Las Vegas Aces vs Los Angeles Sparks - WNBA Game 43 - 2026 | It's a Wrap.

Aces Clinch First-Round Home Court and Close the Home Slate With an 89-79 Win Over the Sparks

The Las Vegas Aces (30-13) closed their regular-season home schedule the way a contender should, controlling the Los Angeles Sparks (16-27) for most of the night and pulling away for an 89-79 win in front of a 68th straight sellout at Michelob ULTRA Arena. The victory clinched home-court advantage for the Aces in the first round of the playoffs, thanks to a pair of double-doubles. A’ja Wilson posted game-bests of 18 points and 10 rebounds, Chelsea Gray chipped in 17, and Jackie Young stuffed the sheet with 14 points and a game-high 11 assists. Steph Talbot matched Young with 14 of her own, a season high, and added a game-high 3 steals, while Jewell Loyd tossed in 9. Los Angeles got 17 from a retiring legend, but the Aces never let the lead feel unsafe. All 10 Las Vegas players who checked in found the scoring column, and the evening doubled as a farewell for a fifteen-year veteran on the visiting side, set to retire when the season ends.

Game Summary: Las Vegas Aces vs Los Angeles Sparks

First Quarter

Los Angeles landed the first punch, nudging ahead 5-2 and holding that lead for the only stretch of the night that belonged to the visitors, just one minute and 33 seconds. Then Las Vegas flipped the switch. The Aces ripped off 15 unanswered points to surge in front 17-5, and the run was a full team effort, with four different players scoring across a five-and-a-half-minute smothering. The defense was the story: over that span, the Aces held the Sparks to 0-for-6 from the field and forced five turnovers, turning stops into transition.

Wilson and Talbot did the early damage, each pouring in 6 points, and Talbot was ruthless about it, hitting all three of her shots. By quarter’s end, Las Vegas had converted 10 points off seven Los Angeles giveaways, a margin that quietly decides games.

The shooting splits told the same tale. The Aces knocked down 10 of 19 (.526) from the floor, though they were cold from deep at just 1 of 5, and it barely mattered because the Sparks could not buy a bucket, going 4 of 13 (.308) overall and 1 of 6 from behind the arc. Rae Burrell was the lone bright spot for the visitors, matching Wilson and Talbot with 6 of her own. Las Vegas 24, Los Angeles 11, and the tone was set.

Second Quarter

The second quarter opened with the Aces still humming. Back-to-back triples stretched the cushion to its biggest of the half, 35-18, with five minutes left before intermission, and it looked like the rout was on. Nah, homie. The Sparks answered with an 11-0 run, hitting 5 of their next 6 shots while Las Vegas went ice cold, missing all four of its attempts and turning it over once. Suddenly, a 17-point gap was a 35-29 nail-biter. Becky was ready to cuss…

Loyd stopped the bleeding at the right moment, burying a 3-pointer with two minutes to play to steady the ship, and from there the teams traded baskets into the break. Gray led Las Vegas with 7 points in the quarter, picking her spots. Erica Wheeler did the heavy lifting for Los Angeles, leading all scorers with 10 as the Sparks clawed back into it.

The period belonged to the visitors on the scoreboard, 22-18, and the shooting numbers explain why. Las Vegas was 7-for-18 (.389) from the field, saved by a sharp 4-for-8 from distance, while Los Angeles caught fire at 10-for-19 (.526) overall and 2-for-6 from three. The Aces still carried a 42-33 lead into the locker room, but the Sparks had served notice they weren’t done with this thang.

Third Quarter

Coming out of the break, the Aces couldn’t put out that Spark. The lead bounced between 7 and 12 points across the first seven minutes, and every time Las Vegas threatened to pull away, the Sparks had an answer. Then Wilson stepped out and drilled a 3-pointer to make it 56-45, and that cracked the game open.

What followed was the dagger. Loyd answered A’ja Wilson’s trey with back-to-back triples, Cheyenne Parker-Tyus added a free throw, and Young dropped in a bucket to cap a 12-2 burst that swelled the lead to 65-47 with 44.1 seconds left in the quarter. The Sparks scrambled to score the final four points, trimming the deficit to 14 heading into the fourth, but the damage was done.

Las Vegas shot a scorching 9-for-16 (.562) from the floor and stayed hot from deep at 4-for-8, while Los Angeles managed just 7-for-17 (.412) overall and a janky 1-for-4 from behind the arc. Loyd was the engine, leading the Aces with 6 points in the period, and on the other side, Nneka Ogwumike, playing her final game in Las Vegas before retirement, poured in a quarter-high 8 to keep the Sparks within shouting distance. Las Vegas was 10 minutes from wrapping up the home slate.

Fourth Quarter

The fourth quarter was never gonna be interesting. Las Vegas kept the Sparks at arm’s length throughout, pushing the margin as high as 17 points on two separate occasions and treating the closing stretch like the benediction at church. Los Angeles kept firing, and to their credit the shots kept falling, but the math simply would not math.

The Sparks were genuinely terrific in the period, connecting on a red-hot 61.1 percent (11 of 18) from the field and 3 of 5 from 3-point range. On most nights, that kind of shooting flips a game. Not this one. The Aces answered with enough offense of their own, hitting 47.1 percent (8 of 17) from the floor even as they cooled to 2 of 7 from deep, and the cushion they had built simply refused to shrink fast enough.

Ariel Atkins did what she could for Los Angeles, matching Wilson with 7 points in the quarter, but the closest the visitors got was a traditional 3-point play with 60 seconds to play that cut it to 87-78. That was as tense as it got. The Aces closed it out 89-79, wrapped a 24-point period with a smile, and sent their sellout crowd home happy one last time before hitting the road to close out the regular season.

Bottom Line

The bottom line is that this was a statement of positioning. With home-court advantage in the first round now locked up, the Aces did the little things that separate them. They won the turnover battle decisively, scoring 18 points off Los Angeles giveaways to the Sparks’ 8, dominated the paint 44 to 38, and buried 11 threes to the visitors’ 7 at 39.3 percent. The Sparks actually out-rebounded them 30 to 29 and matched them at the line, but Las Vegas controlled everything that mattered.

The Aces also owned the fast break, racing to 22 transition points against just 10 for the visitors. The milestones piled up too. Wilson’s double-double was her 19th of the season and 139th of her career, and she has now scored in double figures in a league-leading 64 straight games, a run that also pushed her past Cappie Pondexter to No. 12 on the WNBA‘s all-time field goals list. Young’s game-high 11 assists moved her past Kristi Toliver into No. 25 all-time, and her double-double lifted her to No. 7 in franchise history, passing Liz Cambage. Gray climbed to No. 23 on the league’s all-time steals list and No. 6 on the franchise field goals chart, while Steph Talbot’s 14 points marked a new season high. Four Aces now rank among the top 50 winningest players in WNBA history. Not a bad way to say goodbye to the home crowd before the postseason arrives.

TOP PERFORMERS

TEAM STATS

Points in the Paint: LVA 44, LAS 38 | Second Chance: LVA 10, LAS 7 | Fast Break: LVA 22, LAS 10 | Off Turnovers: LVA 18, LAS 8 | Bench: LVA 24, LAS 26

Next up: The Aces wrap up the regular season against the Phoenix Mercury (15-27) on Thursday, Sept. 24, at Mortgage Matchup Center. Tip-off is 7 p.m., televised nationally on USA and CNBC, locally on The Spot-Vegas 34, and on the Aces Live streaming service.

Franchise Sports Media. Las Vegas sports news about Las Vegas Sports teams.

— TQ (@tqthetrojan) for Franchise Sports Media

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