INDIANAPOLIS — Time magazine has named WNBA player Caitlin Clark as 2024 Athlete of the Year.
The magazine announced the 22-year-old Indiana Fever player received the title because she “took the WNBA—and basketball—to a new level. Her talent brought together communities to celebrate her fire and ability to score.”
In her debut season with the Fever, Clark took home the Rookie of the Year award in October and was named to the All-WNBA first team – the first rookie to do so since 2008 – during the 2024 season.
Clark, a two-time college national player of the year for the University of Iowa, has helped continue to pull more fans to women’s sports, especially the WNBA and college basketball.
“I’ve been able to captivate so many people that have never watched women’s sports, let alone women’s basketball, and turn them into fans,” she said in the Time profile.
The magazine profile discussed the debate Clark often found herself at the center of regarding gender and racial equality in sports.
“I tell people I feel like the most controversial person,” she said. “But I am not. It’s just because of all the storylines that surround me. I literally try to live and treat everybody in the same exact respectful, kind way. It just confuses me at times.”
Her college championship game between Iowa and South Carolina in Cleveland averaged 18.9 million viewers, becoming the second most watched women’s sporting event, outside the Olympic Games, in the history of U.S. television, with American viewership outdrawing that of each game of the 2024 NBA Finals and World Series, according to Time.
For the first time ever, more people also tuned in for the women’s NCAA championship than the men’s.
Time magazine will name the 2024 Person of the Year later this week, but has revealed the 10 individuals up for the title.
Time’s Person of the Year is an annual feature that recognizes an individual, group, concept, or object that had the most significant influence on global events during the year, for better or worse. Time has named a Person of the Year annually since since 1927.
This year’s 10 candidates include politicians, tech moguls, royalty and podcast hosts.
