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NY Liberty suffer first loss of season as Caitlin Clark puts on a show

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WNBA: New York Liberty at Indiana Fever
Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images

The Caitlin Clark show returned in full force on Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately for the New York Liberty, they got front row seats.

WNBA: New York Liberty at Indiana Fever
Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images

When you’re at the top of the mountain, everybody’s looking to take you down. You’re guaranteed to get everyone’s best efforts, the level of focus needed to win rises, and you have a bit less room for error. It’s pressure for sure, but it’s pressure that you’d love to have.

The New York Liberty entered their showcase game against the Indiana Fever a bit shorthanded. Jonquel Jones is recovering from a recent ankle sprain and is expected back next week. Leonie Fiebich is currently away from the team as she is taking part in Eurobasket. Despite those two losses, the reigning WNBA champions entered competition undefeated at 9-0 and with their spirits incredibly high. Waiting for them was a Fever team hungry for some revenge and a superstar making her long awaited return to action.

Caitlin Clark has been out due to a left quadriceps strain for the past few weeks. As it happens, the last game she played was a close one against the Liberty that came down to the final seconds. Since then, she’s been recovering from injury and the Fever struggled to a 2-3 record in her absence. Clark returned on Saturday, and had perhaps the best game of her young WNBA career.

Clark made her presence felt in the first quarter with this spellbinding sequence that had Gainbridge Fieldhouse on ten.

Throughout the game, the Liberty sent different defenders on Clark. Natasha Cloud got the primary assignment, but Clark was able to break free of her for much of the night and score on a variety of Liberty defenders. This three in particular was so good Breanna Stewart and Sandy Brondello couldn’t do anything but smile

Hey, it’s like that sometimes! CC finished with 32/8/9 and seven three pointers on the day as she reinvigorated the Fever and gave the city of Indianapolis something to cheer for after their Pacers lost the night before to the Oklahoma City Thunder in game four of the NBA Finals.

Despite Clark’s heroics, New York hung in thanks to their own star guard. Sabrina Ionescu put on a show as she kept pace with Clark and made some magic of her own

Breanna Stewart tried to pick up the workload for Jonquel Jones and had 21/5/2/3 in 37 minutes. Nyara Sabally got the start at center and filled the stat sheet with ten points, nine rebounds, four steals, two blocks, and one assist.

Despite those moments of excellence, it wasn’t enough.

The Liberty had their first truly poor third quarter in a while as the Fever survived a 9-0 Liberty run to start the quarter and won the period by six points. The Liberty have made it a point to get into the restricted area a lot this season, but the Fever made that goal a lot more daunting.

“We didn’t get to the rim,” Brondello said. “Early in the game we did. I think we had 32 points in the paint in the first half, and we didn’t get as many open ones as we did in the second half. And that’s on the coaching staff, we’ve got to make it a little bit easier for them in that regard. But they were very disruptive, very physical, and we’ve got to do a better job of executing.”

Ionescu cited the Fever’s switching defense as something that made it difficult for the team to get downhill and into the paint. She also acknowledged that the Liberty’s three point shooting wasn’t there. The team went 6-29 from deep and no one outside of Ionescu and Marine Johannes made threes on the evening. They also missed seven free throws after halftime and when you leave points on the board against a good team, you’re going to pay for it eventually.

Final score: Indiana 102, New York 88.

This was the first loss of the season for the Liberty after winning their first nine. Despite that, the mood wasn’t too down.

“My message to the team was “keep your heads up,”” Stewart said in postgame. “A loss is an opportunity for everyone to kind of look at themselves in the mirror and really focus and lock in on the things that we need to get better. And this is a long season, so think that anybody’s gonna go undefeated throughout the entire thing is impossible.”

A loss like this hurts, but gives them something to focus on and go on. The road doesn’t get any easier from here and the champs still have plenty of work to do if they want to repeat as WNBA champions.

Next up

WNBA: Chicago Sky at Atlanta Dream
Dale Zanine-Imagn Images

After a few days off, the Liberty return home to close out the Commissioner’s Cup schedule with a game against the Atlanta Dream on Tuesday night. Tip after 7:00 p.m. ET at the ‘clays.