Cheryl Reese in tears begging for a replay and says ref \u201cstole a victory\u201d from the Lynx.<\/strong><\/p>\nMinnesota Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve said the 2024 WNBA title was \u201cstolen\u201d from her team due to what she called \u201cincredibly disappointing\u201d officiating in Sunday\u2019s 67-62 overtime loss to the\u00a0\u00a0New York Liberty in the deciding Game 5 of the Finals.<\/p>\n
Reeve took umbrage in particular with a foul call on Lynx center\u00a0Alanna Smith\u00a0with 5.2 seconds left in regulation. After missing a pair of foul shots a few plays earlier, 2023 WNBA MVP\u00a0Breanna Stewart\u00a0went to the free throw line and made both attempts for New York to tie the score, effectively sending the game into overtime.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need a replay. All the headlines will be, \u2018Reeve cries foul.\u2019 Bring it on.\u201d Reeve said. \u201cBring it on. Because this s\u2014 was stolen from us. Bring it on.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Lynx challenged the call, but it was upheld. Reeve said after the game that a third party should be involved in reviewing challenges.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the other end when they challenged it, if we would have turned that clip in, they would have told us that this was marginal contact, no foul. Guaranteed. Guaranteed,\u201d Reeve said. \u201cSo, when you review, there should be the same parameters that you\u2019re reviewing with, but the three people on the game need a fourth party to let them know. Because that decided the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reeve initially brought up her issues with the officiating at the beginning of Minnesota\u2019s postgame news conference when asked about her offense\u2019s lack of production in the second half.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw a very physical and aggressive New York team,\u201d Reeve said. \u201cWe know this from being a part of the games for so long that sometimes you get away with this stuff when you\u2019re physical and aggressive, and they certainly did. It\u2019s a shame that officiating had such a hand in a series like this.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Liberty shot 25 free throws to the Lynx\u2019s 8. There were 21 foul calls on Minnesota and 17 on New York.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese guys shot 30% [from the floor]. Shot 30%,\u201d Reeve said of the Liberty. \u201cThe difference was in the foul line.\u201d<\/p>\n
Minnesota superstar\u00a0Napheesa Collier, who finished with 22 points, did not make it to the free throw line in Game 5. Entering Sunday\u2019s contest, Collier \u2014 who went 11-for-23 from the floor in Game 5 \u2014 never had 20 field goal attempts without a single free throw attempt in her career.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was getting held a little bit. It was a little hard to make shots,\u201d said Collier, who fouled out with 13.0 seconds left in overtime.<\/p>\n
Reeve elaborated on her concerns.<\/p>\n
![\"Cheryl](\"https:\/\/a1.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2024%2F1021%2Fr1403511_1024x576_16%2D9.jpg\")
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\u201cIt just doesn\u2019t feel right that you lose a series with that level of discrepancy,\u201d she said. \u201cWe don\u2019t have a team that whines and complains and all that stuff. Sometimes, it probably hurts us. Maybe being a little more, I don\u2019t know, something. But you have a star player like Phee that just \u2014 I don\u2019t get it. I don\u2019t get how she can be held and go to the basket and get hit, and then a marginal, at best, at best, sends their best player to the free throw line. I mean, that\u2019s tough. It\u2019s tough to swallow.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Asked to respond to Reeve\u2019s comments, Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said of the referees, \u201cI thought they were pretty fair.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe last game, that\u2019s where you get give and take. Game No. 1, we should have won that game,\u201d Brondello said. \u201cI have so much respect for Cheryl, and I have so much respect for that Minnesota Lynx team, because, man, that was ugly.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we found a way to win. I\u2019m really proud of our team, how resilient we were, how we stuck together and how we continue to trust each other. That was our word today: Just trust the process. We found a way to win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Both coaches previously critiqued the officiating in the series, with Reeve calling out how Collier was officiated differently than Stewart after Game 3 and Brondello pointing out the foul call disparity following Game 4 when the Liberty shot nine free throws to the Lynx\u2019s 20.<\/p>\n
\u201cOfficiating, it\u2019s not that hard,\u201d Reeve said. \u201cWhen someone is being held, be consistent. If you don\u2019t want to call it a hold at one end, don\u2019t call it at the other. Be consistent. Every team asks for that. Sandy asked for that last game. Three of the games in this series, we\u2019re talking about the same damn thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
Games 1, 3 and 4 also were incredibly close until the end, each decided by two or three points. This Finals series was the first with multiple games that went to overtime, and Sunday marked the first time a winner-take-all Finals Game 5 went to OT.<\/p>\n
Reflecting on the season, Reeve credited her team for \u201c[doing] the things the right way. [We] built the team within the rules \u2026 We gave hope to those teams that aren\u2019t willing to circumvent the cap or fly illegally or all the stuff that\u2019s happened over the last five years.\u201d<\/p>\n
New York was previously fined $500,000 for illicitly chartering flights in the 2021 season. The\u00a0Las Vegas Aces\u00a0had their 2025 first-round draft pick rescinded for violating league rules regarding impermissible player benefits, and the franchise is being investigated by the league for sponsorship deals its players struck with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.<\/p>\n
Reeve \u2014 a four-time champion as coach of the Lynx (2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017) \u2014 said the result \u201csucks\u201d and compared it to Minnesota\u2019s 2016 Finals run that she said \u201cwas lost on officiating,\u201d referring to a missed shot clock violation with 1:12 left in Game 5.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is for a championship for both teams,\u201d Reeve said. \u201cLet them decide it. What contact is legal should be the same for both teams. This isn\u2019t that hard. So, it\u2019s disappointing. I mean, congratulations to the Liberty on their first championship \u2026 It took them 28 years. Congrats to them. We were that close to our fifth. Just didn\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
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Cheryl Reese in tears begging for a replay and says ref \u201cstole a victory\u201d from the Lynx. Minnesota Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve said the 2024 WNBA title was … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11872,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11871"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11873,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871\/revisions\/11873"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usdailys.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}