How Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever have dialed in on defense - ESPN

INDIANAPOLIS — Caitlin Clark repeatedly insisted the sky wasn't falling.

A rough 4-4 start to the season for an Indiana Fever squad with clear-cut championship aspirations created frustrations — and plenty of chatter about cracks in the foundation. Through the opening month, Indiana allowed the second-most points per game (89.0) in the league. Drama swirled around Clark's back injury and the way the team reported it to the league.

Indianapolis was suddenly the WNBA's center of rumor and speculation, and then the team closed May with its worst loss of the season — 100-84 to the expansion Portland Fire, a game in which Clark and coach Stephanie White exchanged animated words on the sideline. A team meeting was called upon the return from Portland.

Two weeks into June, Clark's reassurance appears earned. Winning, the saying goes, cures all ills — actual or perceived.

Since the team meeting, the Fever have responded with a 5-1 stretch. The defense has allowed 83.7 points per game this month, sixth best in the league. Now, though, comes the Fever's most challenging test yet: a stretch that includes two games against the Atlanta Dream, three against the Phoenix Mercury, two against the Los Angeles Sparks and two against the Las Vegas Aces.

«I think there's sometimes an overreaction,» Clark told ESPN. «And as players and as coaches, you can overreact, too, because you want to be perfect and you feel the pressure of the talent we do have on this team.

»Maybe to a lot of people in the outside world, it [felt] like we're really struggling and things are bad, but that's not the reality of how we feel here."

«THE CLARK EFFECT» leads any discussion regarding the state of the Fever. When the team struggled defensively through the