Liberty fall short to bigger Dallas Wings

Stefanie Dolson owned a courtside view for Wednesday’s Liberty-Dallas game and knew exactly what the Liberty were sorely missing against the large, physical, formidable Wings — her.

“Today . . . I think my size was missed,” the injured 6-5, 235-pound reserve center said.

The Liberty tipped off their busy eight-games-in-14-days post-All-Star break schedule on Camp Day at Barclays Center.

The excited campers and the rest of the sellout crowd of 9,012 saw them fall, 98-88, snapping their four-game winning streak and dropping them to 14-5.

They saw Dallas make just two turnovers, tying the WNBA record. They also saw the Wings outscore the Liberty, 50-36, in the paint, and post a 19-3 advantage on second-chance points en route to taking their fourth straight game and improving to 12-9.

“They’re a big team,” Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said. “They really hurt us.”

All-Star guard Arike Ogunbowale also hurt the Liberty from the perimeter, nailing four threes and scoring 25 points. But Teaira McCowan, the Wings’ 6-7 center, did damage inside with 15 points and 12 rebounds, while 6-4 All-Star forward Satou Sabally also scored 15 and 6-2 forward Natasha Howard added 14.

The Liberty’s biggest available players, Jonquel Jones and Nyara Sabally, Satou’s younger sister, ran into foul trouble.

Dolson, meanwhile, sat out her eighth straight game because of a right ankle injury. The 10th-year pro still needs to be able to move laterally and isn’t expected to return until early next month.

“I think in several aspects of the game, I bring a different type of post player than we have,” Dolson said.

She also said the Liberty needed to be more aggressive defensively. “Two turnovers is pretty incredible,” said Breanna Stewart, who paced the Liberty with 25 points.

It was the Liberty by one in the third. Then Ogunbowale hit a couple of threes and scored eight in 16-2 run that gave Dallas a 75-62 lead.

Stewart countered with five, helping cut it to 78-67 after three. But the Wings scored the first five of the fourth. A layup by McCowan made it 83-67.

Courtney Vandersloot and Marine Johannes nailed threes to bookend a 10-3 run, slicing it to 86-77.

Then the Liberty stalled again. Dallas’ advantage soon swelled to 15.

So the Wings became the only team to beat the two that were favored at the start to meet in the title round, Las Vegas and the Liberty.

“When you have a team that has done that, it shows this team what they’re capable of and it gives them confidence,” Dallas coach Latricia Trammell said.

Sabrina Ionescu, fresh off her WNBA three-point contest win, made five threes, including the 200th of her career. She finished with 22 points. But 19 came in the second quarter when she helped the Liberty rally from seven back to grab a 51-49 edge at the intermission.

“I think the media saw us as a superteam because of the players that we brought in,” Brondello said before the game. “But you’re not a superteam until you win championships . . . I think we’re trending in the right direction. But we’re not a superteam quite yet.”