After the Golden State Valkyries won Game 4 in Atlanta and tied the series 2-2, both teams knew that the winner of Game 5 would give themselves a pretty good chance to win the title. It was the type of game in which you’d expect players like Angel Reese, Gabby Williams, Rhyne Howard, or Allisha Gray to step up and will their team to victory. 

Howard did step up, scoring 20 points on 7-of-15 shooting, but it was not enough with Reese and Gray combining for just 17 points on 6-for-20 shooting. Williams wasn’t the driving force behind the Valkyries’ victory, either. She scored just nine points on 3-of-14 shooting from the field. Kiah Stokes and Veronica Burton led the team in scoring with 13 points each. 

For Burton, that’s not a very unusual performance. It is for Stokes, however. Stokes scored a total of 15 points over the first four games. Scoring is not usually her focus. Instead, she makes a difference by rebounding and defending at a high level. And yet, there she was, knocking down three 3-pointers on her way to 13 points, 8 rebounds, 1 assist, and 3 blocks in the biggest game of the season so far. Stokes’s defense on Reese was already a deciding factor in earlier games, but now she finally had the offensive output to match her defensive contributions. 

Kiah Stokes Should Be in the Finals MVP Conversation

Going into the Finals, Angel Reese and Gabby Williams were the overwhelming favorites to win Finals MVP for their respective teams. Reese made an early case with a 30-point performance in Game 2 and a 20-point double-double in Game 3. Williams, meanwhile, fueled the Valkyries’ Game 1 victory with 26 points and had 17 points in a must-win Game 4 on the road. 

Stokes doesn’t have the usual Finals MVP case as a top-two scorer on her team, but the Valkyries would not be where they are without her defense and rebounding. Plus, in the biggest game of the series yet, it was Stokes who came up big for the winning team. 

Fans are certainly appreciating Stokes’s effort. When she did an on-court interview after Game 5, the fans in Ballhalla chanted “MVP” in the background. 

In the postgame media availability, Stokes shared her appreciation for the support, but she also kept her responses humble—too humble, according to Veronica Burton. 

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” Stokes said, per a video on the Valkyries’ YouTube channel. “I didn’t probe. I just opened up space. I’m just like head down, blue-collar hoops.” 

No matter what Stokes says, her contributions have been invaluable in the finals, and if the Valkyries win the championship, she should get some serious consideration for Finals MVP.