Las Vegas Aces and Seattle Storm pull nearly 1 million viewers for WNBA playoff matchup

Scaling up from record viewership this season in the WNBA, a first-round playoff matchup between the Las Vegas Aces and Seattle Storm became the second-most watched postseason game since 2003.

It’s not just Caitlin Clark. After Clark and the Indiana Fever averaged 1.84 million viewers in Game 1 against the Connecticut Sun on Sunday to become the most-watched postseason game since 2003, MVP A’ja Wilson helped draw another record audience on Tuesday night in Sin City.

The clinching game between the Aces and Storm averaged 988,000 viewers as Wilson put up 24 points and 13 rebounds to lead the reigning back-to-back WNBA champions to the second round.

The game drew 110,000 more viewers than last year’s deciding Game 4 of the WNBA Finals, in which Wilson and the Aces clinched their second straight championship.

While Clark and Indiana face Connecticut in Game 2 on Wednesday night in what is sure to draw another huge audience mark (especially with no NFL to match up against), it’s clear attention is up around the WNBA beyond the No. 1 overall pick. Las Vegas’ second-round series will be a Finals rematch with the New York Liberty. If last year’s Finals viewership is any indication, that series will be a big draw as well.

The narrative around how much credit Clark deserves for the sport’s growth has followed her for nearly two years. While reigning NCAA champion head coach Dawn Staley made a point to say after the tournament that Clark is the rising tide lifting all boats, many others in the WNBA world have taken issue with that characterization.

Putting it all on Clark is reductive, to be sure. For years, everything from bad broadcast windows to limited shoulder programming to, of course, sexism got in the league’s way.

Regardless of how the league got here, though, the uptick in audience is not limited to Clark and her Fever.

[ Sports Media Watch ]

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