Date, Time, and Location: Thursday, August 27th, 5:00pm, Barclays Center (Brooklyn)
Broadcast Information: KPYX (San Francisco Bay Area) and KMAX (Sacramento Area) and KION (Monterey Bay Area), WWOR and Liberty Live (opposition’s home broadcast area), Amazon Prime (full national)
The Golden State Valkyries continue their road trip on Thursday when they visit the New York Liberty. The game will be the last one in the regular season against a playoff team and both clubs are in the middle of big battles for playoff seeding. Both sides will be as close to full strength as possible for this game before players start joining their national teams for the upcoming World Cup. This game is on Amazon Prime, but is not exclusive to that platform, so both teams will have local broadcasts as well.
The Valkyries
Golden State is not obligated to release an injury report until later today after playing yesterday. No players played significant minutes, but Tiffany Hayes did only play for a brief stretch in the first quarter after being so important for the team in recent games. Gabby Williams and Cecilia Zandalasini theoretically could have left the team after the Connecticut game and Janelle Salaun could have left at any time, but the importance of the game and the travel schedule made it make sense for this to be their final game before heading to Europe. Miela Sowah also received a late national team callup so she could also depart after this game given that traveling all the way back across the country for Sunday’s game seems like unnecessary miles ahead of a big event.
The Opposition
The New York Liberty sit in a tie for sixth place right now and are very much a potential opponent for the Valkyries to start the playoffs. Since losing the season series in San Francisco in late June, the team has an 11-7 record and also won the Commissioner’s Cup. Their last game was on Saturday, when they started this three-game home stand with a victory over Indiana.
The Liberty have made a couple of moves this month, waiving Betnijah Laney-Hamilton after her contract was not traded before the deadline. They subsequently gave Marine Fauthoux a regular contract to fill the vacant roster spot. To fill that developmental player spot, they recently signed Nigerian forward Elizabeth Balogun, who has been in multiple WNBA training camps, but she has yet to make her debut.
The only player on the initial injury report is Satou Sabally, who is out with lingering symptoms from past concussions having not played since before the last time they faced the Valkyries. The Liberty will be hit even harder by national team absences with seven players expected to join their national teams for the World Cup, but their next game being at home on Saturday should allow them to be at relatively full strength for that game as well with so much at stake for them in seeding.
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