Caitlin Clark, who has only been in the WNBA for three months, is arguably the most well-known player in women’s basketball.
Clark captivated a large portion of the nation and brought millions of new fans to the sport throughout his stellar collegiate career at Iowa. Clark became the most prolific scorer in women’s college basketball history by ending her four years at Iowa with 3,951 points, smashing the previous Division I mark by more than 400 points. Clark did this while consistently drawing up from well beyond the 3-point line, and occasionally closer to midcourt.
Clark left Iowa as the reigning two-time national player of the year and four-time all-American, despite the fact that her team never won a national championship—it lost in the NCAA title game in each of her final two seasons.
2024 Olympic Games in Paris: Watch USA TODAY’s complete coverage here
With her No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 WNBA Draft, Clark joined the Indiana Fever, a team that was already well-known within the league. She has performed to sell out crowds on a regular basis and forced the relocation of games to bigger venues in order to meet the increased demand for tickets.
Even with her widespread popularity and captivating persona, Clark will not be present at one major basketball tournament: the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris on Team USA Basketball.
What you should know is as follows:
REQUIRED READING: USA Basketball misses out on a great opportunity by leaving Caitlin Clark off the Olympic team.
Is Caitlin Clark competing in the games?
Due to her exclusion from the United States women’s basketball roster, Clark will not be competing in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
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Clark’s removal from the roster caused outrage and garnered a lot of attention due to her steadily increasing profile. “This excellent opportunity to showcase international women’s basketball has been lost,” stated Christine Brennan of USA TODAY Sports following USA Basketball’s decision.
In his 40 years as an Olympic reporter, Brennan commented, “I have seen some awful team and athlete selection judgments, but this is the worst by far.” However, we really should not be shocked. The people in charge of the Olympic Games are the last amateurs remaining, as we have known for years.
The 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee president, Carey Wasserman, joined the chorus, stating that Clark’s exclusion from the team represents “a squandered opportunity because she is clearly a generational talent at a time when the world was ready for it.”
A six-person panel selects the U.S. Olympic team.
ESSENTIAL READING:L.A. Olympics official: Caitlin Clark’s exclusion from the U.S. squad for 2024 is a “lost opportunity”
Why was Caitlin Clark left off of the Olympic roster?
Despite all the drama and anger that Clark’s omission from the roster has caused, there are valid reasons why she was eventually left off the squad.
In women’s basketball, the United States has dominated the world stage, taking home the gold medal at every Olympics since 1996. The Americans dominated their opponents by an average of 16 points per game in their six victories in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. They won by an average of 19.7 points in the quarterfinals, semifinals, and championship, with a 15-point victory over Japan in the gold medal match.
The American roster is especially strong going into Paris. With A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart, two-time WNBA MVPs, leading the team, each of the 12 players has participated in at least two WNBA all-star games. All of the players on the team—Sabrina Ionescu of the Liberty being the youngest at 26—have far more experience than Clark does. There was not much room for maneuvering either, as six of the twelve athletes selected for the Olympics are guards who can lead the ball, just like Clark.
To further emphasize how tough it was to get on the roster, especially at guard, Clark might not even be the biggest snub. The WNBA’s second-leading scorer at the time the roster was determined, guard Arike Ogunbowale, was left off the roster as well.
At the time of the team’s public unveiling early in her rookie season, Clark was having difficulty with some aspects of her adjustment to the WNBA. Although she was averaging a WNBA-high 5.6 turnovers per game and an impressive 16.8 points, 5.3 rebounds, and 6.3 assists per game, she was shooting just 32.7% from three, which was poor for a player whose offensive game is based on making long-range shots.
Clark’s performance has advanced significantly in the last seven days. She was averaging a league-best 8.2 assists per game going into the WNBA all-star break in late July. In the 2024 WNBA All-Star Game, she gave out a game-high 10 assists. She set a WNBA record with 19 assists in a July 17 loss to the Dallas Wings. The Fever entered the all-star break having won 10 of their previous 17 games following a dismal 1-8 start to the season. Clark’s development has also improved her team. Even still, those developments occurred after the Team USA selection was finalized.
She received an invitation to the national team camp in April, but due to Iowa’s Final Four performance, she was unable to go.
Dawn Staley, the women’s basketball coach from South Carolina and a member of the selection committee that assembled the 2024 Paris Roster, stated on Sunday that Clark would receive “very high consideration” if the Olympic roster had to be assembled anew. Staley also coached the Tokyo 2020 squad.
“You have the responsibility of assembling the greatest group of players and talent as a committee member,” Staley told NBC’s Mike Tirico. “Caitlin is a rookie in the WNBA; her previous performance was not poor, but it was not as good as her current play. Because of the way she is playing, she has a great chance of making the squad if we were to start again. She outperforms a lot of players in her position.
She is a really good shooter of the ball. She is a superb passer. She simply has a high basketball IQ. Additionally, she has a bit more experience in the professional game than she did two months ago.
ESSENTIAL READING:Dawn Staley: “High consideration” for the Olympics if she were to reselect Team USA for Caitlin Clark
For her part, Clark officially acknowledged that she did not make the squad.
Clark told reporters on June 9 that he was excited for the girls on the team. “I am aware that this is the world’s most competitive squad, and I also understand that my inclusion on the team or exclusion from it might have happened in either scenario. I will be cheering them on to the gold. It will be enjoyable to watch the Olympics as I grew up watching them. To be honest, I am not disappointed. It is a dream, but it offers me something to strive toward. I hope to be able to visit there someday. It is simply a bit additional motivation, in my opinion. You recall that. Hopefully, I will be able to attend in four years.”
There is still the case that Clark ought to have received one of those twelve seats, even accounting for her inexperience.
Despite being a rookie, first-year players have competed for the United States in previous Olympics. Like Clark, Diana Taurasi (2004), Candace Parker (2008), and Stewart (2016) all participated on the national team as rookies, having been selected with the first overall choice in the WNBA draft months after they were selected.
However, the Fever may ultimately benefit from Clark’s omission.
Christie Sides, the Fever coach, told reporters on June 9 that “the thing she said was, ‘Hey, Coach, they woke a monster,’ which I thought was amazing.” “She is young, and she will have a lot of opportunities down the road.”
ESSENTIAL READING:”Hey coach, they woke a monster,” Caitlin Clark said in response to the Olympic team’s rejection.
2024 U.S. Olympic women’s basketball squad
The U.S. women’s basketball team, which will compete in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, boasts some of the largest and most experienced names in the sport, albeit Clark is not one of them. The team is a heavy favorite to take home the gold for the ninth time in a row.
The whole 12-player roster for the American team this summer, along with each player’s position and WNBA franchise, is as follows:
Napheesa Collier, Minnesota Lynx forward
Kahleah CoPper, Phoenix Mercury’s guard/forward
Las Vegas Aces guard Chelsea Gray
Phoenix Mercury’s Brittney Griner, in the center
Sabrina Ionescu, New York Liberty security guard
Seattle Storm guard Jewell Loyd
The Las Vegas Aces’ guard Kelsey Plum
New York Liberty forward Breanna Stewart
Diana Taurasi, Phoenix Mercury’s guard
Connecticut forward Alyssa Thomas Sun A’ja Wilson of the Las Vegas Aces, center
Las Vegas Aces guard Jackie Young
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