Valkyries win the WNBA title in their second season as Gabby Williams scores 28 after halftime in Game 7

The Golden State Valkyries won the WNBA championship in only their second season on Saturday night, Oct. 31, beating the Atlanta Dream 68-63 in Game 7 of the Finals at Chase Center in San Francisco, according to the Associated Press, whose recap WNBA.com carries, and the Atlanta Dream’s own game report. The AP calls the contest “a sensational first WNBA Finals Game 7,” and Ballislife reports that Golden State took the series 4-3 in front of a sellout crowd of 18,064. Forward Gabby Williams scored 30 points and won the Finals MVP award, the AP reports. When the final buzzer sounded, “the violet-clad sellout crowd at Chase Center went into a frenzy” as players sprinted onto the floor and confetti fell, the AP writes.

Williams did almost all of her damage after the break. She went into halftime with 2 points on 1-of-4 shooting, according to Ballislife, then scored 28 in the final 20 minutes, making 9 of 19 shots and 4 of 6 from 3-point range. The Dream’s report calls that total “a league record for points in a half in the Finals,” and Ballislife describes it the same way. The league’s @WNBA account and Sports Illustrated go further and call it a postseason record. Ballislife lists her full line as 30 points, three rebounds, two assists, two steals and four blocks. “Gabby is our closer she stayed patient, she stayed with it,” coach Natalie Nakase said, according to the AP. “Closing with 30!”

Atlanta controlled the first half. The Dream went scoreless for the first 5 minutes 19 seconds and trailed 14-13 after one quarter, but Jordin Canada scored 11 points in the second as Atlanta took a 30-24 lead into the break, according to the Dream’s report. The AP notes that the team leading at halftime had won each of the first six games in the series. Atlanta stretched its edge to 37-28 on a DeWanna Bonner layup with 5:59 left in the third quarter, Ballislife reports. From there Williams hit three 3-pointers in about a minute and then an 11-foot turnaround with 1:05 left that put Golden State ahead 45-44, its first lead since the opening minute of the second quarter, according to Ballislife. The AP credits her with her team’s final 11 points of the quarter.

The fourth quarter swung back and forth. Allisha Gray tied the game at 53 with 5:14 left, and at 4:09 Golden State won a coach’s challenge that turned a foul on Williams into a Williams block on a Canada drive, according to Ballislife and Sports Illustrated. Rhyne Howard’s layup tied it at 57 with 2:41 left, the AP reports, and Williams answered with a 3-pointer from 31 feet. Ballislife times that shot at 2:18 and the Dream at 2:19. Williams then made two free throws at 1:40, and Kiah Stokes followed two Williams misses with a putback that made it 64-57 with 53.8 seconds left, according to Ballislife and the Dream.

Atlanta did not go quietly. Gray hit a 3-pointer and then two free throws that cut the deficit to 66-63 with about 10 seconds left, according to the Dream’s report and Ballislife; the AP puts those free throws at 11 seconds. Gray and Williams then tied up for a jump ball. Veronica Burton came away with it and made two free throws with 5.1 seconds to go, the AP and Ballislife report, and Howard missed a 29-foot 3-pointer in the final seconds. “I’m just so blessed, this is insane!” said Burton, who, according to the AP, Dallas cut two years ago. Golden State made all 10 of its free throws in the fourth quarter, Ballislife reports.

Golden State won with defense more than shooting. The Valkyries shot 24 of 64 from the field and 5 of 20 from 3-point range, while Atlanta shot 23 of 69 and 6 of 30, according to Ballislife; the Dream put its own figures at 33.3% and 24 missed 3-pointers. Howard scored 6 points on 3-of-14 shooting and missed all seven of her 3-point tries, Ballislife reports. Atlanta still won the battle on the glass for second-chance points, 18 to 9. Stokes, now a four-time WNBA champion, grabbed 13 rebounds and blocked two shots, the AP reports, and Burton added 10 points, 10 rebounds and five assists in a game-high 38 minutes 45 seconds, according to Ballislife.

The Valkyries credit the result to depth and patience. Nakase told Williams at halftime that the game would come to her, according to the AP. “She told me to stay patient, I trust her with my life,” Williams said. “All it took was good people,” she told reporters, as quoted by the AP. “All we heard last year was we don’t have no stars. We don’t have no talent. Yeah right!” Sports Illustrated notes that Golden State had no player on this year’s All-WNBA team. After the Valkyries fell behind 2-1 in the series, Nakase moved Kaila Charles and Tiffany Hayes into the starting lineup, the AP reports. Hayes, 37, who came out of retirement two years ago after 10 seasons with Atlanta, scored 11 points in Game 7.

The night carried extra meaning for Williams, a French forward whose favorite holiday falls on Oct. 31, according to Sports Illustrated, which reports her nickname as Spooky G. “I wasn’t going to lose on Halloween,” she joked after the game, SI reports. Williams signed with Golden State before this season after playing for the Seattle Storm, and she played youth basketball in the Bay Area, according to the AP. Fans chanted “Gabby! Gabby!” through the fourth quarter, the AP writes. A clip posted by @WNBA shows her smiling with both the championship trophy and the MVP trophy after the game.

Atlanta’s side of the story centers on its offense. “Unfortunately, today we had more miscommunications and kind of breakdowns, especially that second half, than what we’ve had all series,” Dream coach Karl Smesko said, according to Ballislife, adding: “give Gabby all the credit.” Canada said the Dream “were losing the 50/50 battles and not boxing out,” the same report shows. Reese, the league’s Defensive Player of the Year according to the Dream, said “delayed, not denied,” and added that “it is tough in the moment but we’ll be back,” Ballislife reports. The Dream lost in the Finals for the fourth time in franchise history and had hoped to give Atlanta its fourth major championship, after the Braves in 1995 and 2021 and Atlanta United in 2018, according to the team’s report.

The title also completes a bet by the owners. Joe Lacob said on Oct. 5, 2023, the day his group won the expansion franchise, that the team would win a championship within five years, according to Ballislife, citing the AP. The AP adds that the Valkyries in 2025 became the first expansion organization to reach the playoffs in their inaugural year, and that fans have sold out Chase Center for every game since the first. “We gotta build a bigger trophy case,” co-owner Peter Guber said, the AP reports. Nakase, hired as the first coach in October 2024 after winning titles as an assistant with the Las Vegas Aces, thanked Lacob after the game: “He believed in myself and he set the standard,” she said, according to Ballislife.