4 lessons every WNBA team can learn from the New York Liberty's title run | News, results, highlights, statistics and rumors

In order to keep up with the Liberty players or beat them at full speed, you need some strength beforehand. Additionally, a certain level of skill is required up front to be able to do multiple things on both ends of the pitch.

The Liberty are of course the top team, led by the (Finals) MVP tandem Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones. Stewart can and has been used anywhere offensively and has been used as a scorer and playmaker at all three levels.

Jones is a post demon (free) and a versatile screening partner, capable of causing problems as a screener and serving as a pop threat on ball screens. Her development as a player (career-high: 3.2 assists, 18.3 assist rate) made it a viable option to control the offense through her.

Defensively, the Stewart-Jones tandem caused a lot of headaches. Stewart was able to take on any match that was asked of her throughout the (post)season. Jones was always a nuisance at the rim, but made a decisive impact when asked to play higher up the floor.

Their ability to play off each other increased as the year progressed. Stewart was able to clear gaps near the top of the floor and do so with a degree of aggression, knowing Jones was behind her to clean up any potential mess. Jones was able to transition easily, knowing Stewart and her enormous wingspan could provide similar emergency help.

Per Second Spectrum, when Jones was defending a ball screen outside Drop coverage – switching, hedging, full-on blitzing – on opposing attacks yielded a meager 0.84 points per possession. Stewart was right up their alley when it came to meanness (0.83).

Crucially, both players logged at least 200 of those reps this season – joining a 27-player roster that also included Lynx duo Napheesa Collier (0.73) and Alanna Smith (0.76). .

You could always feel when the Stewart-Jones tandem was on the floor. This got worse when they faced teams whose frontcourt options didn't trust them as scorers. Throughout the Finals run, we saw the Liberty use the Dream's Naz Hillmon, the Aces' Kiah Stokes and the Lynx's Myisha Hines-Allen as escape points to make mistakes elsewhere.

Closing the gap on the Liberty will require either star talent up front or players trustworthy enough to complicate their relief decisions.