Angel Reese has been the center of the WNBA Finals, and the people who spent Thursday watching her in San Francisco had plenty to say about her.

“You know, Angel is like a little bit of a polarizing figure,” one fan said. “I’m glad Atlanta has her because if they didn’t, they wouldn’t have a chance at all. When we can shut her down and when we don’t do turnovers, she can’t play. We are one of the best defenses in the league, and so we just shut her down the last two games and I hope we do it again today.”

Another fan separated Reese’s game from the noise around her. “I respect her game a lot, and I think they have to respect her and they modified their game plan to try to neutralize her,” the fan said.

“I don’t love the other stuff. But she’s a great player. She’s just as dedicated to the game as anybody else, but you know what, we can take care of this. We got this,” he added.

A third kept it to basketball. “I love Angel Reese, but this is the finals. You step everything up in the finals, and it is a physical game. Defense wins championships.”

Reese was the difference in Game 6, and the Valkyries’ plan did not work.

The Dream beat Golden State 80-69 on Thursday afternoon at State Farm Arena to force the first Game 7 in WNBA history, after the Valkyries had gone up 3-2 with a win in Game 5.

Reese ended a two-game slump in which she shot 4-for-20, finishing with 15 points, 14 rebounds and six assists on 5-of-18 shooting. Her 14 boards pushed her to 78 for the series, a WNBA Finals record that passed Sylvia Fowles’ mark of 75 from 2017.

She did it without a big shooting night, and her teammates carried the scoring.

Allisha Gray scored 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting with three blocks, and Rhyne Howard added 21. The Dream scored 32 points in the first quarter, which was how many they had after 4:05 of the third quarter in Game 5, and built a 25-point lead.

Golden State cut it to eight late behind 26 points from Gabby Williams, including 21 after halftime, before Gray hit a dagger three off a Reese assist. Atlanta shot 13-for-30 from three, compared with 7-for-27 for Golden State.

Reese said it was about leading, not scoring. “It was just a mental mindset of me just being able to go out there and just try to lead the team as best I can,” Reese said. “No matter how ugly it can be, as long as we came out with the win, I just wanted to do whatever it took.”