A'ja Wilson scored 45 points Friday night and the Las Vegas Aces beat the Connecticut Sun 101-94 at Mohegan Sun Arena, another punishing stop in a building that has become part of her story. Wilson shot 15-for-18 from the field and made all 13 of her free throw attempts.
The performance gave Wilson her fifth career 40-point game, the most in WNBA history, and made her the only player in league history to score 45 or more points on 80% shooting from the field. Chennedy Carter added 18 points off the bench, Chelsea Gray had 10 assists and seven rebounds, and the Aces won their third straight game since their opening-night loss to the Phoenix Mercury.
The game turned when the Sun, young and short-handed, kept hanging around. Connecticut trailed 69-56 with just under four minutes left in the third quarter, then Saniya Rivers helped fuel a 14-3 run that cut the Aces' lead to two points. Hailey Van Lith scored 17 points to lead Connecticut, which played without Brittney Griner for the second consecutive game because of a left foot injury and also missed Olivia Nelson-Ododa because of a right ankle injury.
Wilson had already tied the arena to the biggest moments of her career. She made her WNBA debut there on May 21, 2018, with 14 points and 10 rebounds in a loss to the Sun, and three years later she and the Aces won their first championship at the same arena. After Friday's win, Wilson said the building had been special to her for a long time, from her first WNBA point to that first title, and said she was leaving with one more memory from a place she said she would miss.
Chelsea Gray said she never gets bored watching Wilson play, calling her greatness something she sees every day and saying she never wants to become comfortable around it. Wilson, in turn, said playing against a young team is a good measuring stick for her conditioning because they are constantly running and gunning. She added that Connecticut has something brewing if its young core stays together and keeps moving as a unit.
That outlook carries extra weight in a season that is still only four games old for Wilson, now in her ninth WNBA season, and for a Sun franchise that is set to move and rebrand next season in the return of the Houston Comets. Friday was another reminder that Mohegan Sun Arena has belonged to Wilson at every stage of her career, and that it still does when she walks back in wearing an Aces uniform.
