Veronica Burton’s historic night vs. Liberty earns ‘relentless’ Natalie Nakase declaration

Pain is never going to stop Veronica Burton. Knock her down, and Burton will get back up. Slap her arms and trip her up, and Burton will get back up. Send her crashing to the hardwood, and Burton will muster every fiber in her muscles, every atom in her body, and Burton will get back up.

And the New York Liberty got firsthand experience of it as the floor general point guard steamrolled her way through their physicality, leading her Golden State Valkyries to a 79-60 win in Barclays Center. Burton tallied a game-high 13 assists with zero turnovers, becoming the second player in WNBA history, alongside Courtney Vandersloot, to have multiple 13+ assist games and zero turnovers in their career.

“She is resilient. Veronica Burton is relentless,” Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase said, in a tone that seemed to suggest that Burton’s toughness was a primordial fact governing the laws of the universe.

And how could she think differently watching what her point guard weathered?

In the first quarter, Burton took a hard spill onto her left arm after a collision at half court, sending her to the locker room for a brief moment. Then later in the fourth, as Golden State searched for a knockout punch, Burton was sent sprawling to the floor, grabbing her leg, after she and Liberty center Jonquel Jones crashed into each other and collided knees. Not to mention all the times she found herself on the ground every time she attacked the basket.

Yet somehow, some way, Burton maestro’d her way into WNBA history, punctuated by her 13th assist in which she sent Breanna Stewart flying into Jones as she wrapped her pass around the wreckage to find Kiah Stokes for a wide-open layup, right in front of a delighted Valkyries bench. One final crescendo in her magnum opus.

“She’s resilient. 13 assists, zero turnovers,” Nakase repeated. “It’s just her composure. She’s gaining this sense of when she needs to punch the paint, but she’s also seeing that next level; she’s seeing the defense beforehand. And that’s what’s really cool about Vee. She’s constantly learning angles, learning where certain players want the ball, and when to find the hot hand. She’s grown into one of the best point guards in the league.”

Valkyries rally behind Veronica Burton’s resilience

According to Gabby Williams, Burton’s toughness isn’t anything new as she’s had to weather opposing teams’ physicality all season.

“She’s a fighter,” Williams said. “We’re not as respected, I think, as other teams. And that includes what kind of whistles we get. We’ve had to play through that all season, especially V, she’s had to play through some tough ones. It actually ended up working in our favor because she wasn’t fazed by the physicality tonight.”

Williams wasn’t the only one bothered by the physicality their leader had to endure. The Valkyries’ displeasure at seeing Burton roughed up couldn’t be clearer in the visible joy they took in pointing at Stewart and Jones on the ground after Burton’s 13th assist. Essentially, a rallying call for the Valkyries as they secured their third straight win.

“You can see they wanted to protect her,” Nakase said, admitting she got nervous and concerned for Burton’s health after seeing her take hit after hit.

“You can see that even the people on the bench jumped up behind [her]. It gave us another boost of energy…Seeing her go down– we all know V doesn’t stay down that long. So the fact that she was down there for a little bit longer shows that it really must have been a big hit. So it rallies, and it shows us if V is resilient, then we had to be resilient too.”

Alongside Burton, Cecilia Zandalasini finished with a game-high 20 points. Gabby Williams added 16 points and two steals, and Tiffany Hayes gave Golden State 12 points off the bench. The Golden State defense held New York to a season-low 60 points and 30.2% shooting.

With the win, the Valkyries are firmly two games ahead of the Las Vegas Aces for the two-seed in the WNBA playoffs. Golden State controls their destiny to the two-seed, clinching the coveted spot without Vegas’s help if they win four of their last five games. The Valkyries will play one more game before the FIBA World Cup break.

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