What I like about watching A’ja Wilson operate is how simple she makes the game look. Not easy, but simple, as she applies basic principles of footwork and positioning at the highest possible level to shred elite defenses, never really needing to do anything more complicated than read the scheme, apply pressure, and make the right play. More often than not, the right play involves her spinning over her right shoulder and popping it from like 13 feet, as smoothly and as under control as any player her size could ever be expected to do. There’s a metronomic quality to her game; you can see why the Las Vegas Aces run everything through their star in a way no other team in the WNBA playoffs has, and why it has gotten them through to the semifinals.
Las Vegas won a nailbiter on Thursday evening, scraping by the Seattle Storm 74-73 thanks to a tough putback from Jackie Young and an ultimately successful yet quite chaotic scramble on the final possession. It was Wilson, duh, who won that possession, defending Erika Wheeler in space and forcing a missed jumper. Gabby Williams’s would-be game-winner, gifted to her by a botched Jewell Loyd rebound, came a hair too late and the overzealous game ops person in Vegas turned off the lights with the ball still in the air. It was a fitting, strange end to a great, anxious series, one that Seattle would have won if Wilson had not spent the three games calmly pivoting and floatering them to death.
Wilson averaged 29.3 points, 8.7 boards, 3.3 assists, and 4.3 stocks in the three games, across which she played all but 14 minutes. She did this against Nneka Ogwumike, Ezi Magbegor, and, most entertainingly of all, Dominique Malonga. Last night, she dropped 38, getting to the free-throw line 11 times, committing zero fouls and a single turnover. When she had one of the Storm bigs in isolation, she’d get to her spot and cash in. If they overplayed it, as they did in the fourth when they cranked up the pressure and nearly got the series win, Wilson would punish their aggression with a perfectly timed backcut. Like I said: simple, deadly. The Aces’ whole loadout is straightforward, with Chelsea Gray back doing Point God stuff, Jackie Young running around and scoring, and everybody else supporting the three title-winners. Wilson is the orbital center of the team, and the reason why they have won 17 of 18.
Wilson’s big series is especially impressive given how well Malonga played in her first playoff series. Game 2 belonged to the French wonder, as Malonga keyed a 10-point fourth-quarter comeback and hit the game-icing and-one. Malonga’s defense was smothering throughout that game’s last six minutes, as she not only held Wilson scoreless by pushing her off her spots and disrupting every shot attempt, she capably guarded Aces ballhandlers in space and navigated screens like a veteran. In Malonga, you can see a terrifying future, a one-woman defensive anchor who will protect the rim and grab every rebound and make it functionally impossible to get a single easy bucket.
But in Wilson, you can see the terrifying present, because as good as Malonga is at the aeronautics stuff, she was still up against a genius ground operator. Wilson was fearless against the extraterrestrial teenager, getting into Malonga’s chest, sending her the wrong way, and ball-faking her into the sky and popping it over her. To extend Maitreyi’s metaphor, if Game 2 was Malonga acing the retest, Game 3 was Wilson calling Malonga up to the front of the class and grilling her until she broke down.
For her efforts, Wilson and the Aces will get to play the depleted, gritty Indiana Fever, who are not as tough a matchup for Las Vegas. Aliyah Boston was good against Atlanta’s Bri Jones, but Wilson will be a significantly tougher matchup. Nobody will overlook the Fever after they upset the Dream in Atlanta. Also, Indiana beat Vegas twice this season. One of those came in late July, in a shambolic Kiah Stokes–era Aces performance—Wilson made nine of the team’s 16 total field goals as Vegas shot 26 percent and lost by 27—in the post–Kiah Stokes era, right before Vegas became unbeatable.
That said, watching this Wilson performance alongside the extremely high-level team stuff the Minnesota Lynx have been doing, it is impossible for me not to want the two teams to meet in the Finals. Whether the Aces can get there, and whether they can win if they do get there, will all be up to A’ja Wilson.