A banner afternoon for Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark — where she set the WNBA single-season rookie assist record against the Seattle Storm — wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Well, from start to finish, anyway. Eventually, competitive fire kicked in, as did a little exasperation from the dynamic guard.
After missing a shot on the other end of the court in the third quarter, the ball went out of play with Clark defending. Clark wasn’t happy with herself and slapped the stanchion in frustration. The referee watching Clark didn’t let this slide and gave her a technical foul for the emotional outburst.
Naturally, as almost any basketball player would do, Clark threw her hands up and disagreed with the call:
They gave Caitlin Clark a tech for this?? pic.twitter.com/MHtsNuDpAm
— WNBA Rookie Watch (@WNBARookieWatch) August 18, 2024
I understand why Clark would be upset with this ruling. A technical foul for plainly showing emotion in a competitive environment is a little silly on its face. At the same time, I don’t think she had much of a case. This is a clear tech anywhere anyone plays organized basketball. There’s showing emotion, and there’s unnecessarily losing your cool in the heat of the moment.
For this specific moment, Clark probably fitted the latter description. Sometimes, passion gets the best of all of us.
UPDATE: Here’s how the referee described this sequence with Clark.
CC says the ref told her it was “disrespectful to the game of basketball” after she got a tech for hitting the hoop base, mad at herself for missing a 3.
Compared it to when she got one for saying “damn it” in college.
Adds: “I think he fired me up to play a lot harder.” pic.twitter.com/qTCRDSgVdi
— Chloe Peterson (@chloepeterson67) August 18, 2024