Date, Time, and Location: Tuesday, September 22nd, 7:00pm, Moda Center (Portland)
Broadcast Information: KPIX (San Francisco Bay Area) and KOVR (Sacramento Area), KPDX/Rose City Sportsnet/live.theportlandfire.com (opposition’s home broadcast area), WNBA League Pass (streaming outside of teams’ broadcast areas)
The Golden State Valkyries play two games on the road to close out the regular season, starting on Tuesday with a visit to the Portland Fire. The teams just met in San Francisco with the Valkyries looking to complete the season sweep in their fight for playoff seeding while the hosts will have their inaugural season end after this game as the one team with the bye for the last two days of games. There will be no national broadcast for this game so there will be the two local broadcasts and then WNBA League Pass for those outside of those markets.
The Valkyries
The initial injury report was of interest again for this game and it is good news on the Valkyries front with no players listed. The return of the rest of the roster will allow the team to both push for the win and get ready for the playoffs with time for the regular rotation to play together again. A victory in this game will mean that the Valkyries could not drop any further in the standings as the only other game that could affect that will be in progress at the same time. It is also possible that the team will no longer be able to move up in seeding depending on the result of a game that will nearly be concluded before this tipoff.
The Opposition
After the game in San Francisco on Friday, Portland headed to Los Angeles for a game on Sunday, losing to the Sparks. Teja Oblak continues to be out while Bridget Carleton is listed as questionable having missed recent games. Jordan Harrison did play in their last game despite exiting the game against the Valkyries early, but is listed as probable on the injury report. Holly Winterburn missed their last game and is currently listed as questionable. While the Fire will certainly be looking for the win, especially in the finale in front of their home fans, it is less clear how they might manage injuries and whether they would rest anyone who is borderline in terms of availability. While it seems unlikely that this game would affect their first round pick odds, they are in a place in the standings where the placement of their other two picks is still up in the air.
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