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MA ForpelESPN.com
Uncasville, Connecticut — almost a year ago, Las Vegas Aces Suffered a season-ending loss that burned within them all winter leading up to this season.but the ace Connecticut Sun They won Game 4, 78-71, and won the WNBA Finals 3-1, giving the City of Las Vegas its first major professional sports championship.
‘I didn’t like that feeling last year,’ says Ace guard chelsea graywas named Finals MVP. “It was a tough moment, but it was character building. It was about setting something for the next year.”
It will also be a first for the Aces franchise, which began as the Utah Stars in 1997 when the WNBA debuted as a league. The team she moved to San Antonio in 2003 and in 2008 he made it to the WNBA Finals and was eliminated. Becky Hammon was a San Antonio player at the time. She is currently the head coach of Las Vegas. As an ace, the franchise was swept once again by appearing in her 2020 WNBA Finals. Under Hamon, however, the final’s ending changed this time.
Hammon, 45, is the first person in WNBA history to win a title in his first season as a head coach. Van Her Chancellor won her first WNBA championship in 1997, when every coach spent her first season with the team, but before that she spent more than 30 years in college and high school. was the head coach of
Five NBA rookie head coaches have won league titles in the last 60 years. Most recently, Nick Nurse, who played for Toronto in 2019, had previously been his head coach for several years at other levels of basketball.
Hammon spent eight seasons as Greg Popovich’s assistant with the San Antonio Spurs before Ace owner Mark Davis hired her to take over the WNBA team last December. She quickly joined the Aces after finishing her season with the Spurs in April.
The Aces tied a league-best regular-season record of 26-10 and secured the #1 seed in the playoffs. They also won the Commissioner’s Cup trophy during the season, Aja Wilson MVP, Defensive Player of the Year, First Team All-WNBA performer and ace guard. Kelsey PlumHammon was Coach of the Year and Ace Guard Jackie Young Selected as player of the year.
Without the championship, however, all awards would have felt a bit hollow for this team.20 points, 6 assists and reserves led by Gray Likna Williams With a season-high 17 points and Wilson’s 11 points and 14 rebounds, the Aces closed out the series in front of a sun-cheering crowd at the Mohegan Sun Arena.
connecticut forward Alyssa Thomas The Sun had two consecutive triple-doubles in the WNBA Finals with 11 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds, but it wasn’t enough as the Sun lost the Finals for the fourth time in franchise history.
The Ace franchise moved to Las Vegas in 2018. That same year, Wilson was the first overall draft pick from South Carolina. The team named Plum, the all-time leading scorer in NCAA women’s basketball, from Washington in 2017, and she was already the No. 1 pick. Ace added another No. 1 pick to Young in 2019 outside Notre Dame.
The Aces made it to the WNBA Finals in 2020, when the season was played in the COVID-19 bubble in Bradenton, Florida. At that time, Seattle took Las Vegas by storm. Plum missed that season with an Achilles injury, but returned in 2021 when the Aces joined free agent point guard Gray. Between 5-5 (Wilson, Gray) and his 3-3 (Plum, Young), Ace won his four gold medals at last year’s Tokyo Olympics.
But the decisive Game 5 loss in the semifinals at home to Phoenix on Gray’s 29th birthday last October came as a shock to the team. Wilson said it was probably the most painful loss of her career. Gray, she said, kept playing costly slow turnovers in three-point losses over and over in her head.
Coach Bill Laimbeer retired, center Liz Campage left for Los Angeles as a free agent, Hammon joined, and another former WNBA player, Natalie Williams, joined as general manager. Without his Cambage averaging 14.2 PPG and his 8.2 RPG, Hammon pushed to open up the ace’s offensive approach and take more of his 3-pointers. Ace has gone from his 162/432 from behind the arc last season to 343/951 this season.
That includes Wilson, who made just one 3-pointer in his first four seasons in the league, but made 31 this regular season. Wilson now has a WNBA title, two of his MVP awards, and an Olympic gold medal all by the age of 26, and won that medal in August.
“And really, she’s about to hit her prime right now,” said Hamon. “Think about the learning curve, even this year alone. She learned something completely new in defense and offense. Her game is on…I really don’t know how far she can grow, but she’s already here…I won’t put a cap on her.”
Laimbeer was in attendance for Sunday’s game, as was Davis, who purchased Aces from MGM Resorts International in January 2021. Davis, who also owns the Las Vegas Raiders, wanted to connect Aces to the entire history of San Antonio and Utah. We invited alumni from these teams to Las Vegas. One of them was Hamon, whose number 25 he wore in San Antonio was retired by Ace.
Much has been made about Davis’ decision to pay Hammon an estimated $1 million salary to the coach, but the owner was smiling outside Ace’s locker room on Sunday.
“She was absolutely incredible. I think this justifies the way we went after her…to see what those rings look like.”
Ace’s win made it another great year for women’s basketball for South Carolina fans. South Carolina defeated Connecticut in April to win her NCAA Women’s Title behind Aaliyah Boston, who is expected to be her WNBA No. 1 draft pick in 2023.
Boston came to a heartbreaking end in the 2021 NCAA Tournament, losing to Stanford in the semifinals, but returned to win the title the following year. It’s a similar story in the WNBA for Wilson, who is expected to soon join the US team in Australia for the FIBA Women’s Basketball World Cup.
“I felt like Vegas set the standard for the league on what a franchise should be,” Wilson said. “When you have a very dedicated owner like Mark, the limits of this franchise are endless.”
And with all major players including Dearika Humveereturning next season, the Aces have a chance to become the first WNBA team to repeat as champions since the Los Angeles Sparks did it in 2001-02.
Gray, who won the title in Los Angeles in 2016, said, “It’s a commitment to bring the group together. It’s a commitment to excellence and a desire to leave a legacy.”
“I think our bond has grown stronger and stronger, especially with the head coach in his first year. We’re talking about more legendary franchises. Hopefully that’s what we can do.” .”
