WNBA’s Slap-on-the-Wrist Sends Wrong Message After Cheap Shot on Caitlin Clark

The WNBA did Caitlin Clark a disservice with its slap-on-the-wrist penalties in the aftermath of the skirmish in the Indiana Fever’s victory over the Connecticut Sun on Tuesday in Indianapolis. Despite her proven value to her franchise and women’s basketball, the league doesn’t have her back.Certainly, her competitors don’t understand her importance to their pocketbook, as evidenced by the cheap shot delivered by Connecticut’s Marina Mabrey in the third quarter of the game as Ms. Clark had her back turned and was covering her eye poked by the Sun’s Jacy Sheldon.In just her second game after missing five due to a quad injury, Ms. Clark fell hard to the floor as a pushing and shoving match between teams ensued.Ms. Sheldon received a Flagrant 1 for the eye poke, but Ms. Mabrey was initially assessed a technical foul for her actions and continued to play in the game. On Wednesday, Ms. Mabrey’s penalty was upgraded by the WNBA to a Flagrant-2, according to reports. But her only penalty is a fine, estimated to be $400.That’s not the message the WNBA needs to send. Ms. Mabrey should be suspended for multiple games, at least two or three, without pay. That would send a clear message that the physical, over-the-top play directed at Ms. Clark will no longer be tolerated. Instead, the WNBA took a soft approach, as if an estimated $400 fine is a deterrent to anyone thinking of blasting Ms. Clark from behind again.Indiana’s coach, Stephanie White, has complained about the lack of fouls called in favor of her team all season. She doubled down on that criticism after Saturday’s melee. “When the officials don’t get control of the ballgame and they allow this to happen — and it’s been happening all season long — this is what happens,” she said, adding, “They’ve got to get control of it. They’ve got to be better.”The eye poke by Ms. Sheldon, which occurred with the Fever leading 55-45, came as she was defending Ms. Clark and can be viewed as accidental. Ms. Mabrey’s blind-side cheap shot was not. It was the latest in several instances of physical play directed at Ms. Clark since she joined the WNBA last season after her record-breaking career at Iowa. Tennis legend Chris Evert has seen enough.“When will these ladies realize, accept, and appreciate @CaitlinClark22 is the best thing that ever happened to women’s basketball,” Ms. Evert posted on X. “This is a bad look for the sport and what’s happened to sportsmanship.”The Fever’s Sophie Cunningham, who owns a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, sought her form of retribution. She came to Ms. Clark’s defense in the final minute of the game when she grabbed Ms. Sheldon during a fast break and threw her to the ground. The hard foul caused a melee under the Connecticut basket, looking like Larry Bird trying to fight the Los Angeles Lakers back in the day. Ms. Cunningham, Ms. Sheldon, and Lindsay Allen were all ejected.The victory earned the Fever a berth in the finals of the Commissioner’s Cup Championship. They’ll visit the defending champion Minnesota Lynx to compete for the title of the in-season tournament on July 1.Ms. Clark would rather talk about that than her skirmish with the Sun. “We’re going to the Commissioner’s Cup Championship, that’s pretty exciting,” she said. “It’s a big deal. It’s a hard thing to do. We’re going to play for a pool of money, and you’re competing for a trophy. We’re proud of that.”The Fever (6-5) have won both games since Ms. Clark returned from a five-game absence that underscored her value to the league and why it can’t afford her to be sidelined by cheap shots like she endured on Tuesday. National television viewership of the WNBA dropped by 55 percent during her absences, while viewership of Fever games fell 53 percent.She scored 32 points in her first game back, helping the Fever defeat the previously unbeaten New York Liberty, 102-88, on Saturday in Indianapolis. The game against the defending champions attracted 2.2 million viewers, making it the third most-watched WNBA game ever on ABC.Before the Commissioner’s Cup final, the Fever has a challenging stretch while they’ll play five games in nine days. Ms. White hopes the officiating will improve sooner rather than later.“Their job is hard,” she said of the officials. “The game has changed so much. The game is fast now, and things are happening quickly. Everybody is getting better except the officials. We have to find a way to remedy it. I don’t know what the answer is.”

WNBA’s Slap-on-the-Wrist Sends Wrong Message After Cheap Shot on Caitlin Clark

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