There's a cool WNBA doubleheader on tonight. Here's how to watch Lynx-Liberty, then Dream-Aces
How to watch WNBA's Tuesday TV slate
Venues: Barclays Center — Brooklyn, N.Y. | Michelob ULTRA Arena — Las Vegas
Watching in person? Get tickets on StubHub.
The Lynx and Liberty do not like each other. Minnesota coach Cheryl Reeve said that the 2024 Finals thriller was 'stolen' from her side, and blamed the refs for imbalanced calls around Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier. Lynx guard Courtney Williams thoroughly enjoyed the latest revenge bout, an 86-80 win on Saturday. The seafoam supporters should show out in full force for this one.
Minnesota is now looking to go a perfect 4-0 against New York in 2025, and will attack the perimeter to do so. It shot a clean 48.4 percent on 3s in the first win, 100-93 on July 30. It shot 47.6 percent behind the arc in the second W, 83-71 on Aug. 10. And while Saturday's triumph didn't have that same long-range smoothness (31.8 percent), Alanna Smith took over down low to anchor the fourth-quarter comeback:
Liberty center Jonquel Jones was efficient last time out, finishing 7-of-11 from the field with two made 3s. Her initiator, Sabrina Ionescu, was bottled up to 5-for-16 shooting and had more turnovers (3) than assists (2). The decorated forwards Stewart (knee) and Collier (ankle) are both still out, but there's enough scoring prowess and star magnetism in this matchup to live up to its billing.
The nightcap tethers two of the league's best midseason turnarounds. Atlanta has won eight of its last 10 games, and now touts a better record than everyone except Minnesota. The Dream picked up a nice national TV win in San Francisco on Sunday, knocking off the Golden State Valkyries with a convincing third-quarter blitz. ATL comes into this game ranked No. 2 in offensive rating and No. 3 and in defensive rating. It also plays with the second-slowest pace and shoots the second-most 3s. The team sets up efficient, patient movement through Rhyne Howard and Jordin Canada, while a pairing of Brittney Griner and Brionna Jones lock down the paint. It funnels action into do-it-all star Allisha Gray, who starts the week with the third-most offensive win shares of 2025. Gray had 24 points and sunk 5-of-11 3s in the Dream's last meeting with the Aces.
Las Vegas dominated that look, though, winning by 15 points on July 22. A'ja Wilson and her A'ces (TM) are now 21-14, riding a seven-game win streak into Tuesday. Vegas is still ninth in defensive rating, but it now enjoys the league's best record (11-5) in close games (five-point lead or less in the final five minutes). The team is shooting an absurd 45 percent from 3 in clutch minutes this year.
Jackie Young, Jewell Loyd and Chelsea Gray are all proven playmakers down the stretch, and the June 30 acquisition of NaLyssa Smith has revamped the rebounding on both ends. But everything runs through Wilson, the incumbent MVP who has notched at least 30 points in three of her last four games. She was locked in against the Dallas Wings on Sunday:
Both of these games are available on NBA TV and WNBA League Pass for out-of-market viewers. The teams' respective local broadcasters will carry for locals.
2025 single-game highs (through Aug. 18)
Points — Kelsey Mitchell (IND), 38
Rebounds — A'ja Wilson (LV), 20
Assists — Alyssa Thomas (PHX), 15 … she's done it three times this season
Steals — Gabby Williams (SEA), 8
Blocks — Ezi Magbegor (SEA) and Alanna Smith (MIN), 6
Updated WNBA odds
Betting/odds, ticketing and streaming links in this article are provided by partners of The Athletic. Restrictions may apply. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence. Partners have no control over or input into the reporting or editing process and do not review stories before publication.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
Minnesota Lynx, New York Liberty, Atlanta Dream, Las Vegas Aces, WNBA, Sports Betting, Fubo Partnership
2025 The Athletic Media Company
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Associated Press
2 minutes ago
- Associated Press
Kei Nishikori will miss the US Open because of a back injury
NEW YORK (AP) — Kei Nishikori withdrew from the U.S. Open on Wednesday, saying a back injury has not fully healed. Nishikori was injured in May and pulled out of the French Open. The 2014 U.S. Open runner-up from Japan returned earlier this month for a first-round loss in Cincinnati but said his back isn't healthy enough to play in New York. 'Hi fans, unfortunately I will not be ready for the U.S. Open yet. I had an MRI taken of my back and it's not 100% healed yet,' Nishikori wrote in a social media post. 'Working hard to be back on court soon. Thanks for the support.' Nishikori was ranked No. 4 in 2015, the highest by an Asian men's player but has struggled with injuries in recent years and has fallen to No. 88. He missed the entire 2022 season after a hip injury. He will be replaced in the draw by a player who loses in the final stages of qualifying. ___ AP tennis:
Yahoo
29 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Pirates call up Bubba Chandler, baseball's top pitching prospect
PITTSBRURGH (AP) — Baseball's top pitching prospect is getting called up to the majors. The Pittsburgh Pirates have decided to promote 22-year-old right hander Bubba Chandler ahead of their game Friday against the Colorado Rockies, a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press on Wednesday. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because the roster move was not yet official. Chandler will join a staff that already includes 2024 NL Rookie of the Year Paul Skenes. The Pirates are shuffling their pitching rotation after sending veteran left-hander Andrew Heaney to the bullpen last weekend. Chandler got off to a hot start in Triple-A this year but has stumbled lately and is currently 5-6 with a 4.05 ERA this year for Indianapolis. ___ AP MLB:
Yahoo
29 minutes ago
- Yahoo
NBA summer predictions: Projecting the West's best teams and LeBron James' future with the Lakers
With the NBA's new schedule out, and training camps just weeks away, it's time to look ahead to the 2025-26 season. What does the future hold for the Western Conference? Our writers take an early stab at predicting how the standings will play out. (Check out our East predictions, too.) Which West team will make the biggest leap in the standings? Dan Devine: The Spurs, but almost by default. The second through eighth seeds in the West were separated by four wins last season, with 48 Ws representing the low end. Nos. 9 through 12 were separated by four wins, too. That kind of congestion makes it tough to envision most of the teams in the conference taking too huge a jump, so give me San Antonio — 34 wins with Victor Wembanyama missing 36 games and De'Aaron Fox playing just 578 in silver and black — to climb the standings with better health, better depth and another year of seasoning. [Join or create a Yahoo Fantasy Football league for the 2025 NFL season] Ben Rohrbach: The Spurs. Assuming Wembanyama remains healthy, he will be the best defensive player in the league, and on offense he will be set up by a trio of guards — Fox, Dylan Harper and Stephon Castle — who are explosive in their own right. They have added some veteran depth around Wembanyama, and they still have much of their existing core, including Devin Vassell. It is a team primed to make a leap from outside the play-in tournament into the hunt for a guaranteed playoff seed. Vincent Goodwill: The easy answer is the Spurs, almost because everyone else in the West is bunched together. We are assuming a full season of Victor Wembanyama and, if that happens, one season closer to him being fully actualized. More playmakers around him to make the game easier and one can expect his first of many DPOYs. Going from 34 wins to at least 43-44 isn't unreasonable. Tom Haberstroh: The Spurs. It's hard to pick any of the West teams that made the playoffs last season since almost all of them were basically 50-win outfits. Of the teams that were in the bottom half, the Spurs have the highest upside with Fox and Wembanyama healthy. I think the public is underestimating the potential for Wemby to establish himself as the NBA's best player by the end of the season. Which West team will make the biggest drop in the standings? Haberstroh: The Lakers. From a standings standpoint, I don't see how the Lakers stay at a No. 3 seed again. I'm a believer in Skinny Luka, but if LeBron James is at all checked out, there's not nearly enough depth on this roster to sustain a level required to having first-round homecourt advantage. I fear the talent drop-off after Luka Dončić, James and Austin Reaves will doom them this season. Devine: This sucks, but … the Kings. I'm just bracing for the worst in Sacramento, where Fox is gone, Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan are hosting a revival of the wildly-underwhelming-in-the-worse-conference Bulls, Domantas Sabonis exited the season hoping for a point guard, and Scott Perry responded with Dennis Schröder and (maybe?) Russell Westbrook. Maybe Doug Christie's got the goods to turn all of this into a team that doesn't find itself drowning well below .500 in the West. But maybe, before too long, last season's 40-42 mark feels like the start of another disastrously steep descent. Rohrbach: The Lakers. Listen: LeBron James will turn 41 years old this season, and he does not seem happy about his current status within the organization, or at least that is what his last public statement suggested. That has a chance to disrupt the team's chemistry throughout the season. Even if it does not, the Lakers face real defensive issues as they try to build lineups around James, Dončić and Reaves. The addition of Deandre Ayton at the center position does little to assuage concern. Goodwill: This is no indictment, but what if it's the Thunder? For the same reasons so many other teams in the West are bunched, what happens if the Thunder slide to an unfathomable 60 wins just from being a champion and taking everyone's best shot? It wouldn't be a mark of decline; remember, the Warriors of Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant went from 67 wins to 58 in a year, just because even dynastic defending is still damned hard. Who will finish with the top six seeds in the West? Goodwill: (1) Thunder, (2) Nuggets, (3) Rockets, (4) Warriors, (5) Timberwolves, (6) Clippers The Thunder are still built to be a regular-season juggernaut with youth and the like. Cameron Johnson over Michael Porter Jr. already looks to be an upgrade, but could we be giving the Nuggets too much assumed love when hardly anyone in today's NBA stays atop or near it for too long? Denver and Houston could flip-flop, as could the Timberwolves and Warriors in the 4-5 spots. A full 'best of the rest of' Stephen Curry, Draymond Green and Jimmy Butler could have them right around 50, but you can't assume health — a big reason why the graybeards in Los Angeles barely escape the play-in. Haberstroh: (1) Thunder, (2) Rockets, (3) Nuggets, (4) Clippers, (5) Warriors, (6) Timberwolves The West is going to be a bloodbath, but I have the most confidence in these teams locking in slots. I'm sincerely hoping we get Lakers-Mavs in a win-or-go-home play-in tournament game. Make it happen, basketball gods. Devine: (1) Thunder, (2) Nuggets, (3) Timberwolves, (4) Rockets, (5) Warriors, (6) Clippers Even if another 68-win campaign seems like a lot to expect, the champs take the top spot until proven otherwise. I loved the Nuggets' offseason, and feel plenty confident betting on Nikola Jokić to get them to 50-plus wins; I'm pricing in a slight adjustment period, though, for Houston after the addition of Kevin Durant, who brings both titanic scoring talent and, seemingly, a fairly particular emotional weather system with him everywhere he goes. Maybe I'm overly bullish on Minnesota, given the loss of Nickeil Alexander-Walker and the big bets that team president Tim Connelly has made on youngsters like Rob Dillingham, Terrence Shannon and Jaylen Clark to back-fill the rotation, but head coach Chris Finch is as good as it gets at maximizing his roster around supernova Anthony Edwards. I think what Golden State found after the Jimmy Butler trade was real, and I think the Clippers' reloaded depth is real … and, evidently, I think they're more real than the Lakers' bet that Deandre Ayton, Marcus Smart and Jake LaRavia will fix a defense that gave up 121.6 points per 100 possessions — a league-worst-caliber mark — when Luka Dončić, LeBron James and Austin Reaves shared the floor. Rohrbach: (1) Thunder, (2) Nuggets, (3) Rockets, (4) Timberwolves, (5) Warriors, (6) Clippers Oklahoma City is a juggernaut. Denver and Houston made moves to firmly position themselves as Nos. 2 and 3 in the West. Minnesota and Anthony Edwards are still lurking. And I trust the veteran stewardship of Golden State and the L.A. Clippers more than I do the defense of the Lakers or the youth of some other challengers, including the Spurs and Grizzlies. However you order them, there are only six slots for twice as many competitors. What's your boldest summer prediction involving the West? Rohrbach: Go big or go home: LeBron James will not be on the Lakers at the end of the season. It made sense for the Lakers to trade James from the moment they traded for Dončić. Paying a 40-year-old max money is a hindrance to building a contender around a 26-year-old perennial MVP candidate. It just is. Who knows how the Lakers find a partner to match salaries for James, but they would be wise to acquire whatever they can for one of the game's all-time greats before he could leave them in 2026 free agency. Goodwill: The Sacramento Kings won't be as bad as everyone thinks. With that roster being logjammed, would a contender or wanna-be contender out East try to get Malik Monk or even DeMar DeRozan to solidify themselves in this Boston-Indiana sabbatical year? And maybe the Kings find themselves in a dogfight with the Lakers for one of the play-in spots. Bold, I know. Haberstroh: LeBron waives his no-trade clause and OK's a trade to the Cavs. He's coming home — again. It won't be easy, but if the Cavs get off to a slow start, Darius Garland's contract could be large enough to grease the wheels in a three- or four-team trade. Devine: Apparently, it's that the Lakers will be in the play-in tournament, Skinny Luka and all. I know. I'm just as surprised as you are!
