Fever’s Caitlin Clark breaks WNBA rookie record for assists

Add yet another milestone to  Caitlin Clark’s record-breaking 2024, her latest coming Sunday in the  Indiana Fever’s 92-75 win over the Seattle Storm as she broke the WNBA single-season rookie mark for assists.

Clark, who leads the WNBA in assists at 8.3 per game, had 9 Sunday to reach 232, passing Ticha Penicheiro’s previous rookie record of 224 set in 1998.

Penicheiro was the No. 2 pick that year for the Sacramento Monarchs, who are no longer in the WNBA. She helped lead the Monarchs to the 2005 league championship and finished her career with 2,600 assists, third most in WNBA history.

Clark was four years from being born when Penicheiro came into the WNBA, and was 10 years old when Penicheiro retired. But Clark said the two connected during her college career at  Iowa. And she knows enough to accurately describe Penicheiro, regarded as one of the most creative and exciting passers in women’s basketball history.

“If you watch her highlights, she was definitely a better passer than me,” Clark said. “She had way more flair to her game. She would spin around and make these crazy passes. I kind of just run in transition and chuck it up there and hope for the best.”

In fact, Clark’s passing is one of her top attributes. Along with scoring a Division I men’s and women’s record 3,951 points at Iowa, Clark had 1,144 assists, third in NCAA D-I women’s history. She topped Penicheiro’s WNBA rookie record in her 28th WNBA game; Penicheiro set her mark in 30 games.

With the expansion of the WNBA regular season to 40 games, Clark still has 12 games remaining to add to her assist total. The overall WNBA single-season assist record is 316, set last year in 40 games by the  Connecticut Sun’s Alyssa Thomas.

Clark at her current pace could eclipse that in 11 more games. Thomas right now is second in the league in assists with 202 through 26 games.

“If you’d told me I was going to lead the league in assists coming in here in my rookie season, I probably would have told you that you were lying,” said Clark, who also had 23 points, 5 rebounds and 2 blocks Sunday. “But I take a lot of pride in that. I want to set my teammates up first and foremost, because that’s going to help you have the most successful team.

“I’m always looking for my teammates in transition; that’s where I tend to thrive the most.”

Indiana, seventh in the WNBA standings, is now 13-15, matching last season’s win total. The Fever haven’t finished with a winning record since 2015, when they went 20-14 and made the WNBA Finals.

They haven’t made the playoffs since 2016, when they were 17-17.

“I think we just have a really balanced attack,” said Fever guard Lexie Hull, who had a career-high 22 points and was 6-of-7 from 3-point range Sunday. “It’s just really fun to watch when you have Caitlin running in transition — the ball can go anywhere, anyone can knock it down, our offense is just so fluid.”