INDIANAPOLIS — How Stephanie White’s Indiana Fever will play is to be determined. One thing is for certain: the former Connecticut Sun coach knew how to beat the 2024 Fever.
Of the six times Indiana and Connecticut played this season, Connecticut won five — including a two-game sweep in the first round of the WNBA playoffs.
“Obviously playing against her, I would say I felt like her teams always had the best scouts against us,” Fever star Caitlin Clark said Monday. “And I think that just speaks to her knowledge of the game and the way she analyzes. Clearly she was onto something. So, you know, hopefully, in turn, now that she knows how to stop us, that should hopefully be a good way to know how to beat certain things as well.”
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Despite the Sun’s success against the Fever this season, White said preparing for Indiana’s pace with Clark pulling the strings was anything but easy.
“They were always really scary for us I think because of the way they could score the basketball,” White said. “I was very concerned about pace and transition, 3-point shooting, you know, the way they spread the floor.
“So a lot of our game plan was the types of shots we were going to be okay with giving them. So those would be the things that we would work on now, right? If we would have played Caitlin a certain way, why we played her like that.”
White has a long history with Indiana, both the state and franchise. She grew up in West Lebanon and was Miss Indiana Basketball out of Seeger, then won a national championship with Purdue in 1999. She played for the Fever in their inaugural season (2000) through 2004, then was an assistant coach from 2011-15 and head coach from 2015-16.
“I think we all know, like, how good of a basketball mind she is, but also like, how much of a legend she is in Indiana,” Clark said. “So like, I think that’s really cool.”
White, who was introduced with a news conference Monday, will be tasked with harnessing the talent of Clark and Aliyah Boston. Both were No. 1 picks and the Rookies of the Year, and they, along with Kelsey Mitchell, are what the Fever front office considers to be the cornerstone of the franchise.
Clark and Boston are special, too, in how much they complement each other. As the starting point guard and center, their connection on the court is one of the most important aspects of the Fever’s game.
“You put it together, and you’ve got the point guard at the center, are you kidding me? Like you got the bookends that you want to build around with them,” White said of Clark and Boston. “These two are the best. And I think that there’s so many things that they do well right now, and you saw the difference from the beginning of the season to the end of the season, and how much better they got with one another, how much they could anticipate what one another was going to do, how they facilitated with one another. But there’s so much room for growth.”
White knows she has some of the best players in the league on her team. And that makes them that much more excited to work with her.
“There’s nothing better than playing for a coach that you can already tell she’s just going to continue to pour into us, because she knows the talent that we have,” Boston said. “I’m super excited to get out on the court.”
White has been part of two of Indiana’s three trips to the WNBA Finals. The first, which was Indiana’s only championship in 2012, came when she was an assistant under Lin Dunn. The second came when White was the head coach in 2015, but they lost to Minnesota in five games.
Indiana hasn’t had that much success in the postseason since White herself was in Indianapolis. Now, the players hope she can bring them back to where they used to be.
“To have someone that’s so happy to be here, I think that’s exciting for all of us,” Fever guard Lexie Hull said. “It’s exciting to hear her talk about, you know, obviously the Fever has had success in the past, and won the finals in the past, and how passionate she is about getting us back to that place. That excites me. That excites our team. We’re just excited about, you know, what we can accomplish this year with her leading us.”
