With A WNBA Finals Game Winner In Hand, A'ja Wilson's Ascent Is Now Complete

There's no question about it now. One win away from a third WNBA title in four years and on the heels of a Game Three game winning jumper, A'ja Wilson is officially the undisputed best in the world.

A’ja Wilson’s shot was catharsis.

A purification that brings about spiritual renewal or a release from tension

Loaded into that mid-range jumper was the last five years of the Aces superstar’s story. The rise, the release, the uncertainty of the bounces around the rim before a drop into the basket, as if it was that was exactly the way it was all supposed to go. That it happened against the Phoenix Mercury was a particularly nice piece of symmetry, given so much of Wilson’s modern GOAT journey started four years ago to the day: October 8th, 2021. But this time, instead of having to face her home crowd in defeat, the four-time MVP silenced a raucous road environment.

It may come as a surprise to some (and may sound blasphemous to others), but there was a period of time in the WNBA where Wilson’s road to being the best player in the league was shrouded in uncertainty. Pretty much everyone we have in the greatest of all time conversation was still playing in the league when the former South Carolina Gamecock began her career. Diana Taurasi, Maya Moore, Candace Parker, Breanna Stewart, a healthy Elena Delle Donne, the list goes on. While Wilson was a much heralded star entering the W and carrying the hopes and dreams of an entire state on her back, success didn’t necessarily come immediately.

The Aces, coached at the time by Bill Laimbeer (yup, that one) and playing their inaugural season in Las Vegas, missed out on the playoffs in 2018 and were locked into the No. 1 overall pick in the WNBA Draft the following season. Jackie Young joined the team and, just before the 2019 season, Vegas traded for Australian center Liz Cambage. It felt like the team had what it needed to really start to contend and stake its claim as an up-and-coming franchise. Behind Wilson and Cambage, the Aces made it to the WNBA Semifinals before falling to Elena Delle Donne’s Washington Mystics in four games.

No matter, right?

Wilson is still 23 years old and just in her second year in the league. If this is what the return is going to be in the long term, Vegas should be fine.

If you were to ask those around the organization, 2020 is when A’ja really made her star turn. Entrenched in the IMG Academy Gymnasiums, known then as the ‘Wubble’, Wilson devoted herself to becoming a different type of basketball player. In a COVID-shortened season, she won her first MVP at 24 years old and officially entered the upper echelon of stars in the league. She wasn’t just chasing the likes of Candace Parker, Brittney Griner and E.D.D, they were her peers.

But there was one particular superstar that loomed like a shadow over Wilson’s full ascendance.

Breanna Stewart rightly earned the title of “presumptive GOAT”, given her collegiate resume of four straight national titles, four NCAA Tournament MOP’s and three Naismith Player of the Year honors. During Wilson’s rookie year, a 24- year-old Stewie won her first WNBA MVP and helped bring the Seattle Storm a championship. The Storm superstar was ascending, but the positioning of Stewart as the league’s undisputed best up-and-coming player helped give rise to the perception that the W’s television partners, particularly ESPN, had an easier time making a UConn alum a star than someone from a non-traditional power like South Carolina.

Once Wilson took that MVP honor in 2020, the two teams met up in the WNBA Finals, with A’ja getting a real chance to try and stand toe-to-toe with Stewart. The Storm swept Vegas in three games, with Stewart being named the Finals MVP. While, at this point, Wilson was still just 24 years old, the concept of becoming the best player in the sport felt like it was slipping away. Stewart was already building up a convincing professional resume to go along with a historically impeccable collegiate one. The chase was on, and the Aces had to start maximizing their window immediately.

Which is how we end up traveling back in time from Wilson’s present-day buzzer beater, four years to the day, to October 8th, 2021.

It’s Game 5 of the WNBA Semifinals. Michelob Ultra Arena. The Phoenix Mercury, led by Diana Taurasi and Brittney Griner are leading the Aces 86-84 with 4.8 seconds to play.

Bill Laimbeer draws up a play and who else is the ball going to but A’ja Wilson? She posts up on Griner, gets the inbound from Chelsea Gray, goes to the hoop…

And is met by BG almost immediately.

Phoenix ball. 0.7 seconds left to play.

Series over.

This was the moment where wonder set in for the first time among many WNBA fans. If not now, then when for the Las Vegas Aces and A’ja Wilson? Losing to Phoenix constituted an upset as Vegas was 24-8 and the No. 2 seed in the playoffs that year. The morning of the game, ESPN re-published a story from Katie Barnes entitled ‘WNBA Playoffs give Las Vegas Aces’ A’ja Wilson chance to cement her status as an icon.’

Wilson collapsed on the floor. Her teammates circled around her as they put a towel over her head and helped her walk back to the locker room. In her postgame press conference, she was unable to hold her head up without crying. Bill Laimbeer said in the postgame press conference that the game was “a good learning experience of how hard it is and how mentally strong you have to be.”

By the next season, Laimbeer was gone and Becky Hammon arrived.

Wilson channeled all of the anguish of that final possession into a revenge tour so powerful it lasted two straight seasons. The ascent to GOAT status began and, since that fateful night in Vegas four years ago, the Aces superstar has never looked back.

It’s why this shot, albeit in a different city but against the same team, carries so much weight now. Laimbeer threw his team under the bus in 2021, implying that their mental toughness wasn’t where it needed to be. Four years later, Wilson has proven to be one of the most battle-tested competitors in the WNBA. And, perhaps more importantly, she’s done without having to compromise her own emotionality in the process.

The weight of four years was in Wilson’s game-winner on Wednesday night. A quest that began the minute she entered the WNBA, meandered through success and failure, hit a proverbial rock bottom and emerged stronger on the other side. While much of the discussion as of late has been about Wilson’s greatness and the perceived lack of respect around it, the well-intentioned desire to insulate her from any critique has hindered the ability to see the Aces superstar for what she truly is: a hero with a journey.

There was a time when her ability to hit that game winner was an open question, as was her status as the best player in the WNBA. Would she ever get by Breanna Stewart? When would her time come to raise a trophy of her own? These are important questions and ones that we love to ask of the greats. Who are *you*? How did you get here and what did you have to overcome to arrive?

Find me a GOAT and I’ll find you a nemesis. Michael Jordan had Isiah Thomas and the Pistons. Wayne Gretzky had Mike Bossy and the New York Islanders. Novak Djokovic had Roger Federer *and* Rafael Nadal.

There is someone, or something, to overcome. Even if your ascent is more meteoric, like Stewie, Patrick Mahomes or Tom Brady, there is bound to be an inevitable descent.

What makes Wilson’s journey to greatness so rich is that the payoff is earned. While a highly touted prospect and first overall pick, she had to earn what she now enjoys. There was the disappointment of missing the playoffs as a rookie, the 3/12 performance in the 2019 semis against the future champion Washington Mystics. In 2020, there was the three routs at the hands of the woman that would lay early claim to the “best player of the era” title. And then, in 2021, there was the block.

But from the ashes came the player that we see today. While some fans of the game have only ever known A’ja Wilson, the generational superstar, there is another A’ja Wilson people should meet: the steadfast competitor who now has earned the right to stand on the mountaintop and in the pantheon of all-time greats. With just one more win, it will all but be solidified.

And as time ticked away in PHX Arena and Wilson came back down to her feet, that final release of tension came out like an implosion, the gravitational force of four years of climbing taking the energy of 17,000 Mercury fans and collapsing it into itself.

All that was left was Wilson, tongue out and standing tall.

The best player in the world at last.