The red-hot Indiana Fever seems to be cooling down, at least where the Las Vegas Aces are concerned. The MVP favorite of the season, A’ja Wilson, created history the last time these two teams met. By surpassing Jewell Loyd’s single-season scoring record (939), Wilson’s 956 points top the W right now. Pundits are speculating that she might even reach 1000 points, but whatever Wilson does, her Aces remain dominant over the Fever. But does the Indiana head coach Christie Sides have a plan to tackle this issue?

The WNBA Coach of the Month for August has more than done her part for the team by pushing the Fever to the playoffs for the first time since 2016. But this Friday, the team faces an old foe from Las Vegas that’s looking to sweep them with four wins. In a recent video posted by the team’s YouTube page, Sides praises Wilson, “She’s so talented and she just makes it really hard in whatever actions they put her in for us to guard.”

But she remains hopeful that “we’ll be able to slow her down a little bit. But we can’t let those players that come off the bench have the success that they had the other night.” The duo of forward Alysha Clark and guard Tiffany Hayes combined for 26 of the Aces’ 30 bench points while Indiana just managed 11.

The Aces currently rank 4th in defensive rating, but A’ja Wilson’s offense carries them. Clearly, Christie Sides has some work to do with the Fever. The Head Coach also said of Wilson, “She’s looking to attack all the time, and now she’s able to hit that high post jumper, even step out. They’re running inverted actions for her when they’re putting her in staggers, putting her in pin-downs. So that’s different for a post to have to guard those actions.”

The Las Vegas team took this victory from the Fever as their straight 14th win, strong playoff contenders looking for a three peat. But as for tonight’s game, Indiana at least wants to avoid another loss and a clean sweep. Sides had said after the last game, “They are very physical. But we still took a lot of wide-open shots, they just didn’t fall for us.”

But even with the head coach trying her best to make the team playoff-worthy, Christie Sides has been facing flak from fans.

As Indiana Fever gets ready for the postseason, Christie Sides comes under fanfire

A third straight loss to Las Vegas was something no Indiana Fever fan wanted to see. Not after their fiery form post-Olympics. And even though she had just been named the Coach of the Month. a first for the franchise, a section of social media has been calling for Christie Sides to leave her coaching role.

In that last game, late rotation decisions with Kristy Wallace and Katie Lou Samuelson didn’t go well for the home team. The two, along with Damiris Dantas, seemed to be struggling to get comfortable on the court. Sides admitted later, “We’re trying to make those adjustments. What’s hard is, this is kind of the way we’ve been playing. Caitlin, Kelsey (Mitchell), they’ve been playing those kinds of minutes, so it’s just really hard to try to keep that momentum and flow going.”

While it was a rare off-night for Caitlin Clark, everyone knows she’s capable of stepping up when needed. The question is, can the rest of the team step up their game in time? “This is a playoff series for us. That’s how we’re playing it. So, we need to win. We’ve got to make those adjustments coming in on Friday and try to get that win on Friday,” Christie Sides continued.