{"id":39337,"date":"2025-07-04T23:49:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-04T23:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/39337\/"},"modified":"2025-07-04T23:49:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-04T23:49:11","slug":"liberty-missing-injured-jonquel-jones-presence-on-defense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/39337\/","title":{"rendered":"Liberty missing injured Jonquel Jones’ presence on defense"},"content":{"rendered":"

The importance of Jonquel Jones has never been more evident than over the two-plus weeks when she\u2019s been sidelined by an ankle sprain.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jones is the glue of the Liberty on both ends of the floor. Without her, their play looks out of sorts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Offensively, the Liberty have managed to make do without Jones, for the most part. They\u2019re getting plenty of good looks and still lead the league in points per game, though possessions, at times, can lag.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Defensively, though, is where the Liberty missed Jones most.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She is, in a lot of ways, the air traffic controller of the paint and the team\u2019s best rim protector.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Liberty\u2019s defensive rating when Jones is on the court is 83.7, but when she\u2019s on the sidelines, it balloons to 102.6, per WNBA advanced stats.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"AliyahThe Liberty have struggled without Jonquel Jones (No. 35) on defense. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Jones said this week she was upset that her ankle injury derailed her All-Star campaign. But there\u2019s no doubt in Sandy Brondello\u2019s mind that Jones, when healthy, has been one of the league\u2019s best players.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLook JJ, I think you see when you look at someone, [do] they also have an impact on their team? And you see that she has a very big impact on our team,\u201d Brondello said. \u201cShe was playing great. She\u2019s just this comfort blanket. For me, she\u2019s an All-Star.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s still unclear when Jones might be cleared to play. The Liberty said June 21 that she\u2019d be out for 4-6 weeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Breanna Stewart wasn\u2019t happy with the way she started the season, especially when it came to her rebounding efforts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stewart had three or fewer rebounds in four of the team\u2019s first eight games. To put it bluntly, Stewart said her rebounding \u201cwasn\u2019t up to my standard.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But as of late, especially with the Liberty missing Jones, Stewart has been far more aggressive in that area.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"JonquelJonquel Jones (No. 35) blocks a shot during the Liberty-Mystics game on May 30, 2025. NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Stewart notched her third double-double this season Thursday, recording 17 points and a season-high 14 rebounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Over the last five games, Stewart is averaging 9.4 boards per game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCovering the Liberty like never before\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Madeline Kenney’s Inside the Liberty, a weekly Sports+ newsletter.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to clean up everything for my teammates and really getting back to that standard of just being aggressive on the boards, even on the offensive end,\u201d Stewart said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard. It\u2019s hard when you have to box out the other teams on defense and I want them to feel that same pressure.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Might Unrivaled co-founders and UConn alumni Stewart and Napheesa Collier team up at All-Star weekend later this month?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stewart didn\u2019t rule out the possibility that a backroom, handshake deal has already been made with Collier.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI know things that you don\u2019t,\u201d she quipped. \u201cSo that\u2019s all I got to say.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The importance of Jonquel Jones has never been more evident than over the two-plus weeks when she\u2019s been…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":39338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[2338,1520,62,67,132,68,232],"class_list":{"0":"post-39337","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-jonquel-jones","9":"tag-new-york-liberty","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us","14":"tag-wnba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114797645934385775","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}