August 24, 2025
Stewart’s absence shows, but Liberty eye playoff boost
The Liberty have discovered what it's like without Stewart, their superstar and glue
Kennedy Burke flailed her white towel from the bench when she saw what had happened in front of her. Teammate Sabrina Ionescu was up in Bridget Carleton’s space while the Lynx wing was trying to figure out how and where to move the ball from the right corner.
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With the shot clock ticking down to four seconds, Ionescu swiped the ball out of Carleton’s hands and fell to the floor, causing a Carleton turnover and offensive foul. Ionescu grabbed the ball, punched the air, kicked her leg and yelled alongside Burke’s emphatic towel waiving.
“We’re unstoppable when we move the ball,” Burke said following the Liberty’s triumphant 85-75 win over the Lynx on Tuesday. “And each player in different positions on our team, we’re just so explosive. We just bring something special every time we come on the court. … It’s a mindset, just realizing the talent that we have, and like I mentioned before — when we play together, no team in this league can stop us.”
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Following the high of Tuesday night’s game, the Liberty dropped a game to 12th place Chicago Sky at home on Thursday. In the final moment of the game against the Sky, Sabrina Ionescu went for a rebound and got her left foot squashed by Sky center Kamilla Cardoso. As a result, the Liberty got smacked by the Atlanta Dream 78-62 just two days later without Ionescu who was back in New York nursing the foot injury.
Amidst a tight playoff race, back-to-back losses are tough to swallow. There are of course asterisks next to both, especially the blowout loss to the Dream. In addition to Ionescu, three other players — Isabelle Harrison, Nyara Sabally and Breanna Stewart — also missed the game due to injury. Stewart hasn’t been on the floor since she left the July 26 game, dealing with a bone bruise on her right knee.
“We’re on the struggle bus,” head coach Sandy Brondello said after Saturday’s loss to the Dream. “We know that. But we’re getting some really good players back, and then we know it doesn’t mean things will just automatically change. We have to bring the appropriate effort and energy and trust and talk and everything and be connected.”
Since Stewart has been sidelined, the Liberty’s defensive rating has plummeted by almost 10%, decreasing from 97.2 to 106.8 in just a month’s time. According to PBP Stats, the team’s defensive rating with both Stewart and Jonquel Jones on the floor has been as low as 91.3. While with just Stewart on the floor that rating hikes up to 101.3. But with just Jones and no Stewart, which has been the case for the past month, the Liberty’s defensive rating stands at 106.8.
Why without Stewart for around a month have the Liberty been struggling noticeably more than they struggled in the months of June and July when they were without 2024 WNBA Finals MVP Jones?
The reason is multifactorial. What can’t be overlooked is not only how much Stewart gives the Liberty each night — schematically on the court and emotionally as a leader — but also how central she is to the ways their revived 2025 offense and defense functions.
Why Breanna Stewart is the Liberty’s ‘glue’
The Liberty are trying to do whatever they can to get back to the finals and win it all again. They knew they had to evolve how they play in an ever-changing and more competitive WNBA. As part of the evolution, the Liberty updated to a 5-out, position-less offense rather than their previous 4-out, 1-in motion offense, and the team brought in NBA alumna Sonia Raman to help facilitate those changes.
“Five-out opens up the middle, but the gaps are smaller between players,” current Indiana Pacers head coach Rick Carlise said about this type of offense on Caitlin Cooper’s YouTube channel. “Four-out, 1-in the gaps are much bigger and if the big has good feel for movement along the baseline it can be more effective as a way to drive the ball.”
What has this meant for the Liberty? It’s meant that to start the season Stewart was playing like a slashing wing rather than a creation-heavy power forward. She’s had more room to get downhill and out-run the defenders guarding her. As a result, her field goal percentage on 2-pointers has been the highest this season since her first MVP season in 2018.
Playing a positionless 5-out has given Stewart ample opportunities to have the ball in her hands and play “point Stewie” which has allowed for Ionescu to run around off-ball and function as one of the best catch-and-shoot shooters in the league. The Liberty have also been playing more “random” style basketball, meaning more freedom for players to make decisions on the fly rather than a coach running a set play.
“She’s got the ball in her hands, and we’re running some sort of off-ball action,” Raman said about what Stewart adds to their offense. “ … She just keeps the ball moving really well, just a “point 5” way of playing that just really starts to move us offensively and just kind of keeps the ball popping.”
Stewart’s game also fits nicely into the Liberty’s defensive schemes this year. The Liberty switch a lot and Stewart’s awareness about when to help — in addition to her athletic versatility — allows for the Liberty to counter how opposing offenses attack the Liberty’s switching.
Raman and Brondello agreed that the Liberty miss Stewart’s roaming and ability to be everywhere and anticipate really quickly where and when someone needs help defensively. When Jones is pulled out to the perimeter especially on a switch, Stewart has the length that can rim-protect when Jones isn’t there. “She can anticipate really well, and knows where to be next,” Raman said.
When asked about how much Stewart’s presence impacts the functionality of the Liberty on both sides of the ball rather than box score stats, Brondello couldn’t stop listing different fundamentals that Stewart brings by being on the floor.
“You want me to keep going?” she asked me.
But it isn’t just the schematic on-court basketball skill and awareness that the Liberty miss from Stewart — it’s also her emotional intelligence and loud confidence. Jones called Stewart almost a member of the coaching staff, a calming presence that brings people together emotionally.
“She just knows the right thing to say at the right time,” Jones said. ” … Sometimes we come into the huddles … we sometimes just don’t know what to say. … And I think Stewie does a really good job of knowing what to say and when to say it.”
The road ahead
When Stewart went down, and even when Jones went down earlier this season, the Liberty’s approach has been overly cautious. Jones was out a full month when she suffered a first degree ankle sprain and now Stewart has been out a month dealing with an injury that wasn’t structural but rather just needed rest. Instead of rushing a return to the court, the calculation the team has made is that Stewart at her most fresh when they need her most is going to be what takes the Liberty over the top.
Coach Brondello must problem-solve to figure out how this team can win games consistently again as players return to the rotation. As she said, just because Stewart and presumably Ionescu are set to return this coming week doesn’t mean that the team is going to immediately return to form.
If Stewart does return on Monday, Aug. 25, which has been her target date, the pressure is on this New York Liberty team and their coaching staff to find a winning formula to repeat as champions. Does this group have enough time to mesh with just seven games left in the regular season?
While that remains to be seen, the return of Stewart, the franchise’s schematic and emotional leader, boosts the Liberty into title contention.
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Written by Jackie Powell
Jackie Powell covers the New York Liberty for The IX Basketball and hosts episodes of The IX Sports podcast, where she explores national women's basketball stories. She also has covered women's basketball and the culture of the sport for Bleacher Report, Sports Illustrated, MSNBC, Yahoo Sports, Harper's Bazaar and SLAM. She also self-identifies as a Lady Gaga stan, is a connoisseur of pop music and is a mental health advocate.
