Jackie Young scored 25 points and the Las Vegas Aces finally got rolling on offense to take down the Indiana Fever 84-72 to grab a 2-1 lead in a WNBA semifinal series on Friday at Indianapolis.
It took a strong fourth quarter for Las Vegas, which trailed for much of the third quarter.
The Aces’ NaLyssa Smith finished with 16 points and four blocked shots, Chelsea Gray added 15 points and A’ja Wilson got untracked for 13 points, eight rebounds and three blocks. Dana Evans had six of her 10 points off the bench in the fourth quarter.
“Obviously, we’re happy with the win, but we have to move on,” Aces coach Becky Hammon said. “We have to go back and do some things much better. I know my group understands that.
“We played good in patches. Obviously, the fourth was great. We still feel there are some areas we can do much better.”
Kelsey Mitchell produced 21 points and Lexi Hull had 16 points and 10 rebounds for the Fever, who weren’t able to take full advantage of a 39-26 rebounding edge. Aliyah Boston notched 12 points and eight boards.
“We just got to make a little more shots,” Fever coach Stephanie White. “We had a lot of good opportunities. I felt like we had more open shots in this game than we had in the last one. … They just didn’t go in.
“We went through some stretches where we really gave ourselves a chance at the defensive end.”
Game 4 in the best-of-five series will be played Sunday afternoon in Indianapolis.
The Friday contest was a grind for large segments. Las Vegas outscored Indiana 25-16 in the fourth quarter.
The Aces made a move by scoring the final six points of the third quarter in the last 51 seconds, claiming a 59-56 lead.
Young shot 9-for-14 from the field, and Wilson, the WNBA’s Most Valuable Player, was 6-for-20.
White said of Wilson getting untracked, “A’ja is going to find hers. There’s no doubt about it.”
The Aces made 50.8 percent of their field-goal attempts, hitting 4 of 10 shots from 3-point range. Indiana was 7-for-23 (30.4 percent) from beyond the arc and shot 35.6 percent from the floor.
The Fever managed only three points in the first 7 1/2 minutes of the fourth quarter. Before a scoring drought of nearly four minutes ended, they trailed 73-59.
Indiana went 13-for-21 on free throws compared to 14-for-17 for Las Vegas, notable numbers after much-discussed officiating regarding physical play since Game 2 on Tuesday. The Aces were 8-for-8 from the foul line in the final minute of Game 3.
The Aces, who lost on both of their regular-season visits to Indianapolis, led 35-34 at halftime despite Wilson going 1-for-11 from the field.
The Fever cut what had been a 26-16 deficit with a push late in the half.
Mitchell and Hull combined for 21 of Indiana’s first-half points.
–Field Level Media
