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USA Today via Reuters

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  Debate

Debate

Is Sheryl Swoopes' silence on Caitlin Clark's achievements a sign of deeper issues in the WNBA?

After a victory over the Atlanta Dream, Caitlin Clark once again is close to breaking another record. She has the same number of 3-pointers made by a rookie as Dream’s Rhyne Howard (85). The performances have silenced many after the initial criticism, and Sheryl Swoopes, who is usually not shy about criticizing the Fever rookie, chose to remain silent on another milestone achieved by Clark.

The 22-year-old added another accolade by being the WNBA Eastern Conference Player of the Week. During the third quarter of the game featuring Aces and Wings, she was on air when her co-commentator, Ron Thulin, spoke about the accolades, hyping up Caitlin Clark’s 25 points average and Napheesa Collier, who was the Western Conference Player of the Week. He would later continue to speak about the game where the Wings player made the bucket.

That was the exact time when Sheryl Swoopes broke her silence and spoke about the game. In her defense, it was not that she ignored Caitlin Clark’s first-time POTW award in favor of Collier. She was silent the entire time until the play resumed. And the rookie’s fan account, Clark Report, caught the silence and uploaded the 50-second clip.

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After the Olympic break, Caitlin Clark picked up from where she left off. In the Fever’s three games, Clark ranked third among all players in the WNBA for scoring as she averaged 25.0 points per game to go along with 9.0 assists and 5.0 rebounds per contest, as the Fever surpassed their 2023 win total with 10 games left in the season.

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Even with all the success, the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer doesn’t get credited for the success. Sheryl Swoopes recently credited 3 other Indiana stars but not Clark for their performance this year.

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Is Sheryl Swoopes' silence on Caitlin Clark's achievements a sign of deeper issues in the WNBA?

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Caitlin Clark, the central figure in the back-and-forth between Sheryl Swoopes and the ESPN veteran analyst

During the Queens of the Court podcast, Swoopes highlighted the efforts and improvements of three Fever players over Caitlin Clark. “I was giving credit to Lexie Hull, Aliyah Boston, Kelsey Mitchell because seriously, they played exceptional basketball, ” said Swoopes. Mitchell tops the scoring for Indiana with (18.2), while Boston leads them in rebounds (9.2). Hull is showing significant growth from her bench duties, but ignoring Caitlin Clark was certainly a choice.

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Stephen A. Smith was not a fan of the choice from the WNBA legend. “There is no woman, no matter how great you were as a player, Sheryl Swoopes, there is no woman who should negate mentioning Caitlin Clark and what Caitlin Clark is doing for the game,” the ESPN veteran spoke on his YouTube channel.

Amidst all the discussion, the Fever team continues to break records. They broke the NBATV WNBA viewership record on Sunday in their matchup vs. the Lynx (569k). This makes it the 14th game out of 16 games where Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever have broken the viewership records of different networks like NBATV, ABC, or ESPN this year. It will be interesting to see in the future which feat this rookie power will surpass next.

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