Liberty rip Caitlin Clark-less Fever thanks to Jonquel Jones

Jonquel Jones’ return wasn’t pretty at first.

She started just 1-for-7 from the field. She committed silly fouls. She wasn’t the imposing presence on defense she usually is.

But it was just early rust. Jones shook off her rough start and was paramount in the second half of the Liberty’s 98-84 win over the Caitlin Clark-less Fever on Tuesday night at Barclays Center.

She became a force in the paint. She began vacuuming rebounds at will. She affected shots with her size.

Jones finished with a team-high 18 points on 5-for-13 shooting from the field along with nine rebounds. Her 3-pointer with 6:01 left in the game gave the Liberty a nine-point lead — their largest of the night up to that point.

She was making her long-awaited return, having missed more than a month after re-spraining her right ankle. And she very quickly made it obvious just how much the Liberty had missed her.

The Liberty had two All-Stars in Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu, and a third in Natasha Cloud participating in the week’s festivities.

Jones, their anchor in the paint, is a perennial All-Star and likely would have been again this year if she didn’t miss so much time due to the injury.

But it was one of their role players in Leonie Fiebich who joined Jones in saving them after the All-Star break.

While the Liberty’s usual leading faces were sluggish and sloppy early in the first game of the second half of the season, Fiebich carried them for large stretches of the game.

Each time the Fever looked to be making a run — and there were plenty — and begin pulling away, there was Fiebich with a clutch bucket.

She finished with 17 points on 5-for-7 shooting from the field and perfect 2-for-2 from 3-point range along with five rebounds.

The Liberty were on the ropes late in the third quarter, down 67-60 with 2:24 left. But they closed the quarter on a 9-0 to take a two-point lead into the fourth quarter and promptly scored the first four points of the final period to extend their lead to six. Fiebich drilled a 3-pointer in the third-quarter run and hit two free throws in the run.

Jones and the Liberty’s other stars finally came alive and took it from there. Stewart woke up after a slow start of her own, recording 11 points in the second half to finish with 17 on 6-for-11 shooting. She also picked up three steals.

Ionescu helped the Liberty put the game away, erupting out of nowhere for 10 straight Liberty points in the fourth quarter as their lead ballooned to 13.

She had been struggling with her shot up to that point.

Kelsey Mitchell paced the Fever with 29 points but was quiet down the stretch.

The Liberty were careless for too many stretches of the game, committing 19 turnovers. Too many were avoidable, the product of ill-advised passes into traffic.

But when a team is as stacked as the defending champions are, there is room for errors.

And for the first time in a while, that stacked roster is pretty much entirely back together.