Inside the abrupt ending to A'ja Wilson's historic MVP season — SkimNews
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- A'ja Wilson received her record fifth WNBA MVP trophy on Thursday — her third in a row — in a surprise ceremony where WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert presented a cream-colored old-fashioned phone preloaded with congratulatory messages from Kamala Harris, Dawn Staley, Lisa Leslie, Sylvia Fowles, Chelsea Gray, and Becky Hammon
- The Las Vegas Aces were eliminated 87-77 by the Golden State Valkyries in Game 2 the next night, completing a semifinal sweep after she shot 6-of-19, missed three free throws in the fourth quarter, and committed a turnover with 1:54 left that allowed Golden State to tie the score
- Wilson finished the regular season averaging 26.2 points per game with a league-leading 9.4 win shares and a 32.4 efficiency rating, while shooting a career-best 40.4% from three-point range on her expanded perimeter game
- Coach Becky Hammon, who arrived in 2022 and asked Wilson to let her "coach her hard," transformed the 6-foot-4 center from a low-post anchor into a "big guard" matchup nightmare that defenses couldn't solve
- A nagging back injury forced Wilson out of the FIBA Women's World Cup on Aug. 31 — the first concrete sign something was off — after she had also missed four games in June and July with an ankle injury
- The Valkyries, a first-year expansion franchise, used a suffocating defense and took advantage of injuries to Wilson's Aces teammates to pull the semifinal upset over the defending champions
Why it matters: The Aces' title defense ended at the hands of a first-year expansion franchise in the Valkyries, marking the second time in Wilson's five MVP seasons that individual dominance failed to translate to a championship — a mirror of her 2020 season when the Aces were swept in the Finals by Seattle. The loss leaves Wilson with three titles from five MVPs and raises real questions about whether the Las Vegas championship window is narrowing.
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