NEW YORK — Sabrina Ionescu’s final pass of the New York Liberty’s 91-82 Game 2 victory over the Atlanta Dream was to no one in particular. It was less of a chest pass, really, and more of a celebratory spike — an emphatic bounce of the basketball around midcourt after a 36-point, nine-assist masterclass that lifted the top-seeded Liberty into the WNBA semifinals.

Ionescu opened Tuesday’s scoring with a 3-pointer on New York’s first possession and sealed the win with the final two free throws of the series. She did plenty in between after saying Liberty had no intention of traveling south for a decisive Game 3.

“We don’t want to go to Atlanta,” Ionescu said Tuesday morning. “That’s not something we want to do.”

New York needed to outscore Atlanta 26-18 in the fourth quarter to win, beating the Dream 2-0. Ionescu expected Tuesday’s game to be tougher than Sunday’s first game, in which the Liberty never trailed and won by 14 points. Her prediction proved correct, as the Dream played with a renewed sense of urgency.

“We had to hit them hard from the beginning and let them know it was going to be a neck-and-neck race,” Atlanta coach Tanisha Wright said Tuesday morning.

Dream All-Star guard Allisha Gray made her first five shots and had outscored New York 14-13 with 2:18 left in the first quarter. Still, Atlanta’s nine-point lead in the first quarter and five-point lead at halftime proved insufficient. Gray’s 26 points and Rhyne Howard’s 19 were ultimately for nothing.

Sabrina Ionescu went OFF against Atlanta, scoring 36 points to defeat the Dream in straight games. photo.twitter.com/QCMzGEgwmx

— The Athletics (@TheAthletic) September 25, 2024

Ionescu saved New York from having to board a plane. Though she scored 13 points and dished out seven assists in the first half, she ignited Liberty’s second-half rally, scoring 11 points in the third. At one point, she scored nine straight points for New York, turning a three-point deficit into a two-point Liberty lead. She celebrated by waving to the crowd, pointing to teammates who made assists and even high-fiving lauded director Spike Lee, who was sitting courtside across from the Liberty bench, for one layup.

Even with Breanna Stewart not scoring a single goal from 6:17 into the second quarter until 4:27 of the fourth quarter, New York’s offense continued to be dangerous. Ionescu buried 3-pointer after 3-pointer. She hit five in total. Jones made eight of her 12 shots and finished with a double-double of 20 points and 13 rebounds. It was her first time since August 22 that she reached double figures in both categories.

On Tuesday morning, Brondello reminded those in her locker room how they had effortlessly defeated No. 7 Washington Mystics in the second game of the first round last year.

“I think those who were here last year are a memory,” Brondello said. “All the lessons we learned last year, we’ll carry with us this year.”

She was specifically referring to their takeaways from that overtime win over Washington. But Brondello could just as easily have been referring to what New York learned from the Finals loss to the Las Vegas Aces. Those lessons will surely come flooding back soon enough.

New York awaits the winner of the first-round series between the Aces and Seattle Storm, which kicks off Tuesday at 9:30 p.m. ET.

The semi-finals start on Sunday.

Required reading

(Photo: Catalina Fragoso/Getty Images)