In Indianapolis, a recent U. of Iowa grad goes the extra miles to report the Caitlin Clark story

It was like following a sports Beatlemania around the country.

“It was a cultural phenomenon,” Chloe Peterson said about covering Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever last year for the Indianapolis Star newspaper.

Two years ago, Daily Iowan sports editor Peterson took a job on the sports staff of the Star. She had covered Iowa women’s basketball for three years at the DI, culminating with the Hawkeyes’ appearance in the 2023 national title game in Dallas.

Off she went to Indianapolis to cover an assortment of things, including its WNBA team. At the time, there was no fever for the Fever. They went 13-27 in 2023, the seventh-straight year they missed the playoffs.

“Not easy to do when eight of the 12 teams qualify,” Peterson said last week.

“Then, when Caitlin got drafted, it blew up.”

In December 2023, Indiana got the first pick in the WNBA draft lottery. Four months later in Brooklyn, in perhaps the least-suspenseful No. 1 selection in the history of pro sports drafts, the franchise picked Clark. That night, the star player got reacquainted with the young woman who covered her for print and hosted her on podcasts for the DI.

“Nice to see you again,” Clark told her. They spent most of the next five months bouncing around America as excited sellout crowds were the norm wherever the Fever played. Peterson covered every game home and away. The scene everywhere was the same.

“Wherever you’d go there were Fever fans, Caitlin fans specifically,” Peterson said.

“In Los Angeles there were five sailors in uniforms who all got their hats signed by Caitlin. Every game felt like a Fever home game.

“Women’s sports were getting more and more mainstream before Caitlin came into the league, but she was a big catalyst for getting the WNBA consistently talked about.”

Indiana’s average attendance in 2023 was 4,067, which more than doubled the 2022 total. Last year, it was 17,036.

Gainbridge Fieldhouse curtained off the upper deck for Fever games before last season, a reminder of what Carver-Hawkeye Arena did for Iowa women’s games before the Clark Effect put an end to that.

Today, Clark and the Fever will be at Carver to play a preseason game against Brazil’s national team. There will be 15,000 fans, an ESPN audience, and no curtain.

Clark remains a growing, evolving national sports story. As opposed to getting her feet wet in pro ball last year with a team that rallied in the second half of the season to finish 20-20 before going out in the first round of the playoffs, she now is on a team with high aspirations.

The Fever changed head coaches, hiring Stephanie White away from the Connecticut Sun. White’s two-year record with the Sun was 55-25.

The team added veterans with pedigrees in forwards Natasha Howard and DeWanna Bonner and guard Sophie Cunningham. The Fever’s free agent additions total more than 1,100 games of WNBA experience.

Only five players from last year’s roster are back, but the big three of Clark (19.2 points per game), Kelsey Mitchell (19.2) and Aliyah Boston (14.0) are among them.

“I think the expectations are to win a championship,” Peterson said. “They talked about it a lot at (last week’s) Media Day. It’s realistic they can compete with the (2024 champion New York) Liberty and (Minnesota) Lynx.”

Nonetheless, Clark had a warning for her teammates at Media Day. It wasn’t, however, about overconfidence.

“At Media Day she was telling everyone there’s no air conditioning at Carver and there will be 15,000 fans there,” Peterson said. “She told them how hot it was in there for her graduation.”

It will be a homecoming for Peterson, too. She’s from Appleton, Wis., but cut her teeth on covering that big women’s basketball story at Iowa. By traveling to all of Clark’s games for the Star, she is flying in the face of her industry’s trend of reducing coverage and the accompanying travel expenses.

“My editor essentially said it pays for itself from how well the stories are read and the interest in general.”

Indianapolis and the 11 other WNBA cities know there is someone who is good for the U.S. economy right now. Iowa City-Coralville gets one more pot of gold from Clark today.

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com