{"id":825568,"date":"2026-08-25T18:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T18:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/825568\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T18:00:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T18:00:11","slug":"fiebich-returns-and-gives-fever-fits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/825568\/","title":{"rendered":"Fiebich returns and gives Fever fits"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New York Liberty have been desperately in need of a two-way forward.<\/p>\n

Why not call on the one that helped the franchise win its first-ever WNBA championship two years ago?<\/p>\n

Leonie Fiebich spent seven weeks aching to hit the hardwood with her teammates while dealing with a nagging left-foot injury.<\/p>\n

She showed little to no signs of rust during her show-stealing return Saturday night at Downtown\u2019s Barclays Center.<\/p>\n

Fiebich established season highs with 20 points and five assists while grabbing five rebounds and picking up a steal in New York\u2019s 109-102 victory over Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever in front of a sellout crowd of 17,581 on the corner of Atlantic and Flatbush.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sucks to not be on the court, to have to watch,\u201d ceded the German forward following her first appearance since July 3. \u201cI was suffering a lot the last week. I was happy to be back and help the team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fiebich bolstered her Big Three teammates \u2014 Jonquel Jones, Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu \u2014 by guarding Clark closely. Indiana\u2019s superstar guard was rushed into 2-of-7 shooting when Fiebich was guarding her.<\/p>\n

Also, the Liberty\u2019s returning starter scored nine of her points during New York\u2019s big third-quarter push, helping her teammates open an 85-78 lead entering the final 10 minutes.<\/p>\n

Clark, who finished with 21 points and seven assists, got Indiana (24-14) back into a 100-100 deadlock before Fiebich took over down the stretch.<\/p>\n

She followed a free throw by Stewart with a driving layup to give the Liberty a three-point cushion.<\/p>\n

Fiebich even took a moment to roar with delight in front of the partisan crowd before returning to her stoic on-court nature.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a natural reaction. If you see me play for Germany, you see it a lot more,\u201d added the German national team veteran.<\/p>\n

Fiebich wasn\u2019t done.<\/p>\n

She pressured Clark into missing a runner on the other end before grabbing the rebound and feeding Pauline Astier, who calmly buried two from the charity stripe to open a 105-100 lead with 29 seconds left.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew that I wanted to have an impact defensively, because that\u2019s what we need,\u201d said Fiebich, who finished 7-of-10 from the field, including 3-of-5 from 3-point range.<\/p>\n

\"IndianaLeonie Fiebich kept close to Caitlin Clark throughout New York\u2019s win over Indiana on Saturday at Barclays Center. Photo: Angelina Katsanis\/AP<\/p>\n

Stewart scored a team-high 22 points, Jones added 19 points and 10 rebounds and Ionescu had 12 points for New York (23-15), which climbed into sixth in the standings, 1 \u00bd lengths behind the Fever and Atlanta for home court in the opening round of the playoffs.<\/p>\n

The Big Three was happy to expand into a Fab Four over the weekend, especially with three-time All-Star Satou Sabally dealing with concussion issues since late June.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt like (Fiebich) was impacting the game in so many different areas, even in areas that weren\u2019t on the stat sheet,\u201d said Jones, who was back in action despite suffering an ankle injury in Chicago last week.<\/p>\n

\u201cPicking up full court, being really aggressive defensively, helping us set the tone defensively, I think it was an all-around game for her.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ionescu concurred.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been at it for a couple years now,\u201d the four-time All-Star guard said of Fiebich, a hero on both ends of the floor during New York\u2019s title run in 2024.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you were able to see that tonight. She fit in seamlessly.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kelsey Mitchell had 25 points and Aaliyah Boston added 22 for the Fever, who rebounded quickly with a win in Chicago on Sunday.<\/p>\n

The Fever posted back-to-back comfortable wins over New York in Indiana earlier this year, but fell to 0-2 at Barclays.<\/p>\n

Chomping at the bit to get back in after watching the Liberty go 9-7 in the 16 games she sat out, Fiebich was happy to contribute to the postseason push.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re going to be a playoff team,\u201d she said of the Fever. \u201cWe might see them at some stage, so just want to have that good feeling whenever we see them, like we know that we can beat them, and I think that helps us a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

New York has two games remaining before the WNBA takes a three-week break for the World Cup.<\/p>\n

The Liberty will host Golden State here on Thursday night before finishing up this three-game homestand vs. Chicago on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Tip-off vs. the Valkyries is slated for 8 p.m.<\/p>\n

The game will air nationally on Prime Video and locally on My9.<\/p>\n

\"NewLiberty center Jonquel Jones bounced right back from last week\u2019s ankle injury to post a double-double against Indiana on Saturday. Photo: Angelina Katsanis\/AP<\/p>\n

GIVE ME LIBERTY: Concerns over Jones\u2019 trip in the Windy City were put aside quickly as the 6-foot-6 center started and logged 29 minutes against Indiana. \u2026 Astier put up eight points on Saturday, giving her 350 during her rookie campaign, third-most by any first-year player in Liberty history. \u2026 Ionescu has made at least one 3-pointer in 20 straight games. \u2026 Jones had 17 of her points in the first half vs. Indiana. \u2026 The Liberty will return from the World Cup break on Sept. 18 at league-leading Minnesota, the team they beat for the title in 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The New York Liberty have been desperately in need of a two-way forward. Why not call on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":825569,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[402,436,120270,99,434,206696],"class_list":["post-825568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-basketball","tag-new-york-liberty","tag-no-paywall","tag-sports","tag-wnba","tag-wnba-womens-national-basketball-association"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/825568","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=825568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/825568\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/825569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=825568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=825568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=825568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}