The worst-kept secret in women’s basketball has been revealed. Caitlin Clark, the former Iowa Hawkeye sensation, has been chosen No. 1 by the Indiana Fever in the 2024 WNBA draft.
“I know the Indiana Hoosiers didn’t love me too much during my career,” she said of Iowa’s Big Ten rivals. “But hopefully we can turn them into Fever fans. I couldn’t be more excited to get there.”
Clark was selected by the same team that took former South Carolina forward Aliyah Boston with the No. 1 pick a year ago. Clark and Boston joked at the beginning of the 2023-24 college basketball season that they could be teammates one day. Now they are.
She joins a Fever team that is coming off a forgettable year that saw the franchise miss the playoffs for the seventh consecutive season and finish in the basement of the Eastern Conference with a record of 13-27.
Clark’s four years at Iowa were spent shooting logo 3-pointers, rewriting the basketball record books and changing the perception of women’s college basketball. She ended her college career with 3,951 points, the most all-time in men’s and women’s college basketball, and holds the single-season scoring record for women’s basketball at 1,234 points. Iowa advanced to the title game for the second year in a row but lost to Dawn Staley’s South Carolina.
The Gamecocks’ 87-75 championship victory was the most-watched women’s basketball game ever at 18.7 million viewers. The 2023 title bout between Iowa and LSU totaled 9.9 million viewers.
WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert told Sportico in March that Clark joining the league “couldn’t have come at a better time.”
The hope this year is that Clark will boost WNBA viewership, as she is part of a star-studded draft class that includes Angel Reese, Cameron Brink, Kamilla Cardoso and others. The league’s media rights are up for renewal after the 2025 season. Last week, the WNBA released its 2024 broadcast schedule, with 36 of the Fever’s 40 games set for national TV.
Clark’s Iowa team set a litany of records on and off the court during the 2023-24 season. Iowa sold out every home game and helped sell out venues on the road. The Big Ten women’s tournament was sold out for the first time in league history. Now the WNBA’s challenge becomes figuring out how it capitalizes on and markets one of the most anticipated college players to enter the league in its nearly three-decade existence.
Some teams have begun preparing for Clark’s WNBA arrival before she was even drafted. The Las Vegas Aces shifted their game against the Fever from Michelob Ultra Arena to the larger T-Mobile Arena, which holds 20,000. The Phoenix Mercury have promoted their matchup with Indiana, which would pit Clark against Diana Taurasi, the WNBA’s all-time leading scorer.
Sponsors have been calling Clark’s name for quite some time leading up to the draft, and that will only continue as a pro. She’s worn Nike shoes throughout college—Iowa is a Nike-sponsored school—but now she is free to sign with whichever company she pleases. She will likely have a variety of options to choose from.
Clark inked an NIL deal a month before the draft with financial services company Gainbridge, which is also the naming rights sponsor of the Fever’s home arena.
She also has trading card and signed memorabilia exclusivity with Panini America, which will see her make over $1 million in the first year of a multiyear deal. The record for the highest women’s basketball card sold at auction also belongs to Clark at $78,000, according to Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA).
The Fever begin the 2024 season on the road against the Connecticut Sun on May 14. Clark makes her home debut in Indiana against the New York Liberty on May 16.
