The Caitlin Counter: How Clark and the Fever have benefited from the Olympic break
Caitlin Clark received a gift bestowed to only a handful of WNBA rookies in the league’s 28-year history. When she was left off the Paris Olympics roster, the consolation prize was time. Time away from basketball. Extra hours with her new city and teammates. More minutes on the court and in the film room without a clock of the next game looming.
The benefit has been clear. Clark is averaging 23.5 points over four games in August, up from 17.1 before the All-Star/Olympic break. Her rebounding and assists numbers are holding steady while she’s dropped her turnovers from 5.6 per game to 4.8.
She is connecting on more shots (46.3 FG%, 62.4 true shooting percentage up from 57.1) with an offensive rating 11 points better than pre-All-Star, and notched her first month to date with a positive net rating. The rookie’s stat line on Monday night against Atlanta was her 21st of at least 15 points and five assists, a WNBA record. She’s played only 30 games; every one since the break has qualified.
“Getting to know my teammates and playing with them, it’s just a comfortability,” Clark said following the Fever’s 98-89 win against Phoenix. “It was going to take me a little bit of time to get used to. It was hard to adjust and once I kind of found my groove so far, I think we’ve just been getting better and better.”
At 14-16, the Fever have already reached the most wins since 2016, which was also the last time they made the playoffs. Indiana hasn’t clinched a berth yet with 10 games to play, but is in prime position to keep the No. 7 seed. No. 8 Chicago (11-18, 2.5 games back of Indiana) and No. 9 Atlanta (10-19, 3.5 games back of Indiana) are in a battle for the last seed.
The improvement isn’t a misnomer of boosted numbers because of a small sample size of lottery competition. Indiana defeated Phoenix for the series sweep and Seattle, both teams above .500, immediately out of the break. The Fever ran into the MVPhee dominance of Napheesa Collier and the Minnesota Lynx, but handled the recently surging and healthy Atlanta Dream to come within a game of that series sweep.
“She’s grown in a lot of ways,” Storm head coach Noelle Quinn said following a 92-75 loss to the Fever. “[She’s] finding ways to be effective [and] not chasing the ball a lot, but playing in the pocket, slowing down, and making good reads.”
No teammate has benefitted more than Kelsey Mitchell, the most veteran Fever player who had to carry the majority of the scoring load for years in Indy. She’s averaging 26.3 ppg in August, 10 points more than her pre-All-Star average, and hitting 39% of her 3-pointers on nearly double the attempts. All of her other numbers are up significantly: field goal percentage (44.3 to 50), rebounds (2.2 to 3.7), assists (1.8 to 3.0) and steals (0.7 to 1.7).
“I always say that C-squared (Clark) is one of those players where her IQ is going to take us a lot of places,” Mitchell said. “So you just really got to fill in where you fit in as far as knowing how to read and adjust off [of] her. And once you make that adjustment, I think it obviously shows in good basketball.”
The point guard is better at finding open teammates now when she inevitably draws in the defense, and those teammates are reaping the rewards. Guard Lexie Hull is surging from 3 alongside Clark, shooting 71.4 percent on double the attempts post-break — three times her pre-break clip. She combined with Mitchell to shoot 11-of-15 from 3 to beat Seattle. Two of the Fever’s four highest-scoring games from 3-point range came since the break.
“That break really does make a difference I think as a rookie,” Storm forward Nneka Ogwumike said last week. “It’s something that allows you to kind of reset, look at tape, work on some things. That’s kind of what made the difference for me in my rookie year.”
Ogwumike, the No. 1 pick in 2012, scored her career-high after that year’s Olympic break and jumped 8% in efficiency. Breanna Stewart, the 2016 No. 1 overall pick, spent her off time with Team USA winning gold in Rio. The other rookies in the class who stayed back experienced statistical bumps out of the break. Guard Moriah Jefferson, the No. 2 pick by the Sky, closed out her final eight games after the break averaging a season-high 18.9 points. Jonquel Jones, the No. 6 pick, nearly doubled her scoring output in the 10 games after the break.
None carried as much of a load as Clark, who could have easily gone to Paris on this year’s roster. As Indiana plays teams the third and fourth times, their offensive rating leaps. It shot up 10 points in the recent wins (with the exception of Atlanta), and did the same a week before the break when they defeated New York for the first time in four tries.
Indiana plays twice more this week, beginning with a home contest against Connecticut on Wednesday. The Sun are 3-0 in the series, but all wins were between the season opener and June 10. The Fever then will look to lock up the season series against Chicago and rookie Angel Reese, who also was gifted the benefit of time, on the road on Friday.
Caitlin Counter
We’re tracking Clark’s numbers in comparison with Candace Parker, who was the only WNBA rookie to be named league MVP.
Season averages: Points (FG%/3FG%/FT%), rebounds, assists (turnovers), steals, blocks
Advanced stats: Player efficiency rating; offensive/defensive rating (via Her Hoop Stats); true shooting percentage, win shares per 40; plus/minus
Caitlin Clark (through 30 games)
Season averages: 18.0 PPG (41.4/33.3/89.9); 5.8 RPG, 8.2 APG (5.5 TOV); 1.4 SPG, 0.8 BPG
Advanced: 18.3 PER; 101.7/106.6 O/DRTG; 58.0 TS%; 2.5 WS; -3.1 +/-
Totals: 539 PTS (169-408/85-255/116-129), 173 REB, 247 AST (164 TOV), 42 STL, 25 BLK
Notable league rankings: Clark climbed to the top of the league in average assists since we last did this look-in ahead of the All-Star break. She leads Alyssa Thomas (7.8), Natasha Cloud (7.0), Skylar Diggins-Smith (6.3) and Sabrina Ionescu (6.0). She moved up to third in assist percentage (38.5%) and second in assists per 40 minutes (9.4).
She is 10th in scoring with a slight bump over the last seven games and ranks second in 3-point attempts, though she’s shooting 32.9%. Her 26.4 usage rate is 11th and she remains one of the best at getting to the free throw line, but not as strong as before the break.
Candace Parker
Season averages: 18.5 PTS (52.3/42.3/73.3); 9.5 REB, 3.4 AST (2.8TOV); 1.3 STL, 2.3 BLK
Advanced (full season): 27.4 PER; 112.5/88.4 O/DRTG; 58.2 TS%; 0.24 WS; 3.5 +/-
Totals through 30 games: 549 PTS (214-413/10-22/124-168), 294 REB, 105 AST (87 TOV), 38 STL, 67 BLK
Notable league rankings (full season): Parker led the league in rebounding as a rookie, finished fifth in scoring and 17th in assists per game. Those remain among the best numbers of her career. The advanced stats ranked top five across the board with the exception of her 11th-best offensive rating. She was named Player of the Week once in August.
A familiar trajectory
Every couple of weeks we’ll compare Clark to another rookie in history based on one statistical category comparison.
As Maya Moore accumulated one of the greatest careers in WNBA history, a young Clark watched from the Target Center seats. Clark, a bona fide Moore fan, said she fell for Moore’s “very complete game,” even if there’s one major aspect she hasn’t quite added to her bag.
“Obviously, I didn’t take the defensive mindset from Maya. I don’t really have that,” Clark said before Saturday’s game in Minneapolis.
They both play with a similar style, two superstars out of college with cultural status in their own rights. Moore made history as the first WNBA player to sign with Jordan Brand, doing so as a rookie. She was as heralded a basketball player in 2011 as Clark is now in a different, more widely recognized and discussed era.
“Just the passion and the joy that you could always see her play with,” Clark said. “She always had a smile. She was competitive. She was fiery. But she was just a solid basketball player and obviously a solid individual.”
Moore averaged 13.2 points (21st in the league), 4.6 rebounds (30th), 2.6 assists (26th) and 1.4 steals (13th) to run away with Rookie of the Year and her first All-Star berth. The Lynx missed the playoffs six consecutive seasons when they won the lottery for Moore, but she was surrounded by more veteran talent as a first-year player than Clark. And she had Lindsay Whalen, an eight-year veteran, leading the offense at point guard.
The two-time NCAA national champion at Connecticut quipped to the Associated Press after the ROY announcement, “I better get rookie of the year if I’m playing with two MVP candidates.” Whalen, who the Lynx traded their 2010 No. 1 pick for, finished fifth in voting with four first-place votes and 104 points. Seimone Augustus finished eighth and Rebekkah Brunson tied with Moore with one point. Fever forward Tamika Catchings won.
Moore would have played in all eight All-Star games of her career, except they were not held in 2012 and 2016 because of the Olympics. She earned MVP votes every season, winning the award in 2014, and played in six Finals with a Finals MVP in 2013.
