Souhan: Lynx might be WNBA’s best team, but no longer the scariest

On Aug. 2, the Lynx defeated the Las Vegas Aces 111-58. That shocking display of basketball dominance prompted presumptions.

The Lynx were not just the best team in the WNBA, they were lapping the field.

The Aces, who had fallen to fourth place in the league in 2024 after winning consecutive titles in 2022-23, were a dismantled dynasty.

Lynx star Napheesa Collier, as the best player on the best team and the league’s leading scorer, was a certainty to win the league’s Most Valuable Player award.

On Tuesday night, the Lynx will play at Indiana in their penultimate regular-season game. They will finish the regular season on Thursday against Golden State at Target Center.

The Lynx remain atop the league standings and have clinched home-court advantage throughout the playoffs, but the presumptions of early August will continue to be tested, this week and in the postseason.

The Lynx have earned the right to call themselves the best team in the league. They are tops in the WNBA in victories, home record, road record, conference record, points per game, points allowed per game, field-goal percentage, three-point shooting percentage and point differential.

Since Aug. 2, the Aces have won 14 consecutive games, including a 10-point victory over the Lynx in Las Vegas on Thursday.

Collier is no longer a sure thing to win the MVP. Aces star A’ja Wilson, the three-time and defending league MVP, has passed Collier in the scoring race and ranks second to only Chicago’s Angel Reese in rebounds. Wilson also leads the league in blocks.

The two are tied in steals per game. Collier has a slightly higher shooting percentage. Collier is widely regarded as a superior defender, but Wilson being a more prolific rebounder (10.1 to 7.4 rebounds per game) might offset that.

Las Vegas’ surge has also created a potential clash of the last two WNBA franchises that could be considered dynastic. In winning those back-to-back championships, the Aces became the first team since the 2001-02 Los Angeles Sparks to win consecutive titles. The Lynx won four of seven from 2011 through ’17.

The Aces have the same coach, Becky Hammon, and several of the same core players — Wilson, Jackie Young and Chelsea Gray — of their championship teams.

It seems likely they will play Seattle in the first round. They are 2-2 against the Storm and 31-7 against the rest of the league.

Seattle has twice been able to overpower the Lynx inside with size and strength. The Lynx’s two best inside defenders, Collier and Alanna Smith, are exceptional but can be muscled by powerhouse centers, like Seattle’s Ezi Magbegor or New York’s Jonquel Jones, who was the MVP of last year’s WNBA Finals.

The Lynx could face the defending champion Liberty in the second round. New York has had a disappointing regular season but has all its key players back from last year’s team.

And in the WNBA Finals, the Lynx very well could match up with the Aces, who used that 53-point loss to the Lynx to motivate them, and who have been by far the best team in the league ever since.

The Lynx have taken a logical approach to the stretch run, resting key players so they will be fresh for the playoffs.

The Aces have taken this time to remind themselves and everyone who watches The W that they have a championship pedigree and perhaps the best player in the league.

This postseason could be defined by two quests for revenge:

The Aces wanting to erase any memories of that 53-point loss to the Lynx.