nine in the period, tied for a WNBA playoff record in any quarter, with Reese and Canada taking three each.
• Points off those: The Dream scored 16 off turnovers in the quarter and 32 in the game, tying the playoff record for a single night.
• The score: Atlanta outscored New York 32-15 and opened the half on a 13-3 run it never fully gave back.
• The Liberty mistakes: New York finished with 19 turnovers; Leonie Fiebich had four of them.

Ionescu said the Dream “upped their defensive pressure” and that New York drove into traffic without a clean outlet. Stewart called it live-ball turnovers and said Atlanta “raced down our throats,” the same third-quarter problem New York saw in the regular-season meetings. The eighth seed had just swept No. 1 Minnesota. Experience did not travel to State Farm Arena.

Who Covers Gray if She Misses Game 2?

Gray, a four-time All-Star, scored 22 points in each game of a first-round sweep of Washington. Sunday she scored seven in 11 minutes. Smesko had no medical update after the win, only “hopefully she’ll be okay.”

HOW GRAY LEFT GAME 1

1. Oct. 4, 3:59 of the first quarter: She goes to the floor holding her left wrist and hand and walks to the locker room.
2. Oct. 4, 8:30 of the second quarter: She checks back in with her ring and pinky fingers taped, misses a shot, and peels the tape off.
3. Oct. 4, 3:44 of the second quarter: She dives for a loose ball, grabs the same hand, and leaves for good. The team rules her out before halftime. She later sits on the bench with a splint.

Brionna Jones already sat with a left leg injury. If Gray cannot go Wednesday, the same two veterans who scored 48 will have to do it again, with Isobel Borlase in line for extra minutes. Reese found Gray after the win and told her, “We got you, we got you.”

WHAT WE KNOW

• Gray: Left hand, out for the second half, no timetable from Smesko.
• Bonner’s night: 23 points, nine rebounds, 30 minutes off the bench in her eighth game with Atlanta.
• The streak: The Dream have won eight in a row, are the only unbeaten team left in the postseason, and had not won a semifinal game since 2018.

WHAT IS UNCONFIRMED

• Game 2 availability: Gray’s next chance is Wednesday in Atlanta. The club has not said whether she will play.
• The diagnosis: The Dream have not called the injury a break, a sprain, or a dislocation.

Atlanta hosts Game 2 on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. ET. The series then moves to Brooklyn later in the week.

The Valkyries Grabbed 52 Rebounds and Would Not Let Go

About 36 hours after a 16-point comeback finished Dallas, Golden State held the defending champions to 60 points, Las Vegas’s lowest total of the season, in front of 18,064 at Chase Center. The WNBA called the 52 rebounds a franchise high. Las Vegas had 25, including two on the offensive glass, and did not get its first offensive rebound until about two minutes into the second half.

THE TWO OPENERS, SIDE BY SIDE

Gabby Williams scored 25 points with 11 rebounds and five assists on 9-for-18 shooting, the 10th 25-10-5 postseason line in league history. Kayla Thornton had 11 rebounds. The Valkyries shot 26-for-69 (38%). The Aces shot 21-for-62 (34%) after 45.3% in their first-round closer against Indiana, and they never got closer than five after Golden State’s lead peaked at 13.

A’ja Wilson scored 24 on 8-for-21 shooting, grabbed four rebounds, and had no assists in 35 minutes. Chelsea Gray scored 16 and, with 411 career postseason assists, passed Alyssa Thomas for the playoff assists record while logging her 69th playoff game. Jackie Young scored 11 with five assists in 38 minutes. Becky Hammon had spent two days on one subject.

All we talked about for the last 48 hours was rebounding and blocking them out, and we did not do it. Period.

Becky Hammon, Aces coach, after Game 1

Williams said the group was connected, communicating, and “showing them bodies,” and that it came down to rebounding. Golden State’s second-chance edge was 20-3. It is the third time in Aces playoff history they have been outrebounded by more than 20.

Thirteen Minutes and a Wilson Assignment

Gueye signed a rest-of-season contract on Sept. 20 after a year at Casademont Zaragoza. She is 6-foot-4, 24, and had played four regular-season minutes in a Valkyries uniform. In the first round she played 10 minutes. On Sunday Natalie Nakase gave her Wilson, and she finished with nine points in 13 minutes on 4-for-5 shooting, plus two steals and a block.

That is the practical answer to Wilson’s size. Gueye does not need 30 minutes. She needs to be tall, physical, and present when Stokes comes out. Kaitlyn Chen, the second-leading scorer, added 11 points in 22 minutes after Burton checked out with 7:30 left in the third and did not return. The Valkyries bench scored 27. Las Vegas’s bench scored seven, with Kierstan Bell’s three the high.

THE PEOPLE WHO CLOSED SUNDAY

• DeWanna Bonner: 23 points and nine rebounds off the bench in her eighth game after the Aug. 27 signing.
• Jordin Canada: 25 points and five steals after three first-half fouls, the head of Atlanta’s second-half surge.
• Aminata Gueye: Nine points on 4-for-5 in 13 minutes against Wilson, two weeks after the September deal.
• Kaitlyn Chen: 11 points in 22 minutes, including the layup that made it 64-53 and the one that made it 71-58.
• Kiah Stokes: 14 rebounds and four blocks, zero points, and the body Williams pointed to when she talked about slowing Wilson.

Young’s three with 8:25 left got Las Vegas within 58-53. Chen’s runners ended the debate. Loyd had already left. NaLyssa Smith’s season ended in late August with a left leg injury. Stephanie Talbot (knee) and Dana Evans missed a second straight game. The Aces are in the semifinals for an eighth straight year and are running out of people.

A Former Ace Owned the Glass Against Las Vegas

Stokes won three championships with Las Vegas as Wilson’s backup. Nakase was on Hammon’s staff for two of those titles before she took the Valkyries job and won Coach of the Year in 2025. Sunday she put Stokes on Wilson in a double-team shell and let the rest of the floor get small. Stokes took 14 rebounds, seven of them offensive, and blocked four shots. She did not score.

Williams grabbed Stokes by the shoulders after the game and said, “The secret is here.” Golden State had already taken its first playoff series win in a 2-1 first round against Dallas, the last game a 77-73 comeback from 16 down. This was the first semifinal win in franchise history, in year two, against the club that swept Phoenix for the 2025 title.

Loyd hurt her left leg in the first two minutes of the third quarter, attempted two shots, made none, and was ruled out by the end of the period. Hammon had no update. Nakase had said before tip that Loyd gets mentioned less than Wilson, Gray, and Young and should not be. Loyd had scored 11 in the first-round clincher. Without her, and without Smith, the Aces asked Wilson, Gray, and Young to play 35, 36, and 38 minutes and still lost the glass by 27.

Wednesday Brings Both Series Back to the Same Gyms

Atlanta is 30-14 and 1-0. New York is 26-18 and 0-1. Golden State is 32-12 and 1-0. Las Vegas is 31-13 and 0-1. The Dream host Game 2 on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. ET. The Aces and Valkyries play Game 2 on Wednesday night at Chase Center at 9:30 p.m. ET, then Game 3 on Friday at 9:30 p.m. ET in Las Vegas.

Gray’s hand and Loyd’s leg are the open questions. The closed ones from Sunday are on the sheet: 48 points from Canada and Bonner, 52 rebounds in San Francisco, and a September signing who spent 13 minutes on the best player in the league.