Caitlin Clark broke the WNBA record for assists in a game with 19 in the Indiana Fever’s 101-93 road loss to the Dallas Wings on Wednesday night, the final game league-wide prior to the month-long Olympic break.
The previous single-game assist record was 18 by Courtney Vandersloot for Chicago on Aug. 31, 2020. Vandersloot also had 18 in a playoff game on Sept. 28, 2021.
Clark, the No. 1 pick in the 2024 draft and NCAA Division I all-time scoring leader, also had 24 points on 10-for-19 shooting. She scored or assisted on 66 points for the Fever — the most in a game in WNBA history, surpassing a 65-point effort from Diana Taurasi on Aug. 10, 2006.
Clark became the second rookie in league history, joining Candace Parker in 2008, to score or assist on 50 or more points in multiple games.
Her career high for assists in college at Iowa was 18 at Penn State on January 25, 2022, while her previous WNBA season high was 13, set four times. The most recent was in a 95-86 victory over Phoenix on Friday night.
Clark’s stat line marked the second 20-point, 15-assist game in league history, with the other belonging to Vandersloot in 2018. It was Clark’s third game with 20-plus points and 10-plus assists; only Angel McCoughtry in 2009 had ever recorded such a game before as a rookie.
“She’s gonna say it means nothing, but I think it’s pretty cool,” teammate Aliyah Boston, who finished with a career-high 28 points, said of Clark’s accomplishment.
“I just try to set my teammates up for success,” said Clark, who had nine dimes to Boston alone and helped the Fever score 62 points in the paint. “I think at times I can almost overpass … especially with AB, I’m just looking to set her up so much. My eyes are just always on our post players.”
Clark is the first rookie and ninth player overall in WNBA history with at least 400 points and 200 assists in a season. Chelsea Gray has three such seasons, Alyssa Thomas has two and six other players — Sue Bird, Jordin Canada, Natasha Cloud, Sabrina Ionescu, Courtney Williams and Vandersloot — have done it once.
Said Fever coach Christie Sides: “[Clark] has the ability and her vision to see things, and we’re just getting better and better as we play with her to be on the same page with her … 19 assists is incredible. That’s incredible.”
Following her record-breaking performance, Clark went from -1000 to -2000 odds for WNBA Rookie of the Year honors at ESPN BET, while the Sky’s Angel Reese moved from +500 to +600.
Now 26 games into the season, Clark has scored or assisted on 915 points, a rookie single-season record. Her 213 assists on the season are also second most by a rookie in league history and are approaching Ticha Penicheiro’s record of 225.
But after the game, the Fever lamented leaving Dallas without a win. Now 6-19, the Wings are in last place in the WNBA standings, and Indiana is aware that every game matters as it seeks to return to the playoffs for the first time since 2016.
“Offensively, we were able to get whatever we wanted all night it felt like. It was just our defense,” Clark said. “We gave up 28 points off turnovers, I think 20 of those were in the first half. So that really kills you to start the game, and just got to do a better job taking care of the ball. You give up 100-plus points, you’re not going to win very many games.”
The Fever fell to 11-15 following the loss and enter the Olympic break seventh in the league standings; the top eight teams make the postseason.
“It’s kind of frustrating. I feel like we’ve left two games out there that are very winnable for us going into the break, the Mystics at home and then obviously this one, and then we’ve won other matchups that are really tough for us,” Clark said. “I think that’s the biggest area for our team to grow. These last 14 games of the year, you can’t leave these opportunities on the table.”
Clark, Boston and teammate Kelsey Mitchell will next head to Phoenix to participate in the 2024 WNBA All-Star Game on Saturday, where the trio and the rest of Team WNBA will face the U.S. Olympic team.
ESPN Stats & Information and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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