A’ja Wilson, Aces frazzled and frustrated in Fever loss. In Game 3, they must reclaim their identity

INDIANAPOLIS — Her night long since combusted, A'ja Wilson had her say one more time. This was after the shouting match with a heckler, and the boos, and the face she made coming off the court, and the expletive-laden explanation of her side. She was in a Gainbridge Fieldhouse hallway. The audience was her head coach, who was on the way to the room the Las Vegas Aces star had vacated after four questions.

Becky Hammon stopped, and Wilson continued her locomotive of thought about what happened during a Game 2 first-round playoff loss to the Indiana Fever on Tuesday. She said she didn't go at the heckler, but also maybe kind of did. But she wasn't going to allow some random person to point at her and say whatever he said. And then he backs off and sits down? No way this man says that to LeBron James, the four-time WNBA MVP declared. And then they let the guy back in his seat?

Many points, driven in like foundation piles. Wilson finished, turned to continue on, and a voice stopped her. A fan in a wheelchair found a marker for the autograph he'd requested. Wilson smiled and obliged.

Such was the whiplash of an evening when the defending champions were not themselves, in any useful way. As tightly wound as their emphatic Game 1 win was in Las Vegas , their 99-89 defeat in Game 2 in Gainbridge Fieldhouse left loose ends all over the place. Basically three quarters away from the next round, Las Vegas unspooled, alarmingly. Now it will have to fend off the end of the season, at the hands of a team trying to be the next version of the Aces.

Wilson was hardly the only Aces player to swerve out of character on the floor Tuesday. They're of course human. They're also the group that should be above and beyond the traps they fell into.

"Their urgency was a lot higher, the intensity was a lot higher," Wilson said. "Kind of had us on our heels, the same way we had them in Game 1. We'll be better. We'll adjust, and we'll come back with a better sense of urgency, effort and heart."

That was the basketball part. Defensive lapses and hurried offensive choices. That was hardly the end of it. One unfortunate event represented a scattered mindset behind everything.

Fourth quarter, four minutes and 10 seconds remaining. Wilson and Fever guard Sophie Cunningham bearhug as Wilson rolled off a screen. Cunningham hit the ground but caught the rap for the foul. Wilson walked away. A man in a baseline seating section stood up, took a step forward and pointed at the Aces star. "The foul's on you!" he shouted, according to another fan nearby who heard the exchange.

With that, Wilson removed her mouthpiece, left the court and walked toward the fan, admonishing him for pointing at her. Players and security personnel intervened. Wilson got hit with a technical foul for, evidently, leaving the floor. Plus side: Support staff for an Indiana Fever game is well trained in hell-breaks-loose protocols. Minus side: The unshakeable Las Vegas Aces seemed shook.

"I don't know if you guys know me, but I don't really get into the bulls—," Wilson said during her postgame news conference.

"I try to play my game, keep it pushing. But if I'm just walking, because I just got the foul, I'm chilling. And if I see a man come at me, taking steps towards me and pointing at me, I don't give a damn what you said, I don't give a damn how you said it, the tone – that is unacceptable. You don't step towards me. And point at me. I'm not for that s—. At all. Excuse my French, and God bless me. But that there is unacceptable. And how he gets back in the game because they said he didn't do anything – of course he didn't. And that's hard.

"And I apologized to my team because I got us a tech. But it's just certain things I'm just not going to allow anymore. Because it's just unacceptable."

Hammon, as one would expect for a coach trying to figure out what lifeline to throw her group, didn't see the instigating event. She did see the aftermath. She didn't really recognize it.

"I've never seen A'ja Wilson go like that," Hammon said. "So whatever was done, I can tell you she felt very disrespected in that moment. I can just speak to her — I've never seen her really react like that. Ever. So whatever it was doesn't have any place, I don't think, in an arena."

The unofficial litigation will continue for days, naturally. It is the second time this season the Aces have objected to something said by a fan at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, asking for that fan's removal. "Clearly lines get crossed," Hammon said, "and it seems to happen here." A Fever statement said security interviewed the fan and witnesses and determined there was no violation. The WNBA has no rule about players entering the stands, meanwhile, so apparently Wilson is under no threat of further examination and consequences.

But to hear Hammon describe her surprise at Wilson's reaction is to get the gist of the night. It may be that the Aces are fed up with fans in this city. It also may be that if the Aces were winning, and if they'd resembled anything close to the best version of themselves, then Wilson might have been oblivious to one bloviating fan and avoided the tripwire. These episodes usually don't occur in a vacuum.

This was not who Las Vegas expects to be, in any sense, and Indiana took advantage. The Fever have a Big Three, just like the Aces do. They're more callow, but they're ambitious. They're not there yet, but they have their sights on a legacy similar to the one Las Vegas has authored already. They're one win closer due to the model franchise splitting at the seams.

Before Game 2, while wearing fuzzy slippers with a smiley face on them, Wilson talked about bringing the proper energy and positive vibes on nights like these, so her teammates can follow. By the end, she and the Aces walked off the floor to a round of boos, and out of sight in the exit tunnel, Wilson stuck out her tongue and threw up two thumbs down to mock the crowd.

Neither she nor her teammates can be blamed for their frustration, or salty reactions to a salty sendoff. They do have to retake ownership of their identity by Game 3 at Michelob Ultra Arena.

Imagine the finger-pointing if they don't.

"We weren't ourselves tonight," Hammon confirmed afterwards. "I suspect we will look more like ourselves Thursday."