Sun sharpshooter Marina Mabrey poses early problem for Lynx

After beating the Lynx on Sunday, Connecticut Sun guard Marina Mabrey walked into the postgame news conference and made a beeline to a refrigerator against the wall of the Target Center lounge.

“A little postgame snack,” she said as she grabbed a Coke Zero from the fridge and a box of popcorn off the nearby table, looking around to make sure it was allowed.

Mabrey deserved it. Her game-high 20 points led Connecticut to a 73-70 victory in Game 1 of the WNBA semifinal series. Her six three-pointers (6-for-11) single-handedly outnumbered the No. 2 Lynx, who shot 5-for-20.

The Lynx face two options in Tuesday’s Game 2: Slow Mabrey down, or keep pace with her.

The 28-year-old guard was a late addition for the Sun off a July trade with the Chicago Sky, which gave one of the league’s best post teams a new scoring threat.

“That was fun. [Alyssa Thomas] does a really good job of finding me … so I’m always ready to shoot when she passes to me,” Mabrey said. “That’s what they brought me here to do. I’m going to get out there and shoot the ball.”

After scoring a playoff-record 27 points off the bench in Connecticut’s Game 1 against Indiana, Mabrey started against the Lynx in place of guard Tyasha Harris, out with a right ankle injury picked up against the Fever.

“It’s a scorer’s mentality on the perimeter,” Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve said before Sunday’s game. “Ty Harris has been terrific for them in that space, and now you add Mabrey to that, and that’s an additional scorer. That was a huge trade. A huge trade.”

At the start of the fourth quarter, with the Lynx up by five, Mabrey hit a 31-foot three as the Sun’s shot clock expired, jump-starting the Sun’s 16-8 run to finish the game.

Before adding Mabrey, the Sun were 11th in the league in three-point shooting, with its defense and physicality often clinching victories for the No. 3 seed. But since the addition of the high-volume three-point shooter, the Sun have jumped to sixth in efficiency from behind the arc and second-best in the playoffs (39%). Mabrey has shot 42.4% from three in 16 games with the Sun.

“I’ve been trying to get Marina to come here for a while,” said Thomas, who was one assist away from a triple-double. “She’s something different that we haven’t seen in Connecticut in a while. She’s able to play a pick and roll, and we needed a three-point shooter desperately this season.”

Mabrey’s type of shooting isn’t uncommon for the Lynx. This season, Minnesota has been the most efficient three-point shooting team in the league (38%) and third in three-pointers made (9.5 per game).

But the Sun’s defense limited the Lynx’s ability to swing the ball around the court to find the best shot. Kayla McBride shot 1-for-5 from three, Alanna Smith 0-for-4, Napheesa Collier 0-for-2. Bridget Carleton shot 3-for-6, and she and McBride swapped out guarding Mabrey at various points during the game, with limited success.

“We had, unfortunately, too many of the easy breakdown variety, so they found easier shots than we did,” Reeve said. “Our offense put a lot of pressure on our defense. We had to get stops every time.”

Last year, when the Sun eliminated the Lynx in the playoffs’ best-of-three first round, Minnesota started the series with a 20% three-point shooting night, while the Sun made 16 of 30 threes. Then, the Lynx took Game 2 on the road, improving to 37.5% from beyond the arc.

Not the exact same roster, or same situation, but similar mentality.

“Everyone in our locker room has full trust and faith in each other,” Carleton said. “It’s a long series, five-game series, for a reason.”