A year ago the showdown between college rivals Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark was all the talk of the town and a huge part of the reason why anyone started watching the WNBA. Now here we are over a year later and the Chicago vs. Indiana game comes and goes and neither one of those girls even plays in the game at all.
Chicago didn't exactly have the "team turnaround" that Indiana did with the addition of a star college player in Angel Reese, and they are terrible and remain terrible. So even without Caitlin Clark, Indiana quite easily dismantled Chicago and went on to what appeared after just the first quarter to be certain victory.
I do find it is a bit odd that these two stars from college were hyped so much and their rivalry with one another even more so but the interaction between them in the pros hasn't really been the "Magic vs. Bird" showdown that the league was hoping. Reese hasn't actually been very good and is regularly subjected to a great deal of deserved scrutiny about how her stats outside of rebounds are pretty terrible. There is a new term that was created just for her that I had never heard before called "mebounds" where as I am sure you can guess, is where someone rebounds their own missed shot.
The rivalry was more talk than it was actual action though and not many of their matchups have been very competitive with Indiana blowing Chicago out of the water most of the time.
This time around though, Neither Clark nor Reese were even playing. What was the attendance and TV audience like during this game? I don't know, because I too didn't bother to watch it and the league will almost certainly keep this a secret as well since for whatever reason they don't like to admit that a very large portion of their audience is dependent upon 1 or 2 players of the league actually being on the court.
This isn't to say that the game was necessarily boring, it wasn't. The highlights are pretty solid and this is especially true about Kelsey Mitchel, who put down 35 points in the game.
Mitchell has been playing for the Fever since 2018 and it is ok if you didn't know that until the past few years since almost no one was watching the WNBA at all before then. The really cool thing about her performance is that she is one of the shorter people in the league and that her stats actually saw a bit of a boost once Caitlin started playing for Indiana. This year still has around 18 more games (at least) in it and Kelsey has her best ever PPG since entering the WNBA.
Another point of note was the fact that, and I am probably more proud of myself for making this prediction 6 games ago, Sophie Cunningham has apparently replaced Lexie Hull in the starting lineup for Indiana. She has been doing well lately but unfortunately this last game vs Sky was not her best work as she went 1-6 on 3's and those were her only shots attempted on the night with nearly 31 minutes of playtime.
It is good to see that Indiana can actually play without Clark on the court, but I think it would be better for everyone involved if she was to get back in there as soon as possible.
I am sure it was a real letdown to the fans that went to the game for Sky vs. Fever to not have either of the newly crowned stars in the game. For both teams though I think it is shown that they can still play around the same level without them but unfortunately for Chicago they seem to be pretty terrible with or without Reese in the game.
For Clark fans it looks like it could be another disappointing week as she is listed as questionable as for whether or not she will play later in the week vs Phoenix. For Chicago fans, well, it is has been a disappointing month with only 2 wins at all. This is unlikely to change in the rest of the season as well.