Satou Sabally Suffers Head Injury in Mercury Loss
Phoenix Mercury forward Satou Sabally left Game 3 of the WNBA Finals on Wednesday due to an apparent head injury and did not return to the game. The Mercury fell to their rival with a score of 90-88. The injury occurred with 4:26 minutes left in the final quarter, when Sabally’s head collided with the knee of an Aces defender while fighting for a rebound. Immediately, the player put her hands to her face. After being on the ground for a considerable amount of time, Sabally attempted to get up before needing help to sit back down. Eventually, she was assisted off the court by a teammate and Mercury staff. Phoenix coach Nate Tibbetts reported that he did not see Sabally in the locker room after the game and had no updated information on her status. The 6-foot-4 “unicorn” was the Mercury’s second-leading scorer on Wednesday, with 24 points, 5 rebounds, and 3 assists in 31 minutes. In her first year with the team, she was the Mercury’s leading scorer in the regular season (16.3 PPG) and in the playoffs (19.0). Despite Sabally’s injury and being down by 10 points, Phoenix managed to tie the score in the final minutes, although they were down by 17 at one point. A’ja Wilson scored the winning shot with 0.9 seconds left, and DeWanna Bonner of Phoenix missed a shot that would have taken the game to overtime.The Aces now lead 3-0 in the WNBA Finals series, which for the first time is a best-of-seven game series.“We are not interested in moral victories,” Tibbetts said. “This is a game we wanted and needed to win.”
Nate Tibbetts, Phoenix Mercury coach
Kahleah Copper, 2021 Finals MVP, fueled the Mercury’s comeback with 11 consecutive points after Sabally’s injury. Bonner, a two-time champion with the Mercury in 2009 and 2014, then scored five straight points for the team. However, Phoenix’s effort in the final quarter would not have been necessary if the team had not had a defense, in the words of Alyssa Thomas, “unacceptable” in the first half. The Aces scored 55 points in the first half, the most allowed by the Mercury in any half this postseason, and allowed nine three-pointers by Las Vegas, including seven unopposed.“I don’t know how many teams have come back from 0-3. Not many, right? So I’m not going to sugarcoat this,” Tibbetts commented. “We have a difficult road ahead, but we have to take it one game at a time. This group has competed at a high level. We expect that. We’re in front of our fans. We have a certain level of pride and we’re going to keep fighting.”
Nate Tibbetts, coach of Phoenix Mercury
Copper added: “We have to play harder, get the 50-50 balls. I think that was hurting us in the first half. Offensive rebounds, there were long rebounds, the guards were flying in and getting them, and they were threes.” The Mercury have shown resilience throughout the postseason, overcoming 0-1 deficits to win their best-of-three first-round series against the New York Liberty, and then their best-of-five semifinal series against the Minnesota Lynx. Phoenix also erased a 20-point deficit in Game 2 of the semifinals and a 14-point deficit in Game 4 of that round to beat the Lynx 3-1. They hope to channel that same energy as they face elimination in Game 4 on Friday.“That’s how we should be playing from the start,” Thomas said about the second half. “It took us too long to wake up and play defense. I think the second half is our basketball and how we play, so it’s embarrassing that we don’t come out how we should.”
Alyssa Thomas, Phoenix Mercury player
“It’s pride for me, it’s like, no way,” Copper said about wanting to avoid the sweep. “I’m a competitor, that’s all.”
Kahleah Copper, Phoenix Mercury player
“You just have to keep fighting,” Bonner added. “You’re not going to quit. It’s hard to get here. So we’re going to keep fighting until the end. I feel like that’s what we’ve been doing throughout the playoffs.”
DeWanna Bonner, Phoenix Mercury player
