The ‘Caitlin Clark Effect’ comes to College Park for Maryland women’s basketball vs. No. 3 Iowa

EVANSTON, Ill. — Maryland women’s basketball last sold out Xfinity Center in December 2016. On Saturday, the Terps are again expected to host a capacity crowd of 17,950 — but under very different circumstances.

The last sellout crowd saw fourth-ranked Maryland lose a nailbiter to top-ranked UConn in a battle of unbeaten teams. This time, the Terps won’t have a number next to their name — they sit at 12-9 overall, 4-6 in Big Ten play and are tied for eighth in the conference standings. But the environment will be no less electric because Maryland’s opponent, No. 3 Iowa (20-2, 9-1), is the biggest show in women’s basketball — if not all of college sports — thanks to star Caitlin Clark.

“[Clark is] a transcendent talent,” said Chuck Douglas, a Maryland alum and former NBA executive with the Washington Wizards. “She’s bigger than the game, and you can count on one hand how many players, men or women, that you could ever say that about.”

The greatness of Caitlin Clark

Clark, a senior guard, is leading the country in scoring at 32 points per game. Southern California’s JuJu Watkins, in second place, averages 25.8. The difference between Clark and Watkins (6.2) is the same as the difference between Watkins and the 28th highest scoring player on the list, LSU’s Angel Reese (19.6).

Clark just passed Kelsey Mitchell for the second-most career points in NCAA women’s basketball history, and she is on track to become the all-time leader in four games.

The Iowa star isn’t putting the ball in the hoop like other top scorers, though. Clark has taken 275 3-point shots this season, 88 more than second-place Dyaisha Fair of Syracuse — and many of those attempts have come from far behind the roughly 22-foot 3-point line.

“You have to guard her when she comes over half court,” Northwestern coach Joe McKeown said.

Clark has changed the dimensions of the court with her long-range shooting and her dynamic passing, which has her leading the nation in assists at 7.6 per game.

“Caitlin Clark is playing ‘Guitar Hero’ on level expert, and everyone else is playing it on level easy,” said Meghan McKeown, a Big Ten women’s basketball color commentator. “That’s how I would describe her passing.”

Her well-rounded offensive skill set forces opposing defenses into the ultimate lose-lose scenario; guard her too tightly and she’ll find her teammates. Play off of her, and she’ll score at will.

“You have to try something against her,” said Debbie Antonelli, a national women’s basketball analyst. “And I don’t think any of these strategies work against her, because she’s that good.”

The ‘Caitlin Clark Effect’

The expected sellout at Xfinity Center is nothing new. All seven of the Hawkeyes’ true road games have sold out, with opposing arenas seeing an average increase in attendance of over 150%.

“The women’s game is as popular as it’s ever been,” Douglas said. “[Clark is] part of the reason for that.”

Iowa’s game at Northwestern on Wednesday was perhaps the most striking example yet, as the Wildcats averaged a Big Ten-worst 1,671 fans per home game before the Iowa matchup. A crowd of 7,039 greeted Clark’s arrival, the vast majority of whom were decked out in Hawkeye gear.

At Northwestern, fans even bought season tickets for the sole purpose of attending the Iowa game — and it turned into a fantastic financial decision. Patience Vanderbush and Rosalie Dominik, Northwestern women’s basketball alums, bought two season tickets in a reserved section for $99 each. For the Iowa game, those seats were selling for a minimum of $600.

The Iowa-Maryland game will see a similar story. The cheapest tickets for the Terps’ four remaining home games outside of Iowa cost an average of $4. For the Iowa game, the cheapest tickets are $95, and some lower bowl tickets are selling for over $1,500.

Clark in College Park

But for all of Clark’s accomplishments, Saturday’s game presents one hurdle she hasn’t overcome: winning at Xfinity Center, where she is 0-2. Iowa hasn’t beaten Maryland in College Park since the Terps joined the Big Ten.

Maryland took down Iowa in Clark’s freshman year en route to their sixth Big Ten regular-season title in seven years. The Hawkeyes returned in February 2023, and the Terps again ran them out of the gym with a 96-68 shellacking, holding Clark to 5-for-13 shooting.

After that game, Iowa coach Lisa Bluder called the 9,065 fans “one of the smaller crowds that we’ve went against” and said they were not a factor in her team’s performance. Bluder’s comments stoked the fire of the rivalry between the perennial Big Ten powerhouses.

“They’ll probably heckle the crap out of [Clark] every time she touches the ball,” said Austin Boroshok, who runs “TerpTalk,” a popular Maryland women’s basketball fan account on X, formerly Twitter.

The Terps have lost six of nine games entering Saturday’s contest, but even those struggles can’t suck the life out of what has perhaps become the Big Ten’s best rivalry, as the two schools have combined to win the past five Big Ten Tournaments.

“I’m expecting it to be a pretty raucous crowd,” Boroshok said. “I don’t think it’s a secret that there’s not a lot of love lost between these two programs.”

Robbie Hodin and King Jemison are graduate students at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

No. 3 Iowa at Maryland

Saturday, 8 p.m.

TV: Fox