The Las Vegas Aces won their first ever Finals game after beating the Connecticut Sun on Sunday, 67-54, and are now two wins away from winning a franchise-first WNBA title.
The Aces were led by A’ja Wilson (24 points, 11 rebounds, two steals, and four blocks) and Chelsea Gray (21 points, two rebounds, and three assists).
Dearica Hamby made her on-court return from a regular-season-ending knee injury for Game 1, contributing two points, three boards, and two dimes in 11 minutes of action off the bench. Jackie Young was the only other double-digit scorer for the Aces after she scored 11 points and grabbed three rebounds.
“Coming from being swept and actually getting one. Pretty happy about this one,” Wilson said. “Not going to dwell on it long as we have a really tough Game 2 coming up.”
Despite being down by four at halftime, the Aces rallied in the second half, outscoring the Sun 33 to 26. Hamby was pivotal in helping get Las Vegas back in the game in her spurt of action. She grabbed a pair of offensive rebounds, scored a put-back under the basket, dished two dimes, and got a steal to help the Aces turn a six-point deficit into a two-point advantage in the fourth quarter.
“We had to lock in,” Wilson said during a TV interview with ESPN’s Holly Rowe. “We let them some things get away, and you can’t do that against a Conn team like that. I had to reel my team in, I don’t know what we were thinking, but I really had to use my voice this time and just say, “get with it, get with it, or we gon lose.”
“So at the end of the day, we just had to really come together and buckle in cause Conn gon give us all that they got and we gotta do the same.”
The Aces had to fend off a late rally from the Sun to take Game 1. Connecticut was in the process of erasing a seven-point deficit with 1:24 left after Alyssa Thomas (19 points, 11 rebounds, five assists, three steals) knocked down back-to-back clutch shots to pull the Sun to within three. However, the comeback fell short after DeWanna Bonner’s (three points and five dimes on 1-9 shooting from the field) game-winning three-pointer fell short.
Game 2 between Las Vegas and Connecticut is scheduled for Tuesday at 9 p.m. EST in Michelob Ultra Arena.
