The Minnesota Lynx will look to keep their pursuit of a 12th straight playoff appearance alive on Sunday afternoon, but they will need some help to do it.
Minnesota enters the final day of the regular season with a record of 14-21. That puts them a game behind the New York Liberty and Phoenix Mercury for the two final playoff spots in the eight-team field. If the Lynx want to get in they’ll have to beat the Connecticut Sun on Sunday afternoon.
This is a tall task considering the Sun won both previous meetings this season, scoring a 94-84 victory at Target Center on Jul. 22 and a 86-79 victory two days later, but Minnesota might catch a reprieve on Sunday.
Entering the final day of the season, the Sun are locked into the third seed in the WNBA Playoffs. This creates a scenario where the Sun could rest their stars and Connecticut took advantage this week with no player playing more than 26 minutes in a pair of blowout wins over Los Angeles.
Then again, the Sun have been burned in this position before. Connecticut won its final 14 games to close out the 2021 season but were eliminated in the semi-finals by the Chicago Sky, who eventually won the WNBA title.
“I think we kind of got lackadaisical a little bit and comfortable with our wins,” Jones told the Hartford Courant. “A lot of times when you’re winning, everything seems like it’s going well and then you lose and you’re trying to find ways to be better because you lost. And so for us those losses came at a very crucial time in the season.
“We just have to continue to stay on top of everything that we’re doing…We just hold ourselves accountable and we put ourselves in a better position going into the playoffs.”
Those comments seem to indicate that the Sun wants to be ready for the playoffs and if that includes one last battle with the Lynx, so be it. If the Lynx are able to survive, however, they’ll take part in some scoreboard watching on Sunday afternoon.
Minnesota has the tiebreaker over the Phoenix Mercury and New York Liberty for the final playoff spots, meaning that if they win and either team loses, the Lynx are in.
The Liberty will host the Atlanta Dream, who are looking to keep their own playoff hopes alive. If the Dream beats the Liberty, they’ll be in the same position as the Lynx, cheering for the Sky to defeat the Mercury on Sunday night.
The good news is that Chicago should be a formidable ally. The Sky has plenty to play for as they can jump to the No. 1 seed if they beat the Mercury and the Seattle Storm defeats the Las Vegas Aces. A motivated team should be a challenge for the Mercury, but it means nothing if the Lynx can’t beat Connecticut.
