Kurtenbach: The Valkyries loudly announced themselves as legitimate WNBA title contenders. Too bad the league is hitting pause

If you asked me a week ago whether the Golden State Valkyries were legitimate WNBA championship contenders, I would have said no.

For all the positives this team displays, there were still too many questions, particularly about the offense. How about they show they can beat the Minnesota Lynx, first?

But that was last week.

This week? Game on.

Yes, forget the logical expansion timeline and tighten up Joe Lacob’s five-year plan. On Monday night in Minneapolis, the Valkyries didn’t just beat the four-time champion Lynx — this league’s standard-bearer — no, they snatched their lunch money, dismantled their mystique, and planted a flag atop the league.

This isn’t a feel-good startup story anymore. It’s a title assault.

Just last week, Minnesota strolled into San Francisco, delivered a clinical beatdown, and strutted off the floor like brash royalty reminding the peasants of their place. They made sure Golden State knew there are levels to this business.

Monday was the violent rebuttal.

The Valkyries didn’t strut or gloat through their victory. No, they just choked the life out of the league’s tried-and-trues.

They turned Napheesa Collier — the second-best player in this league — into just another frustrated forward searching for answers. They clamped down on Olivia Miles, the rookie superstar doing a hell of a Steph Curry impression, and put her in a defensive straitjacket, holding her to single-digit scoring.

That wasn’t luck. It was basketball claustrophobia. Welcome to Valkatraz.

But, then again, that’s the standard operating procedure for this team. No one questions the Valks’ defense.

The offense? That’s a different story.

And the Valks authored one on Monday.

The ball zipped around the perimeter with the kind of ruthless precision that used to belong exclusively to prime Warriors operations. Tiffany Hayes was everywhere, orchestrating the chaos at the point and then casually locking down the paint, too. Veronica Burton attacked, attacked, attacked, Cecilia Zandalasini was the matchup nightmare for Minnesota that Valks coach Natalie Nakase envisioned, and Gabby Williams found just enough offense amid a cold-shooting streak.

Golden State was positionless, relentless, and completely devoid of fear. That’s the good stuff. That’s the winning formula.

When your defense travels every single night, you don’t need perfection on offense. You just need a pulse.

Monday night, after a tough start, the Valkyries had a jackhammer.

Perhaps it was a one-off — a juiced-up revenge game that brought out their best.

But if that is the new order of operations for the Valks, it changes everything on the expectation front.

Which brings us to the ultimate buzzkill: the WNBA calendar.

Just as the Bay Area’s newest contender hits maximum velocity, the league is shutting down for a two-and-a-half-week break for the FIBA World Cup.

Only in the W does a league build unprecedented, white-hot momentum and then decide, “You know what fans really want? Absolute silence.”

Send the college kids to play FIBA. Why are we halting the best professional basketball product of the summer so administrators can hold committee meetings in Geneva?

It’s the kind of bureaucratic brain cramp that makes you wonder if sports executives are secretly tasked with preventing their own success.

And I can’t help but wonder if the Valks can avoid what happened to the San Jose Earthquakes this summer. The Quakes went into the break looking like MLS royalty and came out looking like they’d forgotten how to tie their cleats.

Golden State is built of sturdier stuff, to be sure, but you never want to put an inferno on ice.

Especially if you’re a Bay Area sports fan.

Look around the local landscape. The Giants are putting crowds to sleep, the 49ers are trapped in a daytime soap opera, and the Warriors — who have given you no reason to believe — and the Sharks, who have — aren’t playing yet.

Right now, the only team in Northern California looking capable of booking City Hall for a civic celebration plays its home games in purple and black.

Monday was the kind of prove-it game that can buoy a team all the way through to the postseason and be called upon when the going gets tough there. It might have been the biggest regular-season win in franchise history.

It’s a feeling this team won’t want to lose. Serious momentum.

If only the WNBA knew what to do with something like that.