SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 For a moment, it looked like the Valkyries might run away with Friday\u2019s game.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Playing the league-leading Minnesota Lynx, Golden State was up 10 with 38.3 seconds left in the first half.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But all the momentum built in the first half disappeared after veteran Gabby Williams fouled Kayla McBride and Nia Coffey on 3-point attempts on back-to-back possessions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Instead of going into halftime up double-digits, the Valkyries went into the break conceding momentum to the Lynx and they took advantage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Minnesota used the mini second-quarter run to propel it to a 81-75 win over the Valkyries. Golden State has now lost eight straight to the Lynx as they remain the only team the second-year franchise hasn\u2019t beaten in its short history.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Cecilia Zandalasini led the Valkyries with 23 points. Gabby Williams added 15.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Valkyries held rookie sensation Olivia Miles to just seven points and four assists, but couldn\u2019t stop anyone else.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nia Coffey had led the Lynx with 22 points, Courtney Williams had 21 and Kayla McBride recorded 17.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Lynx came out of halftime firing on all cylinders.<\/p>\n
Minnesota opened the game with a 12-5 run to take a 53-51 lead early in the period.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Valkyries cut Minnesota\u2019s lead to five with under a minute to go in the fourth with Janelle Sala\u00fcn at the line shooting two free throws.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But the second-year player missed both and the Lynx slowly built their advantage back with free throws.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Golden State gave one more punch after Zandalasini hit a clutch 3-pointer with under 20 seconds left. But Miles hit two free throws on the ensuing possession and the rookie blocked Zandalasini\u2019s 3-pointer up four to close out the game.<\/p>\n
Zandalasini gets back on track<\/p>\n
The Italian sharpshooter had a rough stretch of games since returning to the starting lineup.<\/p>\n
Over the last five games, she\u2019s averaged just 3.6 points per game. She\u2019s shot 36% from the field and 30% from the 3-point line this season.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Zandalasini scored 14 points in the first half on 5-of-7 shooting from the field and 3-for-4 shooting from the 3-point line.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO \u2014 For a moment, it looked like the Valkyries might run away with Friday\u2019s game.\u00a0 Playing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":765714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3786],"tags":[7,160,479,4705,164,4025,4024,40625,23384,40626,13483,23385,6,23386,29085,23390,23391,23392,66,255,458],"class_list":["post-765713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golden-state-warriors","tag-basketball","tag-california","tag-golden-state","tag-golden-state-valkyries","tag-golden-state-warriors","tag-goldenstate","tag-goldenstatewarriors","tag-lake-county","tag-marin-county","tag-mendocino-county","tag-monterey-county","tag-napa-county","tag-nba","tag-north-bay","tag-northern-california","tag-santa-cruz-county","tag-solano-county","tag-sonoma-county","tag-sports","tag-warriors","tag-wnba"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116781125713885804","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=765713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/765714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=765713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=765713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=765713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}