PHOENIX — Don’t call it a revenge game.
Natasha Cloud cranked those out against her former Phoenix team in the regular season. This career performance, to put the New York Liberty out on the winning foot in the playoffs, was a result of comfort. Of being where she’s supposed to be, chasing a second championship in a place of her choosing.
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“But, obviously, for me, this means a little bit more, too,” Cloud said minutes after bounding into the interview room, greeting each person and eventually hugging old friends in the hallway on the way out.
Cloud — not any of either team’s big three — proved the most productive player in Game 1 of the first-round series between the No. 4 Phoenix Mercury and the No. 5 New York Liberty. New York won, 76-69, and can seal the series with a win at home in Brooklyn on Wednesday (7 p.m. ET, ESPN).
The veteran point guard scored 23 points on her former team, shooting 75% with 6 rebounds, 5 assists and 4 steals. It tied the highest scoring outing of her first season in New York seafoam, and continued a streak of showing up in the brightest moments to propel her team in the right direction.
“Sometimes I feel like I should just be humble, but I know who I am,” Cloud said. “I know who I am in these moments. When these bright lights come on, I’m a f****** dog. When I say that, I mean that s***. Understanding that for our team, I have to set the tone, the standard for the game.”
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Among the litany of storylines this series carries, the headline for Cloud is a return to the franchise that she said told her she’d be able to retire there. But in February, the 10-year veteran was stunned to learn through social media that after one season with the team, she was part of the four-team trade that landed the Mercury MVP contender Alyssa Thomas. A month later, she landed in New York via a trade she requested.
She was hurt that the trade out of Phoenix was all business, with no consideration for the relationship and people involved. She didn’t speak to Mercury head coach Nate Tibbetts afterward, even through the team’s first meeting in New York in June.
Natasha Cloud showed her former team what they were missing with her performance in Game 1. (Photo by Aryanna Frank/Getty Images)
(Aryanna Frank via Getty Images)
A week later, the Liberty made their first trip to Phoenix, and Tibbetts’ wife, Lyndsey, reached out. A naturally bubbly, fun and kind personality, Cloud became friends with the Tibbetts family, including their two daughters.
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“Y’all are gonna talk because he misses you, and I know you love him,” Cloud said Lyndsey told her.
They hashed it out in private, and Cloud felt they “bridged the gap” between them.
“It was the closing to that chapter, and I was able to move on, because there was a lot of love here still for Nate, for what I came into last season,” Cloud said. “But once that chapter was over, it’s been Liberty basketball.”
New York didn’t play its best game and still escaped with a much-needed win led by Cloud, a 2019 champion with the Washington Mystics who falls deep down the loaded depth chart. That’s exactly the type of player who’s most needed in big postseason moments, and the three-time All-Defensive player delivered.
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“She knows what she needs to do to come out to help us win,” Liberty head coach Sandy Brondello said. “She was massive tonight at both ends of the ball. She had to guard [Kahleah] Copper down the other end, but she made some really timely shots, and she controlled the game.”
Copper, the only returner from last season’s Mercury roster, scored 15 on 13 attempts and was scoreless from the perimeter.
Closing out her 10th year, Cloud said she wants to take every advantage, both in games and in the bigger picture. She’s stayed on her teammates, emphasizing that the adversity they faced this season will prove beneficial in the end. She came in clutch with the opening bucket of an overtime period that could have been mired in sludge, and the Liberty will look to her for more of it when the series continues, potentially without All-Star Breanna Stewart.
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None of what Cloud did on Sunday was revenge. It was a product of growth.
“Coming into here, it’s always sweet when this is just where you came from,” Cloud said. “But what is sweeter is I’m exactly where my feet are supposed to be.”
Even if it wasn’t where she thought they would stand.
