As the final seconds ticked down, players hugged and streamers fell from the rafters. Stewart and Jones hugged. The two award-winning free agent signings two years ago who helped this team win their first title.

New York was down two seconds in regulation when Stewart was fouled with 5.2 seconds left. After a detailed video review, Stewart calmly shot two free throws and tied the game at 60.

Kayla McBride, who finished with 21 points, had an open chance for a 3, but she fell off the rim and the game went to OT.

Many of the former Liberty greats were in the audience, including Teresa Weatherspoon, who made a half-court heave in the 1999 WNBA Finals to force a decisive Game 3 that year. Until this year, that was the last time New York had a chance to play in a championship-winning game.

Jones, who was the only Liberty player to previously play in a Game 5 when she was at Connecticut in 2019, received the MVP award.

“I could never have dreamed of this. You know how many times I've been rejected. There were delays. I’m so happy to be doing it here,” she said.

Napheesa Collier scored 22 points to lead Minnesota before being fouled with 13 seconds left in stoppage time.

The Lynx were attempting to win their record fifth WNBA title, breaking a tie with the Seattle Storm and Houston Comets. Minnesota won four titles from 2011 to 2017 behind the core group of Lindsay Whalen, Seimone Augustus, Rebekkah Brunson, Sylvia Fowles and Maya Moore. That was the team's last appearance in the WNBA Finals until this year.

“Congratulations to the Liberty on their first championship,” Minnesota coach Cheryl Reeve said. “It took them 28 years to do this, congratulations to them. We were so close to our fifth goal that it just didn’t work out.”

This is the first time since 2019 that the WNBA Finals will go the distance. Since the league switched to a best-of-five format in 2005, seven other series have gone to a Game 5, and the home team had won five of those previous contests, including in 2019.

This series was a fitting end to a record season for the league. All five games came down to the last few possessions, including two overtime games and one Shot at the last secondwhich have led to record viewing figures.

The first three games averaged over a million viewers each, with viewership increasing with each contest. They also had large influxes of visitors.

Liberty fan Spike Lee was on the sidelines for over an hour before the game, chatting with the media while wearing his Ionescu jersey. After Ionescu finished warming up before the game, the two briefly exchanged words and hugged each other. Lee was part of a sellout crowd of 18,090 that helped this series set both the overall attendance record for a WNBA Finals and average attendance.