As Caitlin Clark noted, WNBA While she has certainly had great success in that regard thus far, she has struggled to bring about wins for the Fever. Friday’s win against the SparksThe game, which included a crucial 3-pointer from Clark, was Indiana’s first win of the season.
Indiana will face the Sparks before hosting the Aces in Las Vegas on Saturday, marking their third road game in four days after the Fever lost to the Storm in Seattle on Wednesday.
All of this happened after the Fever essentially alternated their first four games against the New York Liberty and Connecticut Sun, two of the best three teams in last season’s record.
To call this a grueling schedule would be an insult. In fact, a better description might be unprecedented. As ESPN’s Rebecca Lobo pointed out, this marks only the second time in nearly two decades that the Fever have opened a season by playing 11 games over a 20-day period.
context: Indiana Fever the only Follow This season, the team is scheduled to play 11 games in a 20-day span. This has only happened once since 2007, when the 2011 Mystics went 1-10 during that same span and finished the season with a 6-28 record (last in the Eastern Division). (Research by Mackenzie Kramer) https://t.co/FwEWzLRDNR
— Rebecca Lobo (@RebeccaLobo) May 24, 2024
This wasn’t a hard thing to foresee for the Fever when the schedule was announced, but predicting it is one thing and seeing it come to fruition is quite another.
According to Massey RatingsHeading into Friday’s game against Los Angeles, the Fever have their second-toughest schedule of the season, with only Chicago, who have played three games against last season’s top four teams, ranking higher than them.
The Fever’s three away games are tied for the most of any team this year, and they’ll be alone at the top of that list when the series wraps up Saturday night. That’ll be the toughest start, charter plane or not.
The effects of that have been numerous for the Fever squad, but none have been more noticeable than the fact they have yet to practice since the season began, a fact Indiana coach Christy Sides has mentioned several times this season.
Ahead of Monday’s match against the Sun, Said was asked if she knew when the next or first training session would be, but her focus was on finally giving her players some rest.
“I’m looking forward to giving the guys a day off next Sunday,” Sides said. “This young group is competing hard. They’re learning. I love this group of guys. They’ve grown together since starting last year. It’s a really tough situation for them, but I appreciate their competitive spirit and their ability to stay positive. That can be hard.”
It would be a bit naive to think this schedule wasn’t planned by the WNBA. Of the Fever’s five away games after this weekend, four are against last season’s top three teams in the league, all in Los Angeles, arguably the league’s largest market.
Caitlin Clark is a player who draws attention to her games, and an ideal start to the season for her to maximize the crowds she can draw would include New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, all of which are locations where Clark and the Fever will play their first seven games.
Indiana will end up having a long break. After this opening 11-game series, which concludes on Sunday, June 2 in New York, the Fever will be off until Friday, June 7. At that point, the schedule will be much more “normal,” with multiple days between games, practice time and rest days.
But to get there, the franchise will need to overcome one of the toughest schedules in recent league history.
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