INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Caitlin Clark and her Indiana Fever teammates spent the first part of this week discussing a heated sideline exchange, a lengthy team meeting, even their early-season defensive woes.
On Thursday night, the 2025 Commissioner's Cup champions started working on a turnaround.
From the pregame team huddle to Clark's chest bump of coach Stephanie White during a third-quarter stoppage, the Fever moved beyond the weeklong drama and looked
unified, committed and determined as they began their Cup title defense with an 83-71 victory over the Atlanta Dream.
“A lot of people have called and asked me how I am, and I said, 'What do you mean? I'm great,'” Clark said. “I think a lot of self-reflection from everybody (this week), like look yourself in the mirror and find ways to get better. That's certainly what I did.”
Clark still isn't shooting like her typical self.
She was 6 of 17 from the field and 2 of 8 from 3-point range on a night when she vomited at halftime. She still finished with 17 points, eight assists, seven rebounds and only three turnovers in 31 minutes while playing much better defense.
The performance earned praise from White, just days after she and Clark had a spat on the sideline.
“She was gassed, she was making plays on both ends and she was doing a great job,” White said. “She was running the team and, you know, when you lay it all on the line, you get gassed.”
At least it's a start — and a chance to move beyond what happened at Portland and the ensuing team meeting Monday.
The rare five-day break between games gave Indiana's players and coaches a chance to drill down and figure out what was wrong just in time to start their Cup title defense.
When they re-emerged at Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Thursday, things looked very different — aside from the boos greeting Dream forward Angel Reese, Clark's college rival, and the resounding cheers for the former Iowa star during player introductions.
Indiana came into the game allowing 89 points per game, the third most in the league.
Against the Dream, however, Indiana swarmed and harassed shooters all night and it paid off. Atlanta shot 34% from the field, 29% on 3s, committed 11 turnovers and lost the rebounding battle 35-30, and the Fever had two key blocks during a 16-3 third-quarter run that gave them control of the game.
White described the defensive effort as the expected standard. Clark described it another way.
“The way we played as a team was great, and we've got to keep doing that,” she said. “This group is connected. We hadn't been playing our best basketball, and even though we played it for one game tonight that doesn't mean we are where we want to be. But it also shows what we're capable of and what we can do, and I think it spoke a lot to the character of the people we have on the team.”
The least surprised person in Gainbridge Fieldhouse might have been Atlanta coach Karl Smesko.
“I have a feeling we're not going to play the same team that played the game a few days ago,” he predicted before the game. “You have time to get together, regroup. I'm sure they're motivated to play their best basketball right now, so I think we have to be ready to play the best version of Indiana, which is one of the best teams in the league.”
Kelsey Mitchell and Aliyah Boston, both All-Stars, said they expected this kind of performance, especially after having so many days to make corrections. Indiana visits New York on Saturday.
“From our last day in Portland, from the time we hopped on the plane as a group, our energy shifted,” Mitchell said. “I think when you have hard conversations as a group, you pour into one another, you get days like this because you did the work the right way. For us, it was about using this week for the right stuff.”
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