The Indiana Fever selected University of Iowa superstar Caitlin Clark with the top overall pick of the WNBA draft Monday night, setting a pro stage for the game’s most transformative player.
There was absolutely no surprise when WNBA commissioner Catherine Engelbert told an ESPN audience and a packed house at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York that the remarkably popular Clark had been selected by Indianapolis.
Clark strolled into the hall rocking a two-piece Prada set, with a miniskirt and a jacket atop a midriff-baring sparkle tank.
“I always just believed in myself,” Clark told ESPN and fans. “My parents always instilled confidence in me from a young age, when I was a young girl.”
Stanford’s Cameron Brink went at No. 2 to the Los Angeles Sparks. She was overcome with emotion and warned fans in the hall: “I’m an ugly crier.”
She thanked her family and friends, including her godmother, Sonya Curry, the mother of Golden State Warriors superstar Steph Curry.
“It really takes a village. It’s not a one-person job,” Brink said. “I’m so blessed to have the people I have surrounding me.”
South Carolina’s 6-foot-7 post player Kamilla Cardoso went No. 3 to the Chicago Sky, Tennessee’s Rickea Jackson was the No. 4 pick by the Sparks, Ohio State’s Jacy Sheldon will join the Dallas Wings at No. 5, and Connecticut’s Aaliyah Edwards was selected at No. 6 by the Washington Mystics.
Angel Reese of LSU, perhaps the second-best-known player in college basketball, was the draft’s No. 7 pick, by Chicago, where she’ll team up with longtime rival Cardoso.
“I came from Baltimore. I’m not supposed to be here,” an emotional Reese said, thanking her mother and her brother for the lifetime of support.
Utah’s Alissa Pili, who is Samoan and native Alaskan, was picked at No. 8 by the Minnesota Lynx.
“A lot of indigenous and Polynesian girls don’t get to see that role model, and I’m just so blessed that I can be in a position to be that for them,” she said.
French players went Nos. 9 and 10, with Carla Leite and Leila Lacan going to the Dallas Wings and the Connecticut Sun, respectively.
The hometown New York Liberty, at No. 11, selected Marquesha Davis, from Mississippi. The last pick of the first round, by the Atlanta Dream, was Australian Nyadiew Puoch.
While a dozen players had their first-round dreams come true, Monday night belonged to Clark.
“I’m excited to get there. I’m excited to get to Indianapolis,” she said.
Even though there was no surprise with Clark’s pick, thousands of Fever fans gathered to cheer the selection.
“Caitlin is one of the most naturally gifted basketball players I have ever seen enter the WNBA from the college level,” Fever coach Christie Sides said.
“Her shooting and passing abilities captivated an entire audience of basketball fans, and her ability to make those around her better was even more evident during her collegiate career,” Sides said.
With Clark on the Fever’s roster, even casual basketball fans will be keeping a close eye on Indiana’s games.
The Fever’s first preseason game is set for May 3, against the Dallas Wings in Arlington, Texas. The team’s regular-season opener is scheduled for May 14, when Indiana visits the Connecticut Sun at Mohegan Sun Arena.
Indiana’s home opener is two days later, at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, against the New York Liberty.
The Fever finished last in the WNBA’s Eastern Conference last season, winning just 13 of 40 games. But Clark’s arrival in Indianapolis, less than 400 miles away from Iowa’s Carver-Hawkeye Arena, has already made the Fever appointment TV.
The WNBA has scheduled 36 of Indiana’s 40 games to be shown on national broadcast and streaming partners. The Fever occupied that center stage 22 times last season.
Clark’s arrival in Indiana means she’ll be paired with former South Carolina star and onetime rival Aliyah Boston.
Clark famously scored 41 points in last year’s national semifinal game, leading Iowa past Boston’s then-undefeated South Carolina.
Clark, the two-time national player of the year, just ended the most heralded career in the history of women’s college basketball. She brought unprecedented attention to the women’s game.
She scored 30 points in the NCAA championship game, ending her career with 3,951 points, more than anyone else in the history of top-flight college basketball.
But it was Clark’s dynamic style of play that captured the public’s imagination and brought record attention.
In Iowa’s national semifinal victory over perennial powerhouse Connecticut, an average of 14.2 million viewers tuned into ESPN — the most for any basketball game, college or pro, on the all-sports channel.
Then, two days later, more than 18.9 million viewers watched No. 1-seeded South Carolina score sweet revenge and topple Clark’s Hawkeyes.
The men’s title game a day later, when Connecticut beat Purdue, had 14.8 million viewers, Nielsen said, marking the first time the women’s final had drawn more watchers.
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