Angel Reese saw this moment coming \u2014 literally. A year ago, she said so herself.<\/p>\n
Last season, Reese was sitting at home watching the end of the WNBA Finals when she posted a simple message on social media: “manifesting the finals.” Exactly 364 days later, she made it real, helping the Atlanta Dream sweep the New York Liberty and reach the 2026 WNBA Finals.<\/p>\n
“I manifested this,” Reese told ESPN after Friday’s 85-83 series-clinching win in Game 3.<\/p>\n
The evidence backs her up. After the sweep, Reese resurfaced her October 10, 2025 post with the caption “364 DAYS LATER” \u2014 proof that this moment had been in her sights for a full year.<\/p>\n
“When I came to Atlanta, I knew what I was getting,” she said. “This team has poured so much into me. We poured so much into each other.” Then, with the Finals ahead of her: “I’m supposed to be here. I thank God for this moment.”<\/p>\n
Reese earned every bit of it. In Friday’s closeout, the 24-year-old put up 22 points, nine rebounds, three assists and two blocks, scoring 18 of her points in the first half as Atlanta built a lead it would never fully surrender. She shot 7-of-18 from the field, 2-of-4 from three and a perfect 6-of-6 from the line.<\/p>\n
Across the three-game sweep of the Liberty, Reese averaged 20.7 points, 7.7 rebounds, 2.3 assists, 2.0 steals and 2.3 blocks. Her 23-point performance in Wednesday’s Game 2 overtime win was a playoff career high.<\/p>\n
It has been a season of firsts for Reese, who arrived in Atlanta via trade in April after two seasons with the Chicago Sky. She was named the 2026 WNBA Defensive Player of the Year \u2014 the first in Dream franchise history, collecting 46 of 74 first-place votes. She also set single-season league records with 521 rebounds and 32 double-doubles. Through five postseason games, she is averaging 18.0 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.2 blocks.<\/p>\n
The celebration afterward produced a few new nicknames. Teammate DeWanna Bonner dubbed her “FINALS BARBIE” on Instagram, while Nneka Ogwumike went with “BIG BARBIE.” And The Atlantic’s Jemele Hill summed up the mood of the night: plenty of people owe Angel Reese an apology.<\/p>\n
Reese, though, isn’t done rewriting her story. As she put it Friday night: “The job isn’t done. Happy where we are right now. We’re not satisfied.”<\/p>\n
Atlanta faces the Golden State Valkyries in the Finals starting Saturday, October 17 \u2014 four wins from the first championship in franchise history.<\/p>\n
\u2014 Sources: AP via theScore (Oct. 10, 2026); NY Post (Oct. 10, 2026); USA Today (Oct. 10, 2026); Athlon Sports (Oct. 10, 2026). Stats as reported Oct. 10, 2026.<\/small><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Angel Reese saw this moment coming \u2014 literally. A year ago, she said so herself. Last season, Reese was sitting at home watching the end…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":140,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-angel-reese","category-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":141,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions\/141"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vacancyatmeta.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}