{"id":279519,"date":"2025-11-08T15:08:24","date_gmt":"2025-11-08T15:08:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/279519\/"},"modified":"2025-11-08T15:08:24","modified_gmt":"2025-11-08T15:08:24","slug":"breanna-stewart-injury-liberty-star-has-mcl-sprain-in-left-knee-plans-to-play-in-game-2-vs-mercury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/279519\/","title":{"rendered":"Breanna Stewart injury: Liberty star has MCL sprain in left knee, plans to play in Game 2 vs. Mercury"},"content":{"rendered":"

New York Liberty<\/a> star Breanna Stewart<\/a>, who was injured during overtime of the team’s dramatic Game 1 win over the Phoenix Mercury, told reporters that she was diagnosed with a sprained MCL in her left knee, but plans to play in Game 2 of the team’s best-of-three first-round series on Wednesday. She is officially listed as questionable.<\/p>\n

Stewart did not practice on Tuesday but did participate in shootaround on Wednesday morning.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I wanted to make sure I tried at shootaround, so barring anything crazy happening between now and then, [my plan is to play],” Stewart said<\/a>. “I just want to make sure that I don’t wake up from my nap and feel like shit.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stewart added that what she felt on the play where she was injured “scared me more than anything,” and the issue is something she can “play through” depending on her pain levels.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the middle of overtime in Game 1, Stewart made a tough baseline drive and finished through contact for a clutch bucket that put the Liberty up by five. She immediately grabbed for her left knee, however, and screamed out in obvious pain. After a timeout, she returned to the floor to shoot her free throw, which she missed. Though she tried to tough it out for a few possessions, she was ultimately unable to continue and sat for the final 2:07.<\/p>\n

Stewart, who finished with 18 points, six rebounds and four assists, was able to leave the floor under her own power, both immediately after the injury and following the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If Stewart is able to go on Wednesday, that would be a big boost to the team’s hopes of sweeping the Mercury and advancing to the semifinals. In 31 regular-season appearances, Stewart averaged 18.3 points, 6.5 rebounds, 3.5 assists, 1.4 steals and 1.4 blocks. She led the team in scoring, steals and blocks, and the Liberty were 22-9 when she played.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This has been a frustrating, injury-filled season for both Stewart and the Liberty, who finished the regular season 27-17 and fell to the No. 5 seed largely because they could not stay healthy. Stewart,\u00a0Jonquel Jones<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Sabrina Ionescu<\/a>\u00a0only started and finished 13 regular-season games together; the Liberty won all of them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In March, Stewart underwent a minor surgery to repair the meniscus on her right knee, but was ready for opening night. Her right knee became an even bigger story in July, when she suffered a bone bruise in a loss to the Los Angeles Sparks<\/a> that kept her out for a month.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart, who was injured during overtime of the team’s dramatic Game 1 win…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279520,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[435,14400,3029,1077,7788,436,5551,3675,99,434],"class_list":["post-279519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-breanna-stewart","tag-jonquel-jones","tag-los-angeles-sparks","tag-minnesota-lynx","tag-natasha-cloud","tag-new-york-liberty","tag-phoenix-mercury","tag-sabrina-ionescu","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279519\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}