'Locked-in' Ionescu buries Mystics with 7 3s in Liberty's G1 win - ESPN

New York Liberty guard Sabrina Ionescu scored a playoff career-high 29 points behind a franchise postseason record seven 3s to catapult the Liberty to a 90-75 victory over the Washington Mystics in Game 1 of their best-of-three first-round playoff series.

Friday's win marked the first home playoff win for New York since 2015; after eking into the postseason last year, the Liberty transformed their roster into a super team in the offseason and are hoping to bring home the franchise's first championship next month.

Ionescu's seven 3s are tied for the third most in any WNBA playoff game and were the most in a playoff opener in league history.

No. 2 seed New York's win came five days after the No. 7 seed Mystics stunned the Liberty at Barclays Center in their regular-season finale off a Brittney Sykes buzzer-beater, after which Washington guard Natasha Cloud waved goodbye to the crowd.

«They waved us off our home court last game, and we had to show them what that feels like,» Ionescu told ESPN's Ros Gold-Onwude after the game. «They punk'ed us and we had to come out here and prove what we're made of, and we did that tonight.»

The former Oregon guard and 2020 No. 1 overall pick broke the WNBA single-season record this summer with 128 made 3s and is third in the league in 3-point percentage at 44.8%, over 10 percentage points better than she shot from the arc last year (33.3%).

At first on Friday the Liberty's superstars were quiet, and wing Betnijah Laney — who finished with 19 points — kept the Liberty in the game. Ionescu went into the locker room with 9 points on 1 for 4 shooting from deep.

«B [Laney] was coming down shooting 3s in transition, JJ [Jonquel Jones] was establishing herself inside,» Ionescu said, «and I knew