A’ja Wilson Makes History as the Aces Sweep Seattle

A’ja Wilson scored 30 points and became the first WNBA player with two 1,000-point seasons as the Las Vegas Aces beat Seattle 98-77. Jackie Young added 23 points and eight assists, and the Aces (29-13) won a fifth straight game, holding third place with two games left.

Seattle fell to 8-35, the most losses in league history, even after Flau’jae Johnson’s career-high 29 and Dominique Malonga’s 25. The Storm still have one date left, Wednesday against Dallas.

The Only Two 1,000-Point Seasons Belong to Wilson

The record arrived on a free throw. With 3:39 left in the second quarter at Michelob ULTRA Arena, Wilson knocked down the shot that pushed her to 1,000 points for a second season, the first time anyone in the WNBA has done that. Teammates stood. The building stood. Wilson clapped twice, nodded, and ran back on defense with another free throw still to shoot.

She had been the first to 1,000 in 2024, when she scored 1,021 points in 38 games. Indiana’s Kelsey Mitchell became the second player to the mark this season and, on Friday, passed that 1,021. Mitchell sat at 1,056 points through 42 games after Sunday. Wilson still owns the scoring race by average, and she got there in fewer nights. She missed three games this year with a lower-leg injury and load management, and she carried 26.1 points a night through 38 games before this one.

Aces game notes had her at 962 points through 37 games. She scored 29 at Seattle on Thursday, so she walked into Sunday at 991. The 30 on Sunday lifted her to 1,021 in 39 games, matching her 2024 total with two nights still on the schedule. Sixteen of those 30 came at the line, where she went 16 of 18 after breaking the single-season free-throw record on Thursday. That mark had been 259 makes in 37 games, passing teammate Jewell Loyd’s 254 in 38 games for Seattle in 2023.

WILSON ON SUNDAY

• The scoring: She finished with 30 points, eight rebounds and four assists, plus three steals and a block, on 7-for-13 shooting.
• The line: Sixteen of 18 free throws accounted for more than half her points, her 12th 30-point game of the year and the 49th of her career, behind only Diana Taurasi’s 54.
• The milestone: The 1,000th point of 2026 came on a free throw with 3:39 left in the second quarter, making her the only player with two such seasons.
• The race: She is the reigning MVP and sits in the tight race for a fifth MVP, which would be her third in a row.

Coach Becky Hammon treated the free-throw pile as a scouting report, not a complaint.

(It) just means that she’s a handful. I also think her ability to now shoot the 3 has really just made her that more difficult to guard off the dribble, so now she can put the ball on the floor. And obviously, people are always throwing double and triple teams at her. But the ability to put the ball on the floor so well, and finish with either hand, it really makes her a tough guard, especially off a live catch.

Becky Hammon, Aces coach

Wilson, 30, has three titles (2022, 2023, 2025) and four MVPs. The Aces are in a fifth straight postseason. History keeps landing on nights when the opponent cannot stay in front of her.

Las Vegas Survived a Two-Point Scare After a 17-2 Burst

It looked like Thursday again, then it did not. Seattle led 8-3, then Las Vegas ripped off 17 straight and pushed the lead to 27-12. Young had 12 in the first quarter, and Mai Yamamoto and Young hit back-to-back threes in the burst. Malonga’s late three made it 29-18 after one, and the Storm scored the first seven of the second, capped by her bank shot.

Seattle got it to 45-43 with 1:10 left in the half. Las Vegas answered with the last seven points of the second. Loyd stole the ball and found Young for a layup. Young stole it right back and set up Loyd’s three. The Aces went to the locker room up 52-43, a nine-point gap that had been two minutes earlier.

THREE NIGHTS THAT CLOSED THE SERIES

1. Sept. 17: Las Vegas wins 114-77 at Climate Pledge Arena, its highest-scoring game since a 118-95 win over Atlanta on July 4, 2021.
2. Sept. 19: Seattle loses 70-57 at Golden State on the front end of a back-to-back, falling to 8-34 and tying the league’s season-loss mark.
3. Sept. 20: The Aces finish a three-game season sweep, 98-77, in front of a sellout of 10,263, and Seattle is alone at 8-35.

The Storm hung between six and 11 through the third until Cheyenne Parker-Tyus hit a three with 12.3 seconds left for a 76-64 lead. Yamamoto opened the fourth with another three. Las Vegas held Seattle to four points over the first 5:39 of the quarter and got its first 20-point lead at 88-68 when Young fed Chelsea Gray at the 4:52 mark. Ta’Niya Latson played the last three minutes and went 3-for-3 for eight points. Gray finished with 15. Yamamoto, Parker-Tyus, and Latson had eight apiece.

Las Vegas shot 50.8 percent to Seattle’s 39.4, and 45.5 percent to 29.4 percent after halftime. The Aces outscored the Storm 27-8 on the break, went 23 of 28 at the line to 14 of 19, and turned 20 Seattle turnovers into 25 points. The Sunday night scoring leaders were Wilson at 30 and Johnson at 29, a box score that flattered both and decided only one of them.

Thursday’s 35 Still Hung Over Sunday Night

Young had just come back from Team USA’s World Cup gold in Berlin, where she scored in double figures in every game and had 18 in the final against France. On Thursday in Seattle, a day after her 29th birthday, she scored a career-high 35 and tied the WNBA record for points in a quarter with 22 in the first. That quarter mark is shared with Loyd, Brittney Sykes, and Taurasi. She went 12 of 18 from the field and 8 of 9 in that first period.

Sunday was the quieter half of the same assignment. She shot 10 of 15, scored 23, and handed out a game-high eight assists, with the steal-and-fire sequence that rebuilt the halftime lead and the pocket pass that made it 88-68. Seattle never found a second defender who could live with her and Wilson at once.

YOUNG IN THE TWO SWEEP GAMES

Hammon had said before the Thursday game that Young’s big-stage habit was no surprise. Two games against the same last-place club do not prove a playoff run. They do show a wing who can score 35 one night and run the offense for eight assists the next, which is the version of these Aces that becomes hard to draw in a best-of-three.

Seattle Sets the WNBA Record for Season Losses

The Storm tied the season-loss record at 8-34 on Saturday in Golden State, matching the 2025 Dallas Wings and Chicago Sky. Sunday’s defeat made them 8-35, alone at the bottom of a 44-game schedule. They have lost 18 of 20 and four straight. The only Seattle season without double-digit wins was the 2000 inaugural year, when the club went 6-26 in a much shorter season.

Johnson and Malonga combined for 54 of Seattle’s 77 points, 70 percent of the night. Everyone else scored 21 on 7-for-29 shooting. It was the first time the rookie and the second-year All-Star each scored 20 in the same game. Johnson added six rebounds, six assists, and four steals and hit five threes. Malonga went 10 of 13 from the field with eight boards. First-year coach Sonia Raman called them a bright future and a heavy scoring load. The load was not the problem. The rest of the floor was.

WHERE SUNDAY GOT AWAY

• The absences: Seattle played a back-to-back without Zia Cooke, Ezi Magbegor, and Katie Lou Samuelson, all out with knee or lower-leg injuries, while Las Vegas had sat since Thursday.
• The break: Las Vegas scored 27 fast-break points to Seattle’s 8, the gap Malonga blamed on transition defense more than the half-court.
• The ball: Twenty turnovers became 25 Aces points, and Raman said those giveaways sat with the energy problem.
• The extras: Las Vegas went 23 of 28 at the line; Seattle went 14 of 19 and never recovered the 17-2 hole from the first quarter.

Malonga, 20, put the night in plain language. The Storm knew the second game of a back-to-back would be thin. She thought the half-court defense held and the leak in transition did not. Johnson, 22, looked past the record and toward the pairing. Raman has one home game left to see if that pairing can close a brutal year with a win.

The Block Johnson Plans to Frame

The play that moved after the game was not the 1,000th point. In the second quarter Johnson rose and blocked Wilson at the rim, then stood over the four-time MVP on the floor and let out an expletive before the apology started. She told it afterward as a fan would, not as a trash-talker.

I (saw) who I blocked, and I was like, I’m so sorry. I would never disrespect the GOAT like that. I love A’ja Wilson. I would never disrespect her, but I was in the moment and I was like, Oh my God. I blocked A’ja Wilson. I’m putting that on the wall or something like that. I’m framing that. That was that was like a moment in my career that I’ll never forget.

Flau’jae Johnson, Storm guard, after the loss

That is the split this series keeps drawing. Seattle can produce a possession worth keeping. Las Vegas can produce a season. Johnson went further when she stacked ages against each other, Wilson at 30 and Young at 29, herself at 22 and Malonga at 20.

I think we’re going to evolve into something great. You’re talking about two of the best players in the world. Just seeing A’ja go to work out there is just like ‘Wow.’ She’s not real. But I do feel like Dom is that caliber player. I’m going to push her. She’s going to push me, and this is the way she’s capable of playing. I’m no Jackie Young right now, but in a few years I feel like I could be one of the best players in the league alongside Dom.

Flau’jae Johnson, Storm guard

Jordan Horston picked up a technical in the third while yelling for a foul, and Gray made the free throw. Seattle got as close as 69-63, then the Aces closed the quarter on a 7-1 run and the fourth 22-13. Johnson still wants to “end it on a high note” against Dallas. The clip of the block will outlive the box score. The loss record will too.

The No. 3 Seed Is a Single Game Thick

The win kept Las Vegas a game ahead of Atlanta (28-14) for third. The top four seeds get home court in a best-of-three first round. Minnesota sits at 32-10 and Golden State at 31-11. Catching the Valkyries would take two Aces wins and two Golden State losses. The job in front of Becky Hammon is holding serve.

WNBA TOP EIGHT AFTER SUNDAY

Liberty, Mystics, and Wings are bunched at 26-16, so the 3-6 first-round draw is not ink. The Aces already clinched a berth in August and own the longest active playoff streak, eight straight years. Their last two games are Sparks on Tuesday and Mercury on Thursday, both against clubs that are already out. Seattle hosts Dallas on Wednesday and then the 44-game grind is over.

Playoffs open Sept. 27. Wilson will take a second 1,000-point season into that bracket, and Young will take a 35 and a 23 against the same opponent. Johnson will take a block she intends to frame and a franchise that just set a record no one wanted. The 98-77 score is the smallest number from Sunday. The 1,000 and the 35 are the ones that stay.