ATLANTA -- Angel Reese continued to bark at anyone in her vicinity -- the opponent, her teammates, even the officials -- during Wednesday night's Game 3 of the WNBA Finals. At one point, she even took a moment to celebrate with six-time All-Star Alyssa Thomas, who was sitting courtside.
Reese explained her mentality in simple terms after leading the Dream to a 97-71 win over the Golden State Valkyries that put Atlanta two wins away from its first WNBA championship
"Y'all not taking this from us, and that's in my heart," Reese said. "Like, I'm not letting you take this from us. I think [that confidence] becomes contagious within the team. They feel that confidence too."
Reese, a three-time All-Star, has fully evolved into the emotional leader of the Dream, who took a 2-1 lead in the series. In the process, she continued to set league records, as she finished with 21 points and 12 rebounds, making her the youngest player in Finals history to record three straight double-doubles and joining A'ja Wilson as the only players to record 20 points and 10 rebounds in consecutive Finals games.
A sold-out crowd of 17,099 had State Farm Arena rocking as Atlanta finally found its offense after a pair of low-scoring affairs in San Francisco.
"I knew it was coming, especially back home," Reese said of Wednesday's offensive output. "It feels good to be home on your own court and you've seen the basket that you shoot on every single day. ... Everybody contributed from top to bottom.
"And when you shoot 49%, I mean, you win games."
The Dream shot a series-high 49.3% from the field and knocked down nine 3-pointers, their most of these Finals. Rhyne Howard found her flow with 16 points, four assists and four rebounds while becoming the first player in league history to record five steals in consecutive Finals games. Naz Hillmon added 15 points, DeWanna Bonner put up 12 off the bench and Jordin Canada finished with 10 points, six rebounds and eight assists.
It was just the third time in the 2026 playoffs that a team shot better than 45% from the field against the Valkyries.
"We definitely showed that we played a little more free tonight, and we got easier looks because of it," Howard said. "We weren't stressed. We just let the game come to us, and we went out and we won.
"Our attention to detail, our spacing, making sure that we're moving, giving people the lanes to drive the ball, finding each other for open shots. We were more together on that end of the floor and ... we were just feeding off of each other."
The Valkyries continued to turn the ball over at an alarming rate, committing 17 turnovers Wednesday night that the Dream turned into 22 points. Golden State had 18 turnovers in the Game 2 loss.
Points also continued to be hard to come by for Golden State, which shot 34.8% from the floor. Gabby Williams scored a team-high 15, and Cecilia Zandalasini and Janelle Salaun tallied 13 apiece. (That was a playoff high for Salaun after her postseason minutes had been reduced.) Tiffany Hayes kept the team in the game early and finished with 14 points off the bench.
"I think this game, they wanted it more than us, and that's not who we are," Hayes said. "That's not who we've been, and that's not how we got here.
"[The turnovers are] a lot of us being undisciplined. ... Uncharacteristic of us."
Before Wednesday's contest, Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase said there was nothing she liked about Game 2 and was insistent that her team was ready to fight.
"Sometimes, promises aren't kept," she said afterward. "I think there's sometimes individual punches and some people with great spurts and some people with great energy. But it's like, well, then how can we do it all together?
"The will is there, the want to is there, but the fight together, I'm missing -- the piece of putting it together."