WNBA: Minnesota Lynx having fun with their finest begin since 2017 season

The Minnesota Lynx are off to their finest begin in years, and we’re reaching the purpose within the 2024 WNBA common season the place rumblings of a Lynx championship are getting louder.

There’s good purpose for that. At 12-3, Minnesota is off to its finest begin to a season since 2017, and also you don’t have to remind Lynx followers how issues ended for that workforce. Minnesota received its fourth championship in seven seasons in 2017, bookending maybe the longest dynasty in WNBA historical past, and whereas the Lynx of 2024 look considerably totally different than their most up-to-date title-worthy iteration (save, after all, for head coach Cheryl Reeve), there’s lots purpose to get enthusiastic about them as a title contender.

For starters, ahead Napheesa Collier is taking part in arguably the very best basketball of her profession, and that’s a excessive bar to clear. Collier established herself as a real celebrity final season and has completed nothing to lose that standing in 2024; she’s one among two WNBA gamers to be averaging no less than 20 factors and 10 rebounds per sport (Las Vegas’ A’ja Wilson is the opposite), and she or he’s doing her half as a playmaker, too, chipping in a career-high 3.6 assists per sport.

Picture by David Sherman/NBAE by way of Getty Photos

It’s Collier’s protection that really units her aside, nonetheless. Throughout her Rookie of the Yr marketing campaign in 2019, she rapidly turned referred to as a flexible, athletic and clever defender, and she or he’s taken that to new heights in 2024, posting career-highs in defensive rebounds (7.5), steals (2.4) and blocked pictures (1.5) per sport. Collier, Wilson, and Seattle middle Ezi Magbegor are the one three gamers within the WNBA who’re averaging a mixed 3.8 steals and blocks (or “shares”) per sport; based on Throughout the Timeline, that threshold has solely been reached 28 occasions in WNBA historical past.

Minnesota’s chemistry is resulting in environment friendly offense

As spectacular as Collier has been, it’s removed from a one-player present in Minnesota. The Lynx are capturing the ball extraordinarily effectively, main the WNBA in 3-point capturing share (40 %) and rating second in 3-pointers made per sport (10.2).

With sharpshooters like Kayla McBride, Bridget Carleton and Alanna Smith all taking part in massive roles for Minnesota, this doesn’t come as that a lot of a shock. Nonetheless, there’s one thing to be stated for a workforce that persistently generates high-quality appears from past the arc, particularly when it will get these pictures with constant ball motion that each participant is a part of, and it’s one thing Lynx coaches have seen.

“We’re at all times a workforce that has some stage of chemistry. This 12 months’s workforce has maturity with their chemistry,” Reeve stated after the Lynx defeated the Dallas Wings final Monday. “They’re good basketball gamers.”

Intangibles like chemistry and maturity are laborious to quantify, however within the Lynx’s case, they do present up on the stat sheet. Minnesota leads the WNBA in each share of pictures assisted on (78.2 %) and help/turnover ratio (1.69), stats that show not solely the Lynx’s take care of the basketball but additionally their willingness to share it.

The Lynx may have an opportunity to enhance their report in opposition to the WNBA’s finest

How far can this strategy take the Lynx? Their subsequent few video games ought to inform us so much. Whereas 15 video games is certainly not a small pattern dimension for achievement, there’ll inevitably be chatter that Minnesota nonetheless must show itself in opposition to the league’s finest competitors, and the Lynx may have the chance to do exactly that within the coming weeks.

Minnesota will play the New York Liberty (13-3) twice on its upcoming four-game highway journey. The Lynx have already crushed the Liberty as soon as this season; one and even two extra wins in opposition to New York wouldn’t solely strengthen Minnesota’s case as a championship contender, however would additionally slender the hole between the 2 groups within the WNBA standings, and maybe maintain implications for playoff seeding later within the season.

Picture by Jordan Johnson/NBAE by way of Getty Photos

After their highway journey, the Lynx will return house to tackle the Connecticut Solar (13-2) on July 4. Minnesota fell to Connecticut again in Might in additional time, an 83-82 consequence that almost all would say may have simply gone to the Lynx. Simply as with their regular-season sequence in opposition to New York, the Lynx would do effectively to attain a victory over Connecticut, particularly if the groups shall be jockeying for playoff place come August and September—which they doubtless will.