Aces on brink of historic Finals sweep, but Mercury standing firm

PHOENIX -- The Las Vegas Aces enter Game 4 of the WNBA Finals on the brink of their third championship in four years. With it would come the right to be called a dynasty.

Behind league MVP A'ja Wilson, the Aces hold a 3-0 lead over the Phoenix Mercury in the league's first best-of-seven final series. With their backs to the wall, the Mercury host Game 4 Friday.

The Aces, who won the title in 2022 and 2023, would join the Houston Comets (1997-2000) as the only teams to win three titles in a four-year span. The Comets won the league's first four.

The Mercury will face history without forward Satou Sabally, who was ruled out Thursday after being diagnosed with a concussion following a collision with a Las Vegas player with four minutes remaining in Game 3. Sabally led the Mercury with a 16.3 scoring average in the regular season.

"We're not just going to give up," said Mercury forward DeWanna Bonner, who had 25 points and 10 rebounds as the Mercury rallied from 17 points down to tie the game with a minute left before falling 90-88 in Game 3.

"It's hard to get here, so we're going to continue to fight to the very end. I feel like that's been what we've been doing the whole playoff, is kind of fighting our way back into it."

Wilson had 34 points, including the game-winning jumper with three-tenths of a second remaining Wednesday, to go with 14 rebounds. It was her third straight double-double in the series and 26th of her career in the postseason.

Wilson has 83 points and 38 rebounds in the three games this series, making her all but a lock to win her second WNBA Finals MVP in three years. She was the MVP of the Aces' victory over the New York Liberty in the 2023 Finals.

The Aces, 24-3 in their last 27 games, have won six of the seven games against the Mercury this season, including all three in Phoenix, with a pair of three-point victories in the regular season.

Wilson did not play in the only game the Aces lost, 76-70 in Las Vegas on June 15.

"We certainly have a resilient bunch," Aces coach Becky Hammon said. "A couple of those games, we had to find ways to win. The matchups were not easy. None of this is easy. If it was easy, everybody would be doing it.

"They've just built a tremendous amount of trust with each other, with myself. Our group has become really good at self-adjustments in the game."

Mercury point forward Alyssa Thomas was one assist short of her 10th triple-double of the season Wednesday, when she had 14 points and 12 rebounds. In a defensive switch, Thomas primarily guarded perimeter threats Jackie Young and Chelsea Gray on Wednesday, with Bonner covering Wilson.

"In the first two games, we didn't do a good job of picking up in transition and slowing them down," said Thomas, who has a league-record 30 postseason double-doubles. "Putting me with size and physicality (on the perimeter) was just to make shots more difficult for them."

Without Sabally, the Mercury will be forced into other adjustments.

"You have to think (Mercury coach Nate Tibbetts) is going to throw the kitchen sink at you," Hammon said.

"It's disappointing that we're down 3-0," Thomas said. "It's disappointing that we didn't come out to play in the first half (Wednesday). Now we are facing elimination. You have to give everything you have, or it's over."

--Jack Magruder, Field Level Media