The Fever drop to 12-15 going into the break, while the Wings move to 6-19.
Here are three observations:
Caitlin Clark breaks three assists records
If there’s one thing Caitlin Clark knows how to do, it’s get the ball to her teammates. Just 26 games into the season, Clark broke the Fever single-season assist record with 202 by halftime Wednesday, taking over Erica Wheeler’s one-year-old record of 201.
Clark first set the Fever single-game record with 13 assists against Chicago on June 23. She got up to 13 assists four more times since then, including as part of a triple-double against New York on July 6, but she seemingly couldn’t get that elusive 14th assist.
On Wednesday, she had 13 assists at the end of the third quarter — similar to when she set the record. Against the Sky, she didn’t record a single assist in the fourth. Against the Wings, that long-awaited 14th assist came with 8 minutes left in the game. Clark bounced the ball in-between two defenders to center Damiris Dantas, who brought the ball up for an easy layup.
Clark was full of savvy passes on Wednesday night, including behind-the-back to NaLyssa Smith, bounces to Aliyah Boston, and getting the ball out of double-teams to Lexie Hull at the 3-point line.
Still, she wasn’t done yet. She assisted on five of the Fever’s next eight shots to break 19 to raucous cheers from the Dallas Wings’ crowd — making it feel like another home game for the Fever.
Those 19 assists are a new career-high (collegiate and professional) and take home the WNBA single-game record. It tops Courtney Vandersloot’s single-game record of 18, which was set against the Fever in 2020.
Fever play catchup from lackluster first-half defense
Going into Wednesday’s game, there was one stark stat that encapsulated the Fever defense: they are 0-13 when they allow over 86 points, and 11-1 when they allow fewer than 86 points.
In the first half, it looked like Dallas was going to blow through that 86-point threshold. The Wings were easily dominating the Fever in post-up situations, using Teaira McCowan and Kalani Brown’s height to overpower the Fever. In other areas, the Fever’s defense was lackluster: for one, they tended to help too much in the middle, leaving Dallas’ 3-point shooters wide open on the edge of the court.
Connecting on both 2- and 3-pointers, Dallas cruised to a 54-point first half — the Wings’ highest-scoring half of the season. The Wings shot 57.5% from the field throughout those 20 minutes, but Indiana’s effective, 51.4% shooting only gave them an eight-point deficit at the halftime break.
There were a lot of changes, though, the Fever needed to make to have a chance at winning their final game before the Olympic break. In the third quarter, they did those thing: they limited post-up opportunities for McCowan and Brown, and held the Wings to 2-of-10 3-point shooting.
And the third quarter ended up being the best for the Fever, as they allowed 29 in the fourth to give Dallas 101 points — making it 0-14 when they allow 86 or more.
Arike Ogunbowale comes in clutch again
Last time the Fever played the Wings, it was a preseason game with a Fever team that had fewer than five official practices before heading to Dallas. Still, Indiana stayed in the game against the
Then, All-Star Arike Ogunbowale made sure to make her presence known. Tied with four seconds left back in May, she hit stepback 3-point shot to give the Wings a late lead — one the Fever couldn’t recover from, as a last-second 3-pointer from Clark was no good.
This time around, it was more of the same. With 45 seconds left, Ogunbowale hit a jumper to put the (then 5-19) Wings up two possessions. Then, surrounded by three defenders, Clark turned the ball over to give the Wings possession again.
After that, the Fever just couldn’t make a shot. They resigned to putting Dallas on the free-throw line to try and regain possession but couldn’t get the ball back in the basket themselves.
