A theme that has emerged across the WNBA in 2026 is a focus on much more high-octane offenses. Due to changes in officiating and an emphasis on freedom of movement, a top five offense in the WNBA this season reaches an efficiency rating of over 110. The New York Liberty currently check that box, but it’s not exactly clear yet how proficient a defense needs to be to translate into winning when it matters the most.
The Liberty currently have the seventh best defense in the league, rated at 107.3, the lowest defensive efficiency the team has had since Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones arrived in New York in 2023. During the seasons when the Liberty made it to the WNBA finals in both 2023 and 2024, their defensive ratings were within the league’s top four.
The players are well aware of this deficit — veteran guard Rebekah Gardner pointed toward defense being a major focus during the FIBA World Cup break when half of the Liberty’s roster was across the pond competing in Berlin.
“I feel like one of the main things we worked on is communication, and when things aren’t going our way how we respond to it,” she told The IX Sports. “So like once we hit some adversity, how do we respond? And I feel like that’s been something that we could have done better throughout the season and will be important as we move forward.”
When Liberty head coach Chris DeMarco was asked about that focus on defense during the Liberty’s eight practices during the World Cup break, he was less forthcoming about the team’s current defensive weaknesses.
“Any team on this break has a responsibility to look at their strengths and weaknesses, and we love our ability to protect the paint right now,” DeMarco said at team practice on Sept. 16. “We’re number one in the league in not fouling and defensive rebounding. We’re doing a lot of great things, and then we just want to get better in some other areas. So that’s sort of been the focus — whether it’s film work around the court, our development, our group work — and it’ll continue to be.
“And I think we had a good balance of both offense and defense … I think the other piece is understanding we have an advantage offensively versus when we don’t. Slow it down. Make sure we’re minimizing turnovers and creating high value shots.”
Defensively, the Liberty’s opponent effective field goal percentage is ranked ninth (51.1%), their opponent 3-point percentage is ranked twelfth (35.2%), their opponent live ball turnover percentage is ranked 13th (51.2%), and the team forces 11.8 turnovers, the least amount of turnovers per game in the league.
The team’s marks are better when it comes to average opponent points in the paint — ranked fifth, giving up 38.1 per game — and defensive rebounding percentage — currently ranked second in the league (72.8%). All of that variance, however, still has the Liberty’s overall defensive efficiency ranked seventh.
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One factor contributing to the Liberty’s cumulative defensive statistics this season is the fact that one of the team’s defensive anchors Leonie Fiebich was unavailable due to injury for over six weeks. When Fiebich made her return for the Liberty’s final games before the World Cup break, her individual presence wasn’t enough. The Liberty suffered a 79-60 blowout loss to the Valkyries days before the break.
“I think personally the way that we played the Valkyries game, we’ll never have a game like that again — where we just kind of settle and [take] the shots that they want us to, and not finding any other ways to attack,” guard Sabrina Ionescu said a few days following the Valkyries loss. “And that’s nothing that we talked about. I’d say that’s like a personal statement. … We had open looks, but you don’t want to rely on that every single night.”
When shots don’t fall the counter is to try to create easier offense, and often times that’s as a result of better defense. Against Golden State the Liberty didn’t operate with that approach and it showed in the result.
“I think really the biggest theme is just like mental fortitude,” Liberty defensive coordinator Addi Walters explained to The IX Sports. “Don’t let one side of the ball affect the other, and regardless of what happens, we are going to make mistakes, we are going to miss shots, but that shouldn’t affect our mental approach every single possession.
“We have to go into every possession with a clear mind, knowing what our fallback is and what our identity is. And right now, I think we always have like three to four players kind of on the same page, but it takes all five to really have full possessions on both sides of the ball, but especially defensively.”
During the FIBA World Cup, Team USA head coach Kara Lawson was specifically asked about how she achieves accord defensively in such a small window of time. She pointed toward balance being part of her recipe.
“How you find that balance is really knowing your team,” she said. “How much complexity can we handle, while still maintaining our intensity, our competitiveness, our instincts. If complexity is too much sometimes it gets in the way of instincts.”
In the weeks without WNBA games, the Liberty staff had the opportunity to work with the players on how to rectify some of these mental focus issues. Gardner explained that a recurring issue has been letting mistakes snowball, and that it’s been Jones’ veteran leadership that has helped change course.
Jones noted that she’s been a bit more intentional about using her experience in this league as an advantage. “I kind of see myself as like — I don’t know how many coaches we have, but whatever the next number is — the sixth coach? I kind of see myself as the sixth coach, helping them out with some of the stuff.”
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Having more of Jones’ voice has been particularly helpful according to Rebecca Allen. As the team’s center, Jones is what Allen referred to as “the last line of defense” who is not only involved in on-ball actions, but also relied upon as a helper. “I think her being very vocal is needed, and it’s been really good to see even just improvements from her specifically, but also from all of us.”
Besides the mental and communication-focused efforts defensively, Allen explained to The IX Sports that ample focus was paid to how the Liberty are approaching closeouts — with more attention to detail when it comes to contesting shots and limiting flybys.
“It’s being able to play two sides of the defense rather than just getting a hand up [on] the shot or if they drive as well,” she said. “So there’s a huge focus on that because it just lowers the numbers and the percentages.”
Playing better defense will remain a tall challenge for the Liberty especially when two of their best defenders in Fiebich and Stewart weren’t with the team over the past couple of weeks. It’s a drawback that the Liberty have as one of the most internationally-populated rosters in the WNBA.
“I think we need to understand that we can’t use these next four games as an opportunity for excuses,” Ionescu said. “Obviously we had the most players gone. It’s not easy when most of your team is gone competing. They’re tired, they’re fatigued, they’ve been traveling. Every team is dealing with it…we have to keep building and chipping away to be the team that we want to be come playoff time.”
The team the the Liberty want to be come playoff time is more resilient defensively. Stewart agrees with Ionescu that there’s no room for excuses, but she also offered some lessons learned while in Berlin with Team USA.
“I think that sometimes with USA basketball or with national teams you’re constantly just like going, right?” she said. “You have to give like 1,000% and that’s the same here. It’s like don’t save it because we have a deep enough team. We have people that can come in and do things just as well. So making sure that defensive rotation, that fourth, fifth side doesn’t get forgotten.”
