Lynx Dominate Sun to Secure Playoff Position

Napheesa Collier steadied the ball in her hands, Olivia Miles bounced on her toes at the wing, and a season’s worth of work came into sharp focus.

Minnesota didn’t just beat Connecticut on Sunday. The Lynx imposed themselves, 101-89, and stepped to the brink of locking up the No. 1 seed and home-court advantage throughout the WNBA playoffs.

One more Lynx win. Or one Golden State loss. That’s all that separates Minnesota, now 32-10, from owning the postseason road.

Miles passes Clark, and a rookie season rewrites history

The night belonged to Collier’s poise and power, but the season keeps bending around Olivia Miles.

With 9:31 left in the second quarter, the rookie guard toed the line, knocked down a free throw, and quietly moved past Caitlin Clark for the most points by a rookie in WNBA history. Point No. 770. Clark’s 2024 mark with Indiana stops at 769.

No fanfare. No stoppage. Just another point in a game that demanded all of her 21, and all of Collier’s 23.

Miles has been the engine behind Minnesota’s surge, and again she played like it. Attacking gaps, living in the paint, and forcing Connecticut’s defense to bend until it broke. Her record-breaking season is one of the main reasons the Lynx are staring down the league’s top seed rather than fighting for position in the middle of the pack.

Lynx punch first — and hard

Minnesota came in on a three-game skid. They played like a team sick of that sentence.

The opening 3:30 was a blitz. Collier scored the game’s first four points, setting the tone inside. Courtney Williams — back in the building where she once starred for five seasons — piled on five more during an 11-2 run that left the Sun reeling.

By the end of the first quarter, the gap had ballooned to 27-12. Collier already had 10, Minnesota controlled the glass, and Connecticut looked like a team chasing shadows.

The second quarter didn’t offer much relief. Collier kept carving up the defense, and when she slipped in a layup with 3:44 left in the half, the lead stood at 45-26. Nineteen points. On the road. Against a franchise playing one of its final games in Connecticut.

Then the game finally bit back.

Sun fight back from deep

Connecticut’s season has been battered by injuries, and Sunday brought another blow. Saniya Rivers went down in the first quarter and did not return, adding to a list that has haunted the Sun all year.

But the team refused to fold.

They turned to the 3-point line and started firing. The shots fell. A 15-4 burst slashed the deficit, the crowd woke up, and the Sun were suddenly within eight before halftime. Collier’s three-point play with 25.2 seconds left steadied Minnesota and restored a double-digit cushion, but the tone had changed. Connecticut had found a way to stay in the fight.

That theme carried into the second half. The Sun’s perimeter shooting kept them alive, possession after possession. They hit 12 of their first 19 from beyond the arc and, at one point early in the fourth quarter, had trimmed the Lynx lead to just seven.

Every time Minnesota looked ready to walk away with it, another Sun 3 dropped.

Connecticut finished 15-for-28 from deep. On most nights, that kind of shooting flips a game. On this one, it merely kept them within reach of a team that always had another answer.

Collier closes, Miles commands

When the pressure rose, Minnesota leaned on its stars.

Collier’s scoring came in waves — early dominance, timely buckets, and that late first-half and second-half composure that separates All-Stars from everyone else. Her 23 points framed the night, anchoring the Lynx whenever Connecticut’s shooting threatened to turn the building.

Miles matched that presence on the perimeter. Her 21 points didn’t just fill a box score; they dictated tempo. She controlled when to push and when to pull the ball out, when to attack and when to feed teammates. On a night when history found her, she looked entirely focused on the scoreboard, not the record book.

The Lynx, who had stumbled through that three-game losing run, never truly lost control here. Connecticut’s threes made it tense. They never made it chaotic.

A farewell night, and a familiar name

Beyond the standings, the game carried a different kind of weight.

Before tipoff, the Sun honored former head coach Mike Thibault, who led the franchise from its birth in 2003 through 2012. It was a fitting tribute in a building that is down to its final two WNBA games before the franchise relocates to Houston next season.

The night also carried a family thread. Mike’s son, Eric Thibault, now serves as an assistant coach with Minnesota, sharing the Lynx bench with Lindsay Whalen — another link to Connecticut’s past. Whalen played under Mike Thibault and reached the WNBA Finals with the Sun in 2004, back when this building was still learning how to host big games.

Around them, a roll call of Sun history watched on: Tina Charles, Bria Hartley, Taj McWilliams-Franklin, Nicki Collen and others. A franchise’s memories gathered in one place while its present team, now 10-32 and on a five-game losing streak, tried to punch above its weight one more time.

They had the shooting. They didn’t have the depth, or the health, to match Minnesota for 40 minutes.

What’s next

For the Lynx, the equation is simple now. They close the regular season with a home-and-home set against Indiana, starting on Tuesday in Indianapolis. One win there, or a slip from Golden State, and the road to the title will run through Minnesota.

Connecticut heads to face the Mystics on Tuesday, carrying injuries, a losing streak, and the knowledge that only one home date remains before the move to Houston.

The standings will remember this as another Lynx win and another Sun loss.

The night itself may be remembered for something else: a rookie passing Caitlin Clark, a franchise saying goodbye to its past, and a Minnesota team that looks very much like it intends to own the future.