Fever Coach Christie Sides Sends Clear Message to Caitlin Clark

The Indiana Fever came back from the Olympic break on a hot streak. After a sound defeat over the Phoenix Mercury, the Fever won their second straight game with a decisive 92-75 victory over the Seattle Storm.

As for Fever guard Caitlin Clark, who's fresh off her first vacation in over a year, she's playing lights out. After extending her own rookie record with a 10th double-double against the Mercury, scoring 29 points with 10 assists, she put up 22 points and 9 assists against the Storm, smashing the WNBA's rookie season record for assists.

The Fever have 12 more regular season matchups and head coach Christie Sides needs Clark, who's averaging a league-leading 8.3 assists per game, to play in all of them. After Clark received a fifth technical against the Storm, she's two fouls away from a one-game suspension. After the game, Sides delivered a strong message on how she'll handle the situation with Clark.

"Yeah, no. We’re gonna have a conversation," Sides said. "I don’t need Caitlin to sit out a game. That is definitely going be conversation."

At the same time, Sides doesn't want to strip the intensity from Clark's game. "She’s just a fiery competitor. I mean, I don’t want to take that away from her. That's the difference in who she is."

The technical Clark received was questionable at best. After missing a three-pointer, she was penalized for punching the padded back of the basket. Clark disagreed with the ref's call, but looked at the situation as glass half-full. The 22-year-old used her anger as fuel.

"I thought we got a lot better after he did that so I wanna thank him," she told reporters after the game.

Hopefully, Clark, arguably the most important player on the Fever's roster, can avoid racking up any more techs. With the Fever (13-15) sitting in seventh place, they are currently in position to make the playoffs.

Next up, the Fever travel to face on the Minnesota Lynx on Saturday, August 24.

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