Caitlin Clark Changing The Popularity Of WNBA And Indiana Fever

INDIANAPOLIS — Caitlin Clark is already aware of her place in sports and the WNBA. The Indiana Fever guard hasn’t even played a professional game yet and is already among the World’s most popular athletes. She recently signed a reported eight-year, $28 million endorsement deal with Nike — her brand is growing rapidly after dominating the sports news cycle for nearly two months.

The Fever are seeing massive ticket demand as a result of Clark’s arrival. There were more than 6,000 fans at the team’s draft party earlier this month who just wanted to watch the franchise select Clark, and the media presence after team practices this week is over 10 times greater than what it has been in past seasons. The buzz around Clark and the team is massive.

“I think that just shows the excitement regarding our team,” Clark said this week of the number of people at the draft party and the team’s growing popularity. She expects a big attendance number for Indiana’s preseason opener on Friday in Dallas.

The Fever are looking forward to having large crowds at their games. Veteran guard Erica Wheeler thinks that Fever outings will have some of the biggest attendance numbers she’s seen since Wheeler battled UConn in college while at Rutgers University. NaLyssa Smith remembers playing in front of smaller crowds at Indiana Farmers Coliseum during her rookie season with the Fever. Now, that will look a lot different.

It won’t just be the home crowds that are massive. The demand for tickets to see Clark and the Fever play in non-Indiana markets is high. The Las Vegas Aces are playing a home game against the Fever in T-Mobile Arena instead of Michelob Ultra Arena to accommodate about 6,000 more fans. The Washington Mystics will host Indiana for one game this season in Capital One Arena instead of Entertainment & Sports Arena. That change will up the total capacity by about 16,000 fans.

Fans in Chicago are petitioning for something similar to happen. Clark and the Fever will be popular wherever they go, and that could change the landscape of the WNBA.

“The day she declared, we immediately started selling tickets,” Fever general manager Lin Dunn said after the 2024 WNBA Draft. “From the business side, she’s already had a great impact on the excitement in this city… She’s just created this unbelievable attention. But she’s earned it. Look what she’s done.”

Clark averaged 31.6 points and 8.9 assists per game in her final collegiate season. She became the NCAA Division I men’s and women’s all-time leading scorer that season, which boosted her status significantly.

Clark explained that she’s still in a hotel in Indianapolis as she acclimates to her move to a new city. She likes Indianapolis — the city’s size and speed are fitting for Clark and how she likes to live.

“Just have a quiet presence about me. I mean, I don’t really go out in public and do much,” she shared after her first official practice with the Fever. Clark said her free time consists of recovery and watching movies — she brought her PlayStation 5 to Indy but hasn’t hooked it up yet.

Her life has changed significantly due to her skill and popularity. She was a star in college basketball for years, but after Clark’s Iowa Hawkeyes had a dramatic run to the NCAA Title game during her junior season, things changed.

“Probably after my junior year of basketball in college. But it’s kind of grown on a level that’s a lot different than what it was then,” Clark said when asked about the moment her life became different and abnormal. “I probably still don’t really go about my life in the way that I probably should. I still try to do normal things and live as a normal person,” she added before joking that she has a security team that follows her around now.

That level of popularity comes with a ton of off-court experiences. Clark has appeared on Saturday Night Live, signed with Nike and will get a signature shoe, and will be an executive producer for a show, among many other things. She’s in countless commercials and has become one of the planet’s most recognizable athletes.

That will change everything for the Fever and the WNBA. Indiana hasn’t made the playoffs since 2016 and has ranked bottom-two in attendance in each of the last two seasons. That will certainly change this year.

“I think there’s gonna be a lot of new fans coming into the WNBA. There’s already a lot of fans here,” Clark said. “Just continuing to grow that and attract that and keep those fans will be super important.”

The star guard is aware of her status and what it means for her and the Fever. But she has carried herself well in recent weeks and will hope to translate that to the court when Indiana’s season begins next month.