I have simply been staring at the clock, waiting for it to hit midnight and for it to be gameday. The WNBA Playoffs are a sleep away, and the First Round is providing us with quite possibly the deepest playoffs we have ever seen.

We will have our Playoffathon rolling yet again this year on the NCS YouTube! Postgame lives every day of the WNBA Playoffs covering every game until we crown a champion.

As an appetizer to the gourmet meal that a packed slate of games will be tomorrow, I got one question for each series that will define which teams advance.

The full first round preview in video form…

Tyler’s instant reaction to the Sparks firing Lynne Roberts…

Chelsea Leite joins Tyler to recap Toronto’s first season…

In terms of asking a question of a series this is one of the most simple ones to ask. For a decent part of this regular season, the Lynx were simply better than everyone else. While the rest of the league was in the standings trenches, the Lynx were just a tier above.

The problem for the Lynx is that they haven’t been that team as of late. The defensive struggles have persisted longer than the dominance did at this point. So now the Lynx enter the WNBA Playoffs with proof that they indeed bleed too. So the question is simple, can the Lynx get back to their early season form?

And in theory, they can be better than what they were early in the season as that was before Napheesa Collier’s return. Assuming Olivia Miles is good to go with no hesitation, this Lynx team is the rightful favorite to win it all. If they do return fully to from, they will be WNBA Champions. Even if they don’t make it all the way back, they still got a heck of a chance.

If not…the Liberty are certainly a team that have the potential to take advantage of poor form. Breanna Stewart has been awesome this year, Jonquel Jones can take advantage of her size if it is a chosen focal point by New York, and you have shooters surrounding them with microwave scoring potential. The Liberty are the #8 seed for many reasons, but when you boil it down this is still a roster full of playoff potential. The Lynx will need to be on their game.

Generally speaking, the games slow down in the playoffs and you will see an increase in half court possessions over the course of a game. Bad news for both of these teams.

Over the course of this season both of these teams have had their fair share of offensive struggles at times. The Mystics have struggled more consistently while the Dream have been known to go through in game droughts but also certainly capable of going on runs.

So when looking at who is going to win this series, a series that on paper should favor the Dream in terms of pure talent, the way the game is played is going to be massive. If the Dream are able to turn the Mystics over and get out running they will win this series. If this gets muddied up in the half court it will come down to two players for Atlanta, Rhyne Howard and Allisha Gray.

It is so incredibly clear how much better the Atlanta Dream are as a team when these two stars are scoring, and it is clear because we have witnessed them losing that production frequently this season. If Gray and Howard are able to score and do so efficiently, they will feel very confident in their ability to win. If they get bogged down due to half court struggles, these games will be tight the entire way.

If we are being honest, the Valkyries won the lottery that every top seed wanted. They got the Wings in the First Round. The idea of playing against Paige Bueckers in postseason basketball is a scary one don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t want to willingly play against one of the best players in the world. But with that said the Wings are the team with both injuries and clear issues on the defensive side of the ball.

The name of the game for the Valkyries is threes. If they are hitting their threes you simply cannot keep up with them due to how dominant their defense is. But when the opposite happens, what does the pivot look like for Golden State? We have seen them lose games or be stuck in tight ones due to major droughts on the offensive side of the ball.

And for the Wings I am also watching threes. All eyes will be on Paige Bueckers from this Valkyries defense. You simply must space the floor for her as best as you can and do so efficiently. With no Azzi Fudd, I’m looking at players such as Arike Ogunbowale to try and hit from deep at a high clip or even a player like Awak Kuier to hit enough to keep Golden State honest. Bueckers will get hers even against a defense as stupidly good as this Valkyries one is, but for Dallas to stand a chance they need some help from the perimeter.

When asking this question I am asking it under the assumption that Aliyah Boston is healthy and ready roll. If she isn’t good to go then this could be a quick series that could see A’ja Wilson dominate with a lesser version of Boston guarding her, a matchup that has given Wilson more trouble than any other.

So operating under that assumption my question is directed at the Fever in the clutch, are they ready? This is ultimately a group that hasn’t played much playoff basketball together and they are going against THE clutch team.

Largely to me, clutch time lessons are ones you have to take on the chin. The Fever had the potential to learn some of those lessons in the regular season overtime loss to the Aces that featured two insanely clutch Chelsea Gray buckets. When you come at the champs, you can’t miss. I think there are a lot of aspects to this series that favor the Fever but if it is a close game with under two minutes left will they be able to produce the clutch moments necessary and prove they learned from their regular season lumps?

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