Getty Caitlin Clark
As the most famous rookie the WNBA has ever seen, Caitlin Clark has faced no shortage of takes from the media, fans, and basketball community. “She needs to shoot more” might be a new one, but it comes from her coach, Christie Sides.
Her comments came after the Indiana Fever lost, 89-77, to the Seattle Storm on Thursday night, June 28. The loss dropped Indiana to 7-12 and was their second in a row after unreeling a four-game winning streak in mid-June.
Clark had 15 points, 7 assists, and 6 turnovers for the Fever, taking only 9 shots from the field.
“Caitlin Clark needs to shoot a minimum of 15 shots a game for us,” Sides said, according to ESPN’s Michael Voepel. “She’s got to get shots, and we’ve got to do a better job of setting her up, setting some really good screens for her to get her open.”
Of course, that’s difficult when Clark is at the top of every opponent’s scouting report. She often faces the other team’s best defender, which has no doubt contributed to her record-breaking turnover pace.
“The way people guard her, it’s tough,” Sides added. “Once the ball is out of her hands, she is setting up the rest of our team for some really great looks. She’s getting some pretty good looks [for herself] off the ball. But we like her on the ball, so we have to figure out how to manage the two.”
Caitlin Clark Assesses Her Own Game
Clark may be a rookie, but she’s a student of the game. Never one to shy away from critiquing her own performance, Clark did just that after the Fever’s loss on Thursday.
“I could definitely be a little more aggressive to the basket,” she said. “But I think I’m just going to try to take what the defense gives me and try to set my teammates up for success, too.”
Against Seattle, the defense gave Indiana a bevy of ball screens, as Clark explained. She does not think her team took advantage of the mismatches that came as a result.
“We played out of a lot of ball screens tonight,” she said. “So when you’re getting doubled on a ball screen, you’re always going to give it up. It should create an advantage for us 4-on-3 attacking the basket. But I didn’t think we played too well out of our ball screens tonight.”
Clark also addressed her turnover numbers, which are cruising toward the WNBA’s all-time single-season record.
“The biggest thing for me is like, once I get in [the paint], I still get a little indecisive,” she told the media. “And that’s honestly where a lot of my turnovers are still coming from.”
Caitlin Clark Does Not Even Take the Most Shots on Her Team
Clark enters the WNBA out of Iowa, where she was a bona fide star for four seasons. As Voepel mentions in his story, Clark averaged better than 20 shots per game during her college career and 22.7 her senior season.
It’s natural to expect just about any rookie to take the backseat to a veteran teammate, but Clark isn’t “any” rookie. She’s taking 12.2 shots per game, second on the team to Kelsey Mitchell’s 13.4.
To be fair, Mitchell is an All-Star and the best, most established player on the Fever right now. She’s averaged more than 18 points per game the last two seasons and is shooting better than 40% from three in that time. As a seven-year vet, one could argue she should be taking the most shots.
The other way to look at it is that if Sides gets her wish and Clark begins taking 15-or-more shots per game, it means the team is doing a better job of getting her looks. Her turnover numbers would naturally decrease and it stands to reason her so-so shooting percentages would tick up as well.
Clark is a team player, so she’s not going to say publicly what Sides said on Thursday. However, she must know that the easier her job is, the better it is for the team as a whole.