INDIANAPOLIS — The numbers prove it: Indiana Fever rookie Caitlin Clark is a draw.
She is a draw in a way no other player has been before in the 27-year history of the WNBA, and she and the Fever have been putting up mind-boggling viewership and attendance numbers.
“I’m not gonna deny the Caitlin Clark effect,” WNBA Chief Growth Officer Colie Edison told IndyStar during All-Star weekend. “And we’ve really seen it most importantly in viewership, you know, our average viewership numbers are over 1.2 million. And so that sort of growth is important because we’re opening the aperture and bringing in new fans. So Caitlin was really a catalyst to bringing in a lot of new fans, as well as our other rookies, who came in through NCAA into this draft. It’s been an amazing draft class to watch.”
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The WNBA tried to get ahead of what has become unprecedented viewership numbers for the league. It started its marketing campaign during the NCAA women’s basketball tournament for the first time, and put 36 of the Fever’s 40 games on national television even before Indiana officially drafted Clark with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 draft.
WNBA Chief Marketing Officer Phil Cook said the league is trying to bring in distinct groups of fans. Those include general basketball fans, who may watch NBA or college basketball regularly, as well as fans who mainly pay attention to those big moments, like NBA Finals or Super Bowl, and casual fans who want to be part of the conversation.
And these new types of fans are tuning in to see Clark get the first triple-double by a rookie or dish out a WNBA-record 19 assists in a single game.
“The audience we really wanted to connect with this year was the audience that loves basketball, or loves big sport moments, or is just a casual sports fan,” Cook told IndyStar. “And when you put performances like that, on the board, it gets them interested. They turn their head and say, ’19 assists in a 40-minute game in the W? That’s incredible.’ These numbers are, like, unprecedented, and I think the loyalist has said, ‘Oh yeah, our game has been this good for 20 years, you just haven’t been watching.'”
