‘It’s a shame’: Aces’ winning streak snapped, setting up must-win Game 3

SEATTLE — It was almost a perfectly twisted full-circle moment.

Down three points with three seconds left in Game 2 of their first-round WNBA playoffs matchup with the Seattle Storm on Tuesday, coach Becky Hammon drew up a play for Jewell Loyd to take the final shot.

But the Aces guard, who spent the first 10 years of her career playing for the crowd that was now rooting against her, watched her game-tying attempt fall just shy. The Storm then started celebrating their 86-83 win as the lights went down at Climate Pledge Arena.

Hammon and Loyd agreed on one thing in their quick and somber postgame comments: The Aces shouldn’t have been in that position.

They led by 14 points in the third quarter, but were outscored 25-14 in the final frame and held to just four points over the closing four minutes. The loss snapped the Aces’ 17-game winning streak.

“It should have never came down to that,” Hammon said of the final shot. “It falls back on all of us. It wasn’t just one person, and we all got to do better.”

The Aces were stunned when 19-year-old rookie center Dominique Malonga completed a 3-point play to give the Storm an 84-83 lead with 31 seconds remaining. Guard Skylar Diggins later hit a jump shot to put Seattle up by three with 4.7 seconds to play. The Storm also got 11 points from guard Erica Wheeler in the final 10 minutes.

The No. 2-seeded Aces will host No. 7 Seattle for Game 3 at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at Michelob Ultra Arena. The winner will advance to the second round to play the winner of the Game 3 between the No. 3 Atlanta Dream and No. 6 Indiana Fever on Thursday.

The Storm got the most out of their one home game in the series Tuesday. All the fans in the arena seemed to stay on their feet for the final four minutes.

“Regardless of whether we’re playing at the park or if we’re not, we didn’t execute our stuff at a high level tonight on both ends of the floor,” Loyd said.

The loss was the Aces’ first since Aug. 2. Diggins had 26 points for the Storm, while forward Nneka Ogwumike added 24.

Guard Jackie Young led the Aces with 25 points on her 28th birthday. She scored 12 straight points for the team during one stretch in the third quarter to help it build a 63-51 lead. Reigning WNBA A’ja Wilson had 21 points and 13 rebounds for the Aces, who led 67-53 with 2:05 remaining in the third quarter but couldn’t hold on.

“We bought ourselves 40 more minutes and that was our goal,” Diggins said on the court to the excited crowd postgame. “After tonight, we might start our own streak.”

Diggins said in her postgame news conference the Aces were used to winning and likely expected another victory after dominating the Storm in Game 1 and sweeping Seattle in the first round of the playoffs last year.

Hammon said before the game, however, that she expected a challenge in Game 2.

“It’s going to be a much closer game. It’s a different game. No points carry over. It’s going to be hard to match the emotional energy of this team,” Hammon said. “It just is. Survival is a different attitude.”

Wilson went down hard early in the third quarter after a foul from forward Ezi Magbegor and appeared to grab her shooting shoulder. She was limited to five points in the second half, but it’s unclear if she was impacted by pain from the fall.

“It’s a shame. I feel like we let that one go,” Hammon said.

Contact Callie Fin at cfin@reviewjournal.com. Follow @CallieJLaw on X.