Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon is about as blunt as they come at times. And she lived up to this during one part of her postgame press conference after the Aces beat the Indiana Fever in a winner-take-all Game 3 of their first-round playoff series on Thursday.
Hammon was asked whether she saw any “parallels” between the Fever’s current team and the Aces squad when she took over back before the 2022 season, given the number of high draft picks both teams had in those situations.
“No,” Hammon responded, and left it at that.
A’ja Wilson sat next to her and started laughing.
The reporter clarified by saying that she meant whether Hammon sees similar potential between the Fever right now and the Aces back then.
“You didn’t ask me about potential,” Hammon said.
She began comparing the rosters, saying that Caitlin Clark and Aliyah Boston were the Fever’s only two consecutive first-overall picks. The Aces had three consecutive No. 1 overall picks in the WNBA Draft from 2017 to 2019 (Kelsey Plum in 2017, A’ja Wilson in 2018, and Jackie Young in 2019).
The reporter mentioned Kelsey Mitchell (who was the No. 2 pick in the 2018 WNBA Draft) before A’ja interjected and said, “She was number two, baby. I was number one.”
“Listen: Let’s just move on. Let’s move on,” Hammon then said.
“I think that team has great potential, though, to answer your question. But it’s different,” she finally added.
While Hammon’s response was definitely interesting, this was not her way of throwing shade at the Fever’s franchise.
It seemed like the reporter was trying to give Hammon a chance to praise the Fever and say that the team still has bright days ahead after what amounted to a disappointing playoff exit.
Perhaps Hammon didn’t catch this, or did catch it and didn’t feel like praising the Fever at that point. Regardless, she has said plenty of good things about Indiana’s roster in the past, and her sentiment certainly hasn’t changed just because her team got the best of Indiana this time around.
The bottom line is that the Aces’ three first-overall picks already had several seasons playing together when Hammon took over that year. This was just the Fever’s third year together with their big three, which shows they deserve more time before being compared to the Aces’ dynasty.
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