NEW YORK (AP) — The WNBA playoff picture is sharpening as the regular season enters its final day.
The Minnesota Lynx have clinched the top seed and will face eighth-seeded New York in the opening round that begins Sunday. The Atlanta Dream will be the four seed after beating New York on Wednesday night. They will play either Indiana or Washington.
“Everybody in the playoffs are capable of winning on the road and stealing a series,” Atlanta coach Karl Smesko said. “I definitely think it’s an advantage to have to play in front of your home crowd.”
Indiana plays at Minnesota and Washington hosts Chicago on Thursday.
Dallas is locked into the seventh seed and will face either Golden State or Las Vegas. The Valkyries visit Los Angeles and the Aces play at Phoenix.
The Lynx clinched the top spot in the playoffs on Tuesday after Golden State lost to Portland in overtime. Minnesota benched its starters after an awful first half against Indiana. The Lynx reserves battled back, but fell short. Minnesota has dropped four of its past five games and has one game left at home against the Fever on Thursday.
“The margin for error throughout this regular season is incredibly small and you’ll see that in the playoffs,” said New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart. “Like one through eight you don’t know who will be playing at the end of October, which is exciting. I feel like for us we’re going to get a fresh start when it comes Sunday.”
Stewart missed Wednesday’s game with knee soreness. New York also lost Jonquel Jones to an ankle injury in the third quarter.
With New York finishing at 26-18, this is only the second time in league history that all the playoff teams have won at least 59% of their games. The 1998 playoffs, which only had four teams, had all four teams at 60% or better.
In the four major sports it’s rare to find the last place team in the playoffs with such a high win rate.
