Final stretch will go long way in determining Lynx’s WNBA playoff seed

There wasn’t a lot of time for the Lynx to revel in their victory Friday night at Target Center.

The Lynx beat Chicago 83-66. They improved to 28-9, won their fifth game in a row and won for the 12th time in 13 games.

And afterward, coach Cheryl Reeve said the team had to do more down the stretch. Keep up the defense, bring up the offense, finish the job, which resumes Sunday afternoon in New York.

“We have to be better,” Reeve said. “The next game is against a really good team.”

There are three regular-season games left. Two are on the road, both challenging.

The Lynx are currently in second place in the WNBA and are guaranteed a top-three finish. They are three games behind No. 1 New York and one ahead of No. 3 Connecticut.

And their next two games are on the road at New York on Sunday and at Connecticut on Tuesday. Those two games will go a long way toward determining whether the Lynx finish third and open the playoffs vs. the No. 6 team (most likely Indiana) or finish second and get the No. 7 seed (most likely Phoenix).

The Liberty are the league’s most efficient offensive team, the Sun the most efficient on defense. New York, Minnesota and Connecticut are 1-2-3 in net rating.

First place is still a possibility. But the Liberty would have to go 0-3 to end the season and the Lynx 3-0. That would tie the teams atop the standings, but the Lynx would win the head-to-head tiebreaker.

The most likely scenario is a battle for the second seed.

Because the Sun have already won the first two games vs. the Lynx, the Lynx needs to finish ahead of Connecticut, not tied, to get the No. 2 seed. The Lynx finish the season at home vs. Los Angeles. The Sun play at Las Vegas on Sunday, play host to the Lynx on Tuesday and finish the season against Chicago.

Sunday in New York, the Lynx get a Liberty team they have played three times. Each won a regular-season game against the other at home. The Lynx also defeated the Liberty in the Commissioner’s Cup championship, which doesn’t count in the standings.

“Their offense is better than ours, in terms of overall ratings,” Reeve said. “We’ll have to find a way. We can’t just be average offensively. Your defense gets harder and harder [as the opposition improves].”

Friday’s victory was vintage Lynx. They had assists on 25 of 33 made baskets. There was one play in the third quarter that center Alanna Smith called emblematic of the team. Cecilia Zandalasini got the ball, wide open, on the perimeter. Instead of taking the three, she spied Myisha Hines-Allen all alone under the basket and fed her for the score.

It’s that kind of unselfishness the Lynx have shown all year, the connected nature that has them expecting big things. Now, with the regular season winding down and the playoffs approaching, it has to continue.

“From the beginning, we knew we had the potential to have a ‘ship,” Smith said of the chance of winning a title. “We were ranked ninth in the preseason, and we were like, ‘What the heck? We’re actually really good.’ We continue to prove that each week.”