The Valkyries remain unbeaten at Ballhalla in these playoffs, taking Game 1 of the WNBA Finals over the Atlanta Dream, 68-64, at Chase Center on Saturday. Golden State ended the game on a 7-0 run to clinch the win, with Gabby Williams scoring six of those points from the foul line. Williams led all scorers with 26 points and finished with a +16 in 33 minutes.\u00a0Williams was the only Valkyrie to score in double figures, but her teammates contributed in other ways: Kiah Stokes tied a playoff career-high with four blocks, and Kaila Charles set a playoff career-high with 10 rebounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Allisha Gray paced the Dream with 19 points, but the Valkyries held her to 5-for-19 shooting. They also limited Rhyne Howard to 12 points on 3-for-14 shooting. Angel Reese recorded a double-double with 14 points and 12 rebounds but the Valkyries still won the battle on the boards, out-rebounding Atlanta 41-35 overall and 12-7 on the offensive glass. <\/p>\n
CHEN ENDS 3-POINT DROUGHT
The Valkyries missed their first eight 3-point attempts before Kaitlyn Chen ended the drought, banking in a left-wing triple just before the shot clock expired. Chen brought instant energy off the bench, scoring five straight points during a 9-0 first-quarter run that put the Valkyries up by three.\u00a0<\/p>\n
REESE IN ATTACK MODE EARLY BUT GOLDEN STATES STOPS HER MOMENTUM
Angel Reese set an early tone for the Dream, consistently getting two feet in the paint and finishing inside. Reese scored 11 points on 5-for-6 shooting in the first quarter and was a plus-13 in eight minutes, giving Atlanta an eight-point lead by the end of the quarter. Reese was held without a made field goal for the remainder of the game as she went 0-for-5 over the remaining three quarters. <\/p>\n
WILLIAMS\u2019 16-POINT SECOND QUARTER
Gabby Williams scored the final seven points during a 10-0 run that gave the Valkyries the lead late in the second quarter. Trailing by two, Williams used a ghost screen from the top of the key and got to the rim for a layup. Then she sprinted to the corner in semi-transition for a go-ahead 3-pointer. Williams capped the run by intercepting a pass on one end and going coast-to-coast for a lefty layup on the other. After going scoreless and missing all four field-goal attempts in the first quarter, Williams scored 16 points and shot 6-for-9 from the field in the second quarter.\u00a0Her 16-point quarter is tied for the third-most points in a quarter in WNBA Finals history, only trailing Jackie Young (21) and Angel McCoughtry (19), and the most she’s ever scored in a quarter in her career. <\/p>\n
STOKES TIES CAREER PLAYOFF HIGH IN BLOCKS
Fresh off a stellar defensive showing against five-time MVP A\u2019ja Wilson, Kiah Stokes is tasked with dealing with another lethal post threat: Angel Reese. Stokes earned All-Defensive Team honors for her stifling rim protection and blocked a career-high seven shots against the Dream in the regular season. In Game 1 of the Finals, Stokes tied a playoff high with four rejections.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Valkyries remain unbeaten at Ballhalla in these playoffs, taking Game 1 of the WNBA Finals over the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":936905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,82,630],"class_list":["post-936904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/936904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=936904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/936904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/936905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=936904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=936904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=936904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}