Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever beat the Sun as the WNBA shows off its star in Boston

By Canadian Press on July 15, 2025.

BOSTON (AP) — Caitlin Clark struggled in her first-ever visit to Boston — a performance that didn’t seem to spoil the mood of the fans who filled TD Garden on Tuesday night for a rare WNBA game in the home of the Celtics and Bruins.

Instead of Lucky the Leprechaun and the Boston Celtics’ iconic parquet, the Garden floor featured the logos of the WNBA and Connecticut Suns — the league’s only New England team — as they hosted a game in Boston for the second year in a row.

Both have been sellouts of 19,156 — the biggest crowds to see a basketball game in the building’s history. And this year, it was the visiting Indiana Fever and their breakout star that most of them were there to see.

“It’s a great opportunity for people in the city, or fans around the area, to come and support a team here,” Clark said before the game. “You don’t take these opportunities for granted. It’s always fun to go to a new arena in a new place and enjoy it.”

Fans wearing Clark’s No. 22 crowded toward the court before the game trying to get her autograph, waving her jersey or homemade signs begging for a selfie. Among those in attendance were Celtics Jaylen Brown and Georges Niang, Bruins Jeremy Swayman and Mason Lohrei, Red Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito and Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey.

Clark scored 14 points on 4 for 14 shooting, adding seven assists and eight rebounds for the Fever, who pulled away in the fourth quarter to win 85-77. She committed one of her five turnovers on the Fever’s first possession and another when she stepped on the sideline at the end of the third quarter — guarded too closely to launch one of her logo 3-pointers.

She went 1 for 7 from beyond the arc and did not connect on a 3 until she gave the Fever an 80-71 lead with three minutes left — their biggest lead of the game.

Natasha Howard scored 18 points with 13 rebounds for Indiana. Tina Charles had 21 points and 11 rebounds for the Sun, who beat the Los Angeles Sparks in Boston in front of a sold-out crowd last year but have stumbled to a 3-19 record this season — the worst in the league.

Clark said before the game that she took time to appreciate the opportunity to play in a building where so much basketball lore had been written. The Iowa native said she grew up respecting the Celtics as an organization, even though she now counts herself an Indiana Pacers fan.

“The Celtics are one of the premier organizations of the NBA,” she said. “And having won a championship two years ago now, it’s kind of cool to just be in this building and surround yourself with the greatness that has played in this arena.”

The Celtics won it all in 2024 shooting an NBA record number of 3-pointers — something Clark, whose long-distance shooting made her a breakout star for the Hawkeyes and in her first two years in the WNBA, could appreciate.

“I’m a Pacers fan. I just want to make that clear. But as I’ve been growing up, they’ve been a fun team to root for,” she said. “They’re really fun to watch. They shoot a lot of 3s, which maybe people make an argument against. But for myself, I think that’s fun. I enjoy that. I think it’s a great style of basketball.”

Clark said she had never been to Boston and would have liked to take in a Red Sox game at Fenway Park, but baseball is off for the All-Star break. She searched on TikTok for things to do in Boston, but it will have to wait until next time.

“It seems like an amazing city,” she said. “I would love to come back here and explore a little bit more in the history of it and all the amazing things that you can do.”

That could be a while, because the city that is home to an unprecedented 18 NBA championships doesn’t have a team in the WNBA; the Sun are the league’s sole representative in New England, the birthplace of basketball.

Fever All-Star Aliyah Boston, a three-time Massachusetts Player of the Year while at Worcester Academy before winning an NCAA championship at South Carolina, said she believed her namesake town could support a WNBA team.

“When you look at the atmosphere for the Celtics, when you look at the atmosphere for the two TD Garden games that now we’ve had, it’s been sold out. It’s been energy,” she said. “They obviously have been great, and I think that’s going to be the same all the time.”

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AP WNBA: https://apnews.com/hub/wnba-basketball

Jimmy Golen, The Associated Press