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    • Caitlin Clark’s rookie WNBA season ends with playoff loss to Sun
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    Caitlin Clark’s rookie WNBA season ends with playoff loss to Sun

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    UNCASVILLE, Conn. — With four minutes left in what would be the final game of one of the most remarkable 11 1/2 months an athlete has ever had, Caitlin Clark made one last, stunning 3-pointer. The furious rally she had orchestrated had arrived in a most unexpected place: Her Indiana Fever had taken the lead, 71-70, over the Connecticut Sun in Game 2 of their WNBA playoff series.

    What were we actually watching? Would Clark do what so many of us had seen her do in college at Iowa, reach back-to-back NCAA finals and become the leading scorer in Division I history on both the men’s and women’s teams? And do it again over the past four and a half months as a rookie pro in Indiana, overcoming a brutal early schedule and a terrible start to lead the Fever to a surprising playoff berth?

    Would Clark lead another team to an improbable victory and send this series into a decisive third game?

    The answer this time was No, not quite. Not this time. The Sun proved to be just too good, just too experienced and just too relentless, beating the Fever 87-81.

    But when Clark made that three-pointer, and then again nearly a minute and a half later, when she found Aliyah Boston from underneath for a layup to put the Fever up 2-2 (75-73) with 2:41 left, anything seemed possible for the 22-year-old who has taken the country by storm with her tightrope walking act on the basketball court.

    Instead, the most unexpected and spectacular near-year-long run in women’s sports history is over. From Iowa’s outdoor exhibition game at Kinnick Stadium on Oct. 15, 2023, to Wednesday night, all the records, all the historic television ratings, all the unprecedented sellouts: it’s over. Clark is now done playing basketball in front of the public. She’ll likely be gone until next May. It’s a very strange thought, isn’t it?

    If many of us think this will take some getting used to, imagine how Clark feels.

    “It’s definitely different for me,” she said after the game. “Basketball really took over my life for a year, so I think it’s good for me to reflect on everything that’s happened. I feel like I haven’t even had time to really reflect on my college career because it went by so quickly, and then I came here and tried to give everything I could to this team and move on and put all that behind me and help this team get back to the playoffs.

    “So I’m excited to take some time for myself and really enjoy it and reflect. And you know, it’s been special. There’s a lot of things that this group accomplished that a lot of people probably didn’t think were possible going into the season. So it’s definitely going to be a little weird for me over the course of the first couple weeks. And then I’m sure I’ll get bored and pick up basketball again.”

    Clark led all scorers with 25 points, with nine assists and six rebounds. It was a night of great highs for her and ultimately a sad low.

    “It’s obviously a tough one, especially since we came all the way back and definitely had our chances in the final period, and then we had a couple different misses, and it’s another two-possession game,” she said. “We couldn’t quite get over the hump there. … It’s a good taste of what’s possible for this organization and for this franchise. And there’s a lot to keep our heads up. We’re a young group, a pretty inexperienced group, but we came together and had a lot of fun together.”

    Then she got a little wistful. “That’s the worst part sometimes, when you feel like you’re really playing your best basketball. Then it has to stop, but like I said, proud of this group. We stayed resilient all year and had a lot of fun together.”

    It was natural to ask Clark what would happen next. It’s the first time in a long time that we don’t know the answer to that question. We knew exactly what would happen next in April, after she led Iowa to the NCAA finals and lost to South Carolina. Eight days later, she became the No. 1 pick in the WNBA draft.

    And now?

    “I was focused on covering the Connecticut Sun,” she said. “I didn’t think too far ahead. I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow, I don’t know what I’m going to do the next day. Maybe play some golf. That’s what I’m going to do until it gets too cold in Indiana. I’m going to be a professional golfer.”

    Boston, representing Clark’s millions of fans, had the final say on that idea.

    “Not too much,” she said. “Keep it to basketball.”

    Editor’s Note: Christine Brennan is writing a book about Caitlin Clark and the revolution in women’s sports, to be published by Scribner in spring/summer 2025.

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