For the Lynx, Bridget Carleton’s playoff contributions are quiet, until they’re not

Bridget Carleton, to the untrained eye, was having a quiet night for the Lynx.

She was still scoreless as the Lynx tried to claw its way back from another halftime deficit, this time in an eventual 82-69 victory over the Phoenix Mercury in Game 1 of the WNBA semifinals on Sunday at Target Center.

But with 9 minutes, 17 seconds left to play, a pullup jumper bagged Carleton her first points of the night. Then, she drove down the baseline and kicked a pass out to Kayla McBride for an open three-pointer as the Lynx surged ahead in the fourth quarter.

When Courtney Williams dished a pass to Carleton with 2:35 to go, Williams turned around, put up three fingers and began walking toward halfcourt before Carleton had even shot the three-pointer, let alone when she sunk it from 26 feet.

“If you have a bad game,” Carleton said pregame, “a good one is coming.”

By simple statistical measures, this regular season was a less flashy one for the 6-foot-2 Carleton, a player who has never needed to be flashy for her impact to be felt on a deep Lynx squad.

The starting small forward’s 6.5 points per game were down from last year’s career-high of 9.6. Last year’s 44.4% three-point shooting — good for fifth in the league — dipped to 37.3%, with lower shooting volume across the board.

“You trust the work you put in,” said Carleton, “and I’ve done everything to prepare for every moment I’ve been in.”

Across the first three Lynx playoff games of 2025, Carleton has scored 17 of her 19 points in the second half, shooting a collective 6-for-8 from the field. The Canadian Olympian’s postseason plus-minus — the figure by which a player’s team outscores its opponent while she is on the floor — is a team-high plus-13.3.

“Until you’re up close and personal, you don’t understand all the things she does to help you win,” coach Cheryl Reeve said of Carleton earlier this year.

If the Lynx want to win the best-of-five semifinal against the Mercury — including Game 2 on Tuesday night at Target Center (6:30 p.m., ESPN) — Carleton’s defense will become especially necessary. Guard DiJonai Carrington, a midseason pickup in a trade with Dallas, was ruled out for the season because of a left foot sprain on Saturday, meaning the Lynx lose the 2024 all-defense honoree’s perimeter pressure off the bench.

Of the current roster, Carleton and MVP runner-up Napheesa Collier have played the most games for the Lynx since their rookie seasons in 2019. The team picked up Carleton after she was released by the Connecticut Sun four games into her first professional season out of Iowa State, where she played as a high-scoring power forward.

“I think as roles change, you find ways to impact success no matter what,” said Carleton, who also averaged 3.6 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game this season. “Those things, I think, go unnoticed a lot of the time, but it’s really appreciated here.”

To sweep Golden State in the first round, Carleton hit back-to-back threes (going 4-for-6 from beyond the arc) to keep the Valkyries from digging Minnesota’s hole any deeper in the third quarter of the Lynx’s 75-74 comeback in Game 2 on Wednesday. That was after Carleton shot 2-for-11 from long range in her previous four games.