WNBA game notes: A career-night from Alanna Smith not enough for Minnesota Lynx in nail-biter loss to Washington Mystics

WASHINGTON — Courtney Williams lost focus for a split-second and an inbounds pass slipped through her hands, allowing Sug Sutton to grab the ball and take it all the way to the basket for a layup that put her Washington Mystics up 66-64 on Williams’ Minnesota Lynx with 27 seconds remaining in an eventual 68-64 Mystics win Tuesday night at CareFirst Arena.

Williams, expected to to step up in Napheesa Collier’s absence, committed 10 turnovers in the game and scored just five points on 2-for-11 shooting from the field. She did have some positives, with nine rebounds, four assists and a steal, and also had a chance to redeem herself for the devastating turnover to Sutton, but missed a midrange attempt at 15 seconds, and Minnesota failed to foul right away. The Lynx’s second foul after that miss sent Sonia Citron to the line to bury two free throws that made it a two-possession game with six seconds remaining. No miracle ensued, as Kayla McBride missed a desperation 3 with two ticks left before time ran out and Minnesota fell to 12-2.

It was a thrilling back-and-forth final frame, and, ultimately, a not-so-great-looking loss for the Lynx, who nevertheless can’t be blamed too much for losing without Collier and remain in first place with just two losses.

What to make of a Phee- and Sykes-less game

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Both teams’ best player was questionable leading up to the game, and both were in street clothes come tip-off—Minnesota’s Collier with a lower back injury and Washington’s Brittney Sykes with a lower leg. Collier is the MVP frontrunner and leads the league with 24.4 points per game. Sykes leads her team with 19.6. Both are phenomenal defenders as well, while Phee averages 8.5 boards and Sykes 4.8 helpers. They do so much for their teams.

But let’s admit that Phee was a bigger absence for the Lynx than Sykes was for the Mystics. Not by much, though. This was pretty close to a fair fight, and the Mystics won. If they had won with Sykes, it would not be as much of a red flag for Minnesota.

This was an ugly one in a lot of ways. Regardless of whether Phee is playing, Minnesota should score more than 64 points and shoot better than 37.9 percent from the field.

Fast start and starring roles for Smith, Shepard

Photo by Addie Betz/NBAE via Getty Images

The bright spots for the Lynx were Alanna Smith and Jessica Shepard. Smith (6-foot-4) made a quick statement on the Mystics’ first possession with an impressive block at the apex of Shakira Austin’s (6-foot-5) shot attempt. It was the first big play of the game for either side and foreshadowed a fantastic evening for the seventh-year forward out of Stanford and Australia.

Shepard scored Minnesota’s first four points, but then it was Smith scoring the team’s next 13 (a 13-2 run against Washington that began as an 11-0 run and brought the score to 17-6 Lynx). A Maria Kliundikova 3 then gave Minnesota its biggest lead of the night at 20-6 before the Mystics responded with a 25-4 run and had the Lynx sweating the rest of the way.

Smith opened her 13-2 run with two free throws, then a back-down layup. After another layup came a driving layup turned 3-point play. Then, a layup featuring a driving slash from right to left across the paint that culminated in a lefty (off-handed) finish. All that constituted the 11-0 portion of the run. Smith then capped her first-quarter scoring at 13 with another lefty layup that answered an Aaliyah Edwards layup.

Over the remainder of the game, Smith would connect on four more free throws, as well as two triples. She surpassed her previous career high in scoring (22) when she turned her own steal into a fast break layup that cut her team’s deficit to 46-42 with 6:21 remaining in the third.

Her new career-high in points stands at 26, and the defense she showed on that first possession was present all night as well; she tied her career high of six rejections. She finished 9-for-17 from the field, 2-for-6 from distance and 6-for-7 from the stripe, while also accumulating five rebounds, two assists and two steals.

Smith scored 19.4 points per game as a senior at Stanford and was drafted No. 8 overall in the 2019 WNBA Draft, but her minimal impact over her first four years in the WNBA kept her in danger of losing her spot in the league. That changed with her breakout season with the Chicago Sky in 2023, when she finished third in Most Improved Player voting. Last year, she was one of the many disrespected supporting cast members to Collier’s stardom and was a huge part of leading the Lynx to the brink of a championship, leading me to suggest in my preseason power rankings that maybe she deserves the label of “star.” She backed up that label Tuesday night, perhaps more strongly than ever before in her pro career.

In Phee’s absence, she showed what she is capable of.

When asked about that initial block on Austin, and if she came into the game determined to step up, she offered, “When you’re missing a player like Phee, you do feel like you kind of have to fill that hole. But, to be honest, that’s how I approach every game defensively—I’m just trying to not let my player score.”

At any rate, it was an impressive block and an impressive showing overall. Shepard was also impressive, filling up the stat sheet with 12 points (5-for-8 from the field), 15 boards, four helpers, two swipes and a block despite a recent flight back from EuroBasket that had left her jet-lagged. She also had some words for Austin at one point after a hard foul, but there was no physical altercation.

Backcourt struggles

While the frontcourt of Smith and Shepard shone, the backcourt of McBride (1-for-9) and Williams (2-for-11) combined to go 3-for-20 from the field. Natisha Hiedeman (0-for-3) didn’t provide any assistance. McBride was 0-for-7 from beyond the arc.

“The guard play for us was just not good enough, for sure,” said Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve.

McBride and Williams are the next two-best players on the Lynx after Collier. I wrote about them needing to step up in my latest power rankings, but it should be noted that they were coming off 29- and 18-point performances, respectively. What happened on Tuesday is not the norm; expect them to bounce back.

Missed free throws, missed 3s, turnovers

The missed free throws down the stretch killed Minnesota. After Shepard got into it with Austin, she had the chance to put the Lynx up three with 7:13 remaining, but only made 1-of-2. At 4:19, Smith had the chance to put them up one but went 1-for-2. At 3:23, Williams had the chance to put them up two but went 1-for-2. At 2:53, Hiedeman had the chance to put them up three, but went 1-for-2. Finally, Shepard had the chance to make it a two-possession game with 1:33 remaining, but went 0-for-2.

Thus, Minnesota inched ahead instead of leaping ahead, and was never able to get that two-possession cushion in crunch time. It was 11-for-13 (84.6 percent) from the stripe entering the fourth before going 6-for-12 in the final frame.

Meanwhile, the all-world 3-point shooting talent of McBride failed the Lynx and dragged down the team’s percentage to 16.7 percent (3-for-18). The Mystics, who entered the game with the least amount of made 3s per game in the league, managed to drain more triples than Minnesota with five on 13 attempts.

Lastly, the 19 Lynx turnovers were also killer. That’s 1.2 above Chicago’s league-worst turnovers per game mark. Eleven came in the first half. Washington scored 26 points off turnovers, while Minnesota scored 16 off the Mystics’ 16.

Full press conferences with Reeve, Smith and Shepard

All stats are through June 24, 2025.