This was Liberty’s reward for ambition.

It was covered in sterling silver, via Tiffany’s, as confetti flew and streamers covered the court at Barclays Center, while the 18,090 delirious witnesses to a basketball breakthrough created a roar that Brooklyn and everyone watching women’s sports around the world could hear. bridge: the WNBA trophy.

It was passed on by the owners who moved this entire triumphant show to Brooklyn, was guided by the head coach hired to lend her championship pedigree, and was ultimately held aloft by the players who pulled off a historic 67-62 overtime victory on Sunday the Minnesota achieved. Lynx in Game 5 of the Finals.

Now, finally, the capital of women’s basketball is no longer in Storrs, Conn., or Columbia, S.C., or Las Vegas. It’s here, in New York City, to the delight of a constituency in every stripe of seafoam.

“To be able to bring a championship to New York, the first ever in franchise history, is an incredible feeling,” said Breanna Stewart. “And I can’t wait to continue celebrating it with the city.”

It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t cheap. It wasn’t pretty. This wasn’t anyone’s advertisement for the product’s aesthetics, as previous passages of the finale had been.

The Liberty had to recover from a twelve-point deficit in the first half. Stewart (4-for-15) and Sabrina Ionescu (a shocking 1-for-19) had dismal shooting nights. The team didn’t hit a three-pointer until late in the fourth quarter and shot a combined 2-for-23 from deep.

Tonight, it was just championship courage, in all its blood-and-loose-teeth-on-the-asphalt glory, the kind that would make the ’90s Knicks blush. They went to a bully lineup and held the Lynx to 28 points in the final 25 minutes.

The Liberty are a fitting champion to cap off a year of remarkable growth for their league, a team in the rising image of the modern WNBA. They have investment from Joe and Clara Wu Tsai, who took over five years ago and began building a world-class organization.

“Look what can happen when you have an intention, and you put care and resources into it,” Wu Tsai said during the celebration.

They’ve created an electric home atmosphere at Barclays, buzzing with the elevated decibels of a passionate fan base and bouncing along to the trunk-raising style of Ellie the Elephant.

“I knew the city would be behind us no matter what,” Stewart said afterward. “And they showed up, and they showed up, and they continued to be there for us when we needed them.”

They signed a transformational free agent in Stewart, who canceled out her miss at the foul line after the Game 1 collapse with a pair of free throws to tie the game with 5 seconds left.

They cultivated a homegrown star in Ionescu, who hit the iconic game winner in Game 3.

Over the course of more than four years, they patiently completed a roster (signing Betnijah Laney-Hamilton, trading for Jonquel Jones, importing Leonie Fiebich) with no discernible holes.

Jones and Stewart, the two pillars of Liberty’s 2022-2023 season, embraced at the buzzer.

“We talked about it so much – coming together and what we envisioned and what we wanted to do in New York and what we could do,” said Jones, who was named Finals MVP. “And to make it happen and achieve your dream, and it’s so incredibly hard to do, it just means a lot.”

And it’s a testament to the organization that they still had Nyara Sabally behind them. The second-year pro, who was drafted in 2022 and given a year to get healthy, carried the game with her 13 points, seven rebounds and 17 minutes of energy off the bench.

It was a highlight.

The Liberty were here in the beginning, an original of the WNBA, having waited 28 seasons to call themselves champions.

They came from the bottom up – playing 2019 home games in the minor league Westchester County Center, going 2-20 in the 2020 “bubble” season.

They were rallied to reach the top, labeled as a super team. Without the banner it would have meant nothing. The project was validated during a champagne and party evening in Brooklyn.

“Let’s not stop at just one though,” head coach Sandy Brondello said. “Let’s go for two.”