From the time she stepped foot onto the campus at the University of Iowa to her time as a professional with the Indiana Fever, Caitlin Clark has broken records left and right.
She added another one to her tally on Sunday in a 92–75 victory by the Fever over the Seattle Storm. Clark set the WNBA’s all-time rookie assists record of 225, and she did so with 12 games still left in the Fever’s regular season.
Clark finished the game with 23 points, nine assists, and five rebounds, with her third assist of the game being her 226th of the season and setting the mark. The record of 225 was held by Ticha Penicheiro, who established the rookie assists mark in the WNBA’s inaugural season of 1998 when she was with the Sacramento Monarchs.
In typical Clark fashion, the record-breaker was a beauty to behold as it was a full-court pass to Kelsey Mitchell, who caught the pass in stride and didn’t even need a dribble on her way to the rim for a layup. It came in the third quarter, which is when Clark started being more assertive with both scoring and setting up her teammates. The first overall pick of the 2024 WNBA Draft had just eight points and two assists in the first half before exploding for 15 points and seven assists in the second half.
Part of that surge in the second half can be traced back to Clark’s fiery personality, which resulted in a technical foul. Clark had just missed a three-point attempt, and then there was a stoppage in play, during which she proceeded to slap the base of the basket in frustration. One of the referees didn’t take too kindly to her being so demonstrative and gave her a technical. Seattle made the technical foul shot to cut the deficit to four points, but Indiana then outscored the Storm 49–36 over the rest of the game.
Clark was asked about that technical in her media session after the game and actually thanked the official, as it seemed to make her team play better afterward.
“I got a technical for basically being mad at myself because I missed a three, and then I went and hit the backboard,” recalled Clark.
“[The ref] told me it was disrespectful to the game of basketball, so I don’t know. It reminded me of the technical that I got in college where I said, ‘Dammit,’ where it’s like a personal frustration. It had nothing to do with my team. It had nothing to do with the refereeing. It had nothing to do with the other team; it’s just because I’m a competitor. I felt that I should have been making more shots,” she said.
“But I think he fired me up to continue to play a lot harder. I thought we got a lot better after he did that, so I want to thank him for that.”
While Clark is making her presence felt in a number of statistical categories in the WNBA, from points to assists to three-pointers, the same also goes for her technical fouls count. That was her fifth technical of the season, which trails only Diana Taurasi and Natasha Cloud, who have six each.
The Fever are likely content with Clark drawing the referee’s ire as long as it keeps resulting in wins like what they’ve been accustomed to getting recently. This was their fourth victory over their last five games and their 13th of the season. That matches their win total last year when Clark was busy setting the Iowa Hawkeyes’ single-season assists record, amongst many other marks. Another victory by Indiana would be their most in a single season since 2015, which was before Clark even entered high school.
This is just the latest record or milestone that Clark has set in her debut season in the pros. She had already set the WNBA record for most assists in a game (19) by any player and became the first rookie in league history to record a triple-double. Additionally, she tied the rookie record by making seven three-pointers in a game, set a league record for the most points scored, and assisted (66) in a single contest.
Clark currently leads the WNBA in total assists (232) and assists per game (8.3). While she’s unlikely to challenge Courtney Vandersloot’s all-time record for most assists averaged in a single season of 10 per game in 2020, Clark is on pace to break the league’s record for most assists in a single season. Alyssa Thomas set the mark last year with 316 with the Connecticut Sun, and if Clark plays in the remaining 12 games and maintains her average of 8.3 per game, then she would finish with 332 assists.
