Right after the last game of the regular season concluded on Thursday, the WNBA revealed the schedule for the first round of the playoffs once their television partners at ESPN had their input for broadcasting reasons. The first game in Minnesota was always going to be on Sunday, but the time still had to be determined. The day of the second game had to be chosen between Tuesday and Wednesday and the Valkyries will get to host on Wednesday in San Jose with a tweak to the time as well. That means that any deciding game would be played on Friday. Tickets for the home game that were not distributed to season ticket holders earlier went on sale today with only limited single seats still unsold.
Game 1
There were four possible timeslots for the game on Sunday, but only two of them were realistic with the game in Minneapolis and the locations for the other three games. As expected, the game between Seattle and Las Vegas with be at 7pm as the only matchup where both teams are from the Pacific timezone. Phoenix was given the 2pm local start for their game against New York. ABC is only airing one game with the rest on ESPN, so it made sense that Indiana-Atlanta would be the choice at 12pm with the projected best ratings matchup. That left the Valkyries with the 10am game, which is quite an early local start of noon.
Game 2
Two series were set to continue on Tuesday and the other two series would then resume on Wednesday. The teams in the lower half of the playoff seeds were perfect for ESPN, which will air all of the games, as there are two Pacific Time teams and two Eastern Time teams, leaving no need for creative timeslots. The Valkyries were chosen for Wednesday’s game, leaving Seattle hosting on Tuesday. The original draft schedule had the game starting half an hour earlier, but the game will start at 7pm now, although that is likely to be a slightly later tipoff than for regular season games at that time due to the broadcast after the game in New York.
Game 3
If the series needs a third game, it will be played on Friday back in Minneapolis and be broadcast on ESPN2. When the game would start would depend on whether there is also a deciding game in the series between Phoenix and New York. Since that game would be in Phoenix, it would be the latter of the two games. If there is only one game, the tipoff would not need to be as early.
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