Caitlin Clark is coming back from her back injury Wednesday night against the Los Angeles Sparks, Indiana Fever head coach Stephanie White told reporters hours before tip-off at Crypto.com Arena.
White said the three-time All-Star guard will be active versus the Sparks, whereas four-time All-Star center Aliyah Boston will be out with a right lower leg injury.
“They’ll flip-flop tomorrow night,” White said, via IndyStar’s Chloe Peterson, noting that Clark won’t play on Thursday against the Phoenix Mercury — the back half of the Fever’s back-to-back — but that Boston will be in the lineup for that matchup, the Fever’s final regular-season meeting with the Mercury this year.
Clark has missed the past two games. She hasn’t played since her early exit during a much-discussed June 24 loss to the Mercury. In the second quarter of that showdown, Mercury forward Alyssa Thomas pushed on Clark’s throat while standing up after Clark lost her footing and the ball. A foul wasn’t called in the moment, and the play wasn’t reviewed amid the Fever’s home setback, much to Indiana’s dismay. Eventually, Thomas was issued a flagrant 2 for her “reckless” contact with Clark and suspended one game.
More than a week later, the 24-year-old Clark commented on the situation, telling reporters that she thought it was, in fact, a flagrant foul and that, broadly speaking, “the league’s just got to do better protecting our players.”
Two nights before the Thomas incident, in a June 22 win over the Mercury, Clark was part of a scuffle with former Fever teammate DeWanna Bonner that led to six technical fouls, plus an ejection of Indiana forward Myisha Hines-Allen. Clark has already been T’d up five times this season. She’s three technicals away from receiving an automatic one-game suspension.
As for her injured back, that’s been monitored for a while now.
Clark was initially listed with a back injury in May. At the time, she was a late scratch prior to a game against the Portland Fire. Her sudden sidelining raised questions, as Clark wasn’t previously on the injury report. The WNBA then issued Indiana a warning about injury designations. Since, Clark has been a regular on the injury report, often with the “probable” status next to her name.
The Fever have been taking a cautious approach with Clark this season after a series of soft-tissue injuries limited her to just 13 games last year. In the season opener, a nail-biting loss to the Dallas Wings, she took multiple trips down the tunnel. Clark ultimately explained that she went to get her back adjusted, saying that it “gets out of line pretty quickly.”
Last week, Clark was named a starter for this year’s All-Star Game. She’s played in 17 of the Fever’s 20 games. Across her past eight outings, she’s shot 36.7% from beyond the arc, making three or more triples on five occasions.
Her 21.2 points and 8.2 assists per game are good for fourth and second in the W, respectively.
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