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As the defending champions, the Liberty may have entered this year as the team to beat. But the Lynx have earned that title as the season has rolled on.

Minnesota, last year’s runner-up, has the No. 1 offense and defense and has posted a league-best — by a large margin — 14.5 net rating.

Sunday presented an opportunity for the up-and-down Liberty to see how they measured up.

But, Sunday didn’t provide the comforting results fans may have hoped for as New York fell 83-71.

The Liberty started the game off well and led by two at halftime. But as Natasha Cloud put it, New York took a “downshift” in the second half that allowed the Lynx to take over.

Too many turnovers, a stagnant offense, being out of position on defense and an inability to get out in transition and overall poor execution hurt the Liberty, and the Lynx, who were without Napheesa Collier (ankle), took full advantage.

Minnesota converted 20 Liberty turnovers into 22 points. The Lynx also scored 14 fast break points.

“We didn’t make them feel uncomfortable, and they made us feel really uncomfortable,” Liberty coach Sandy Brondello said. “We lacked a little bit of discipline and how we wanted to run it, and we weren’t on our front foot.

“Some of the passes we threw, no one was open, especially into the [paint]. I don’t know what we’re looking at. I think we’re just a little bit rattled. We’ve got to settle them down, and I’ve got to do a better job of settling them down there.”

The issues for the Liberty can be boiled down to themes that have been discussed all season. Effort was again questioned. They didn’t execute well, and allowed Minnesota’s scrappy guards to blow up their actions.

Defensively, there was a lack of communication, hustle and awareness at times.

“We didn’t really execute well,” said Marine Johannès, who contributed 10 points off the bench. “Our defense in transition was not good either. And, I think the most important part is when it gets hard for us, tough for us, we don’t really stay together, and I think we have to do a better job.”

Sabrina Ionescu, who had 10 points and five assists, shared Johannès’ assessment and said this team, which is without three key players, including Breanna Stewart, and has played with Emma Meesseman for only a week, is still a work in progress.

“We played well when we played fast, then we slowed the ball down, and we didn’t do as well. We didn’t execute. We just kind of turned the ball over and gave them layups,” Ionescu said. “And so for us, that’s something that we’re still trying to iron out is making sure that we execute. And thankfully, championships [are] not won or lost at this point in the season.”

The Liberty and Lynx are scheduled to meet twice more in the next nine days.

But before Friday’s rematch, New York has games in Los Angeles on Tuesday and Las Vegas on Wednesday.