2016 WNBA Playoffs


The 2016 WNBA Playoffs is the postseason tournament of the WNBA's 2016 season.

Format

The WNBA changed its playoff format in 2016. Following the WNBA regular season, eight teams in the entire league qualified for the playoffs and were seeded one to eight.
Regular season records determined the seedings of the teams. The team with the best record received seed one, the team with the next best record received seed two, and so on. The top two seeds get double byes, while the next two seeds get first-round byes.
These seedings were used to create a bracket that determines the match-ups throughout the playoffs. The first round of the playoffs consisted of two match-ups based on the seedings. The two winners advanced to the second round with a match-up between the number 3 seed and the lower of the advancing seeds and another match-up between the number 4 seed and the other first round winner. The winners of the first two rounds advanced to the semifinals, where the lower ranked seed of the winners faced the number 1 seed, while the other remaining team faced the number 2 seed.
The first two rounds are single elimination games played on the higher ranking seed's home court. The semifinals and WNBA Finals are best-of-five series played in a 2-2-1 format, meaning the team with home-court advantage hosts games 1, 2, and 5 while their opponent hosts games 3 and 4.

Tiebreak procedures

  1. Better winning percentage among all head-to-head games involving tied teams.
  2. Better winning percentage against teams within conference.
  3. Better winning percentage against all teams with a.500 or better record at the end of the season.
  4. Better point differential in games involving tied teams.
  5. Coin toss.

    Playoff qualifying

;Notes

Playoffs and Finals

Bracket

First Round

(5) Indiana Fever vs. (8) Phoenix Mercury

Indiana won 2–1 in the regular-season series

(6) Atlanta Dream vs. (7) Seattle Storm

Seattle won 2–1 in the regular-season series

Second Round

(3) New York Liberty vs. (8) Phoenix Mercury

New York won 2–1 in the regular-season series

(4) Chicago Sky vs. (6) Atlanta Dream

Atlanta won 2–1 in the regular-season series

Semifinals

(1) Minnesota Lynx vs. (8) Phoenix Mercury

Minnesota won 3–0 in the regular-season series

(2) Los Angeles Sparks vs. (4) Chicago Sky

Los Angeles won 3–0 in the regular-season series

Finals

(1) Minnesota Lynx vs. (2) Los Angeles Sparks

Minnesota won 2–1 in the regular-season series