Expansion Portland Fire hand New York 3rd straight loss with 81-74 victory

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NEW YORK (AP) — Sarah Ashlee Barker scored all seven of her points in a fourth quarter run to lift the Portland Fire to an 81-74 win over the New York Liberty on Monday night.

Trailing 65-60, midway through the fourth quarter, Portland (4-3) scored 12 straight points with Barker leading the way to go up 72-65. She hit a layup and then a 3-pointer that made it 67-65 — Portland's first lead since early in the third quarter.

New York, which was missing star guard Sabrina Ionescu, could only get within 74-71 on two free throws by Breanna Stewart with just over 29 seconds left.

Carla Leite answered with a 3-pointer with 13.7 seconds left to put the Fire up six. She finished with 18 points to lead the team. New York never could get within striking distance the rest of the way.

The loss was the third straight for New York (3-4), which was led by Stewart's 25 points.

The Liberty trailed 35-33 at the half before getting the offense going in the third quarter behind Stewart and Marine Johannes. The French guard had a spectacular play midway through the third when she dribbled away from the basket toward halfcourt and then threw a backward pass over her head to Jonquel Jones for a layup and foul that made it 47-40.

The Liberty led 57-49 after three quarters, but fell apart in the fourth.

Neither team could get into a real rhythm in the first half as Portland was up by two at the break. The Fire had a balanced offense with Leite leading the way with eight points. Johannes had 11 points for New York

Satou Sabally played the first four minutes of the game before picking up two fouls and going back to the locker room with an illness. She didn't return. Sabally, who played for the first time this season on Thursday, was a huge offseason free agent pick up by the Liberty. She had suffered a concussion in Game 3 of the WNBA Finals last season when she played with Phoenix and was still dealing with lingering effects from it in the offseason.

This was the third and final meeting between the teams this season with all three matchups coming within the first seven games.

Fire return home to face Connecticut on Wednesday.

Liberty host Phoenix for a two-game set starting Wednesday.

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