SerpApi.Org
Caitlin Clark has faced the same kind of growing pains that come with being a WNBA rookie. The league plays faster, the defenses are a lot sharper, and every possession forces the athletes to think on a different level. But Clark’s adjustment period got way more spotlight than a typical first overall pick usually gets.
After four standout years at Iowa, the Indiana Fever got her with the first pick in the 2024 draft. She’d already made her mark in college as the NCAA’s all-time scoring leader with 3,951 points, putting up 28.4 points and 8.2 assists across 139 games.
More than that, she’d become the face of women’s college basketball’s breakout moment, and now she was bringing all that buzz straight to the WNBA. For all she’s become in the league, Clark had hinted at one aspect of the game she could see herself coming back to down the line, but it’s not actually about playing.
Clark Hints At Becoming A Coach In The Future
Caitlin Clark opened up about the differences between reading defenses in college versus the WNBA during a chat on Sue Bird’s Bird’s Eye View podcast. However, the conversation turned to Clark opening up about potentially having a future on the sidelines once her playing days were over.
She said, “Honestly, I might go back at one point in my life and coach college basketball.” It’s not really a stretch when you think about how Clark’s always approached the game. People do remember her for drilling shots from deep, but she’s always leaned just as hard on her ability to break down defenses. That’s been just as central to what makes her effective.
Whether she was running Iowa’s offense or pulling strings for the Fever, Clark’s consistently been a few steps ahead of the defense. She’s brought that same savvy to the pros, where she’s averaging 8.3 assists this season. And to be honest, her playmaking has gotten so dangerous that defenses have started planning chippy plays just to try and throw her off.
Moreover, she has got the kind of basketball IQ that naturally points toward coaching. Players who truly understand the game at this level usually end up coaching once they’re done playing. During the podcast, Caitlin Clark also talked about how one of the biggest things she had to get used to in the WNBA was how differently defenses operate. In college, she’d gotten comfortable attacking basically the same coverage year after year.
She said, “In college, I feel like all I saw was drop. I rarely saw a show, and if we saw a show, we ran this one play, it’s called ‘C,’ it’s engraved in my brain. I acted like I was coming off a ball screen. We got the post player to kind of show out.”
“I would immediately dribble back to my right… We just continued to run it for four years straight. Literally no one could catch on. Professionally? That doesn’t work,” Clark added.
Clark began to wonder why defenders in college basketball would not pressure her like the ones in the WNBA once she got there. It then dawned on her that professional players want it more, as they are faster, know how to communicate defensively, and can read her better than anyone at Iowa could.
She used to see only drop coverages in college, with the defenders sitting back close to the basket, thus giving her enough space but making sure the paint was safe. It is not the same in the WNBA league. There are show coverages that involve stepping up quickly on the screen and then recovering, thus forcing the ball handler to make quicker decisions.
