Minnesota Lynx Sweep Atlanta Dream To Earn First WNBA Championship

by Jessica Lantz on Oct 7, 2011 10:32 PM EDT in WNBA Playoffs 2011

ATLANTA, GA - OCTOBER 07: The Minnesota Lynx celebrates their 73-67 win over the Atlanta Dream in Game Three of the 2011 WNBA Finals at Philips Arena on October 7, 2011 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

For the third consecutive WNBA Finals game, the Atlanta Dream held a halftime lead. And for the third consecutive contest, the Minnesota Lynx stormed back for the win. Minnesota gets its first WNBA Championship in franchise history in their first trip ever to the WNBA Finals in sweeping fashion.

The Dream crowd of 11,543 fans in the Philips Arena watched as the Lynx took over in the final 20 minutes to pull away with a 73-67 victory. The game was not without drama however, as the Dream closed what was an eight-point Minnesota lead with 2:10 to play into a 1-point lead with 1:17 remaining. However, the Lynx finished strong from the stripe, hitting 9-of-12 from the free throw line in the closing minutes to ice the game.

Minnesota's offense came from a quadruplet of players. Finals MVP Seimone Augustus poured in 16 points to lead the way, and averaged 24.7 points through the series with the Dream. Maya Moore, Rebekkah Brunson and Candice Wiggins all joined Augustus in double-digit scoring. As has been the standard, Angel McCoughtry led the Dream with 22 points in the losing bid.

MIN/ATL Game 3 Boxscore

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Post-game stats:

Key stat: shooting efficiency

FG% in last three quarters:
Lynx: 47.5%
Dream: 32.75%

Lynx statistical MVP: Seimone Augustus
Dream statistical MVP: Armintie Price (there’s a pretty good explanation for this one…but I’ll double check the stats too)

Twitter: @NateP_SBN.

by Nate Parham on Oct 7, 2011 11:12 PM EDT reply actions

great job by minnesota

my dad watched with me and says “I don’t care about the other players. It’s all about Maya!”

by thewiz06 on Oct 7, 2011 11:31 PM EDT up reply actions

2011 Finals was competitive, but where is the Atlanta that beat Indiana?

Congratulations to Minnesota. They played like the legitimate potential champions they have been all year, even in the season opener loss to LA. They made the clutch offensive and defensive plays when they were required.

Good stat from Nate. It matches the intuitive feeling that a keen observer gets
when you compare the offensive performance patterns from each team quarter-by-quarter.

Since it is my pet emphasis, I have to add that I enjoyed the pro show-womanship in the 3rd match that was almost as consistent as it was on 10/2 and 10/5. Running baby hook type
of jump shots from Augustus, McCoughtry’s sneak-up-from-behind shot blocks, the unusual 3 point shot from Bales at the Center position.

Too bad that Atlanta were not able to exploit the several opportunities that they had in the 2nd half to eliminate the Lynx lead and take their own lead.

It was strange that the same offensive powerhouses that Lindsay Harding, DeSouza, and Lyttle were in the regular season and in the Eastern conference playoffs were, by contrast, fairly unhelpful in the Finals series. Castro-Marques played strong offense tonite, however.

The good news is at least Atlanta played very strong in their defense and rebounding to keep the finals score tonite and on 10/5 at relatively small victory margins. Atlanta was realistically able to salvage themselves and pull out the victory when the score was 64-63 at 1:07 to play in the 4th quarter.

by 77DJK on Oct 8, 2011 12:25 AM EDT reply actions