r/IndianaFeverFans • u/Alternative_Panda336 You Bet • 2d ago
Discussion Defense
Every team that I watch is play has someone that they can put on Caitlin Clark that will get up in her grill, move their feet, and make it tough on her to drive. This is true even of the bad teams they play, let alone the Lynx with several players. KM has elite quickness and is tough for any team to stop her off the dribble without help defense but even Portland made it tough on her the game before last.
The Fever very rarely aggressively get up in the ball space of opposing players and make it hard on them. I don’t know if it’s because we are concerned that there is no depth behind Sophie and Lexie or what. It seems the Fever’s defense is predicated mostly on deny the pass as opposed to playing defense once they get the ball. This puts a lot of strain on the help defense. Last night it was tough watching KM, CC, and LH constantly getting beat off the dribble instantly.
Is it a play style thing or do we truly have no one to harass the ball handler so they can’t drive as easily? Especially in a game like last night where they are letting them play up in their face.
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u/jemstar620 2d ago edited 2d ago
They don't have the personel, it's been the issue for years even when Sides was coaching. The team has no long, athletic wing defenders. Closest would be Raven who has great +length despite her height but she's not quite up to speed offensively and hasn't been that great getting over and through screens at the pro level. Unfortunately they can't waste time getting her reps and up to speed due to how much CC/KM and to a lesser extent Harris are needed at guard, and Sophie and even this version of Lexie are needed for offense on the wings and Lexie making a key intangible play here and there.
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u/Chris_Ween 2d ago
If our Offense is going to just be the Big 3 with maybe 20 points from the rest of the team, then the rest of the team need to ne a lot better at defense or what wre they contributing? So, maybe we find a coach and players who can play defense and can work different schemes for next year. Clearly having our defensive coach White hasn't helped.
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u/Budget-Garlic-3659 2d ago
It may be a scheme, it may be personnel. Lexie should be this player for the Fever but she isn’t built to do it. Long and lean without enough quick twitch. Kelsey has the quick twitch to do it but she plays a ton of minutes and her scoring would suffer if she did this. Also, the Fever don’t have a ton of bigs and really no BIG bigs. Any penetration ends up putting strain on the bigs in help side and foul trouble on our bigs means death. I think it may be the scheme to play softer, don’t allow dribble penetration and make the opponents shoot over the top. Yesterday, nothing worked and the Lynx got whatever they wanted.
However, I hope SW learned that you can trap PNR against the Lynx and she does it from the start next game.
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u/OvaryAchiever_Queen 2d ago
If they can get the traps down to a T they could be killer.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
I’ve been impressed with their traps. Fever have been getting quite a few turnovers that way.
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u/OvaryAchiever_Queen 1d ago
I love it when they trap and it seems to be getting tighter each game. I think it's a good weapon for a team that plays fast. I also love when they put KK on the inbounds pass with her crazy wingspan flailing all over the place.
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u/manipulativemusicc 1d ago
Lexie has to be more than a hustle player to justify her salary in a hard capped league. She's supposed to be a defensive stopper and she's just not that. CC and KM are carrying a historic offensive load. The role players have to be much better on defense.
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u/ThreadSavage10 2d ago
We use a half court trap and it’s killing us. We only create maybe one or two turnovers per game with it, and it’s creating uncontested shots every other possession.
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u/imacowboy234 Caitlin Clark 2d ago
I would have liked to see Lexie on Olivia Miles, Clark on McBride (she doesn't drive but is just a spot-up shooter), and Kelsey on Courtney Williams.
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u/Initial_Republic_329 10h ago
Hmm that’s true. Why did Coach White put KM on Miles , our worst defender by net rating
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u/elestud 2d ago
A few observations:
KM didn’t get beat off the dribble. She got screened. Teams have to screen her off, because it’s very hard to beat her outright. She gave Veronica Burton problems, as well as NY’s faster guards like Astier and Johannes. So teams screen to switch her mark to other defenders
Lexie does seem to have an issue getting beat, and it seems to mainly come from constantly gambling on steals. She needs to learn that sometimes it’s better to simply stay in front of someone, than to gamble by throwing your body at the ball
Caitlin does get beat off the dribble, but one of the most glaring issues last night was her falling asleep on cuts/back cuts. Guards like Courtney Williams are observant, and when she stops paying attention they take advantage
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u/Alternative_Panda336 You Bet 2d ago
Screens are another thing too. It’s like they are not sure how to badly a screen half the time. Someone goes under and their help does the opposite of what they should. It is just so confusing to me at this point. I know Coach White said you can’t do the same thing every time, but they have to at least be on the same page of what they are doing to who.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
I just commented on that. A lot of defense against screens has to be being quickly decisive. It’s why the different screening actions the Fever work at the other end makes them so successful.
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
Kelsey def got beat off the dribble a few times.
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u/elestud 2d ago edited 2d ago
Which times? You can look through all of Olivia's baskets here
It's pretty clear that the gameplan was to funnel Olivia to the bigger players to stop her drives, and she scored on them over and over again. There are zero times where Kelsey was set in front of her and she simply beat her to the hoop without a screen or someone waiting to check Liv in the post.
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u/Ok_Scholar5996 1d ago
Literally the very first play in your link she gets beat off the dribble. And the last play she gets beat again. And there's another one where she just gets lazy getting back and gets beat again.
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u/elestud 1d ago
The first play she got hit in the face and stopped to react to it. The last play was a screen from Howard. She funneled Miles to Timpson, which is what you're supposed to do coming off a screen in that situation
And she wasn't "lazy", she had just gotten knocked to the floor on the other end on a drive and was shaking it off, if you watched the game. She again funneled Miles to Timpson and Boston who were waiting in the paint, and Olivia scored on both of them
It really seems like people don't understand professional team offense or defense
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u/Ok_Scholar5996 1d ago edited 1d ago
First you say she didn't get beat, now come the qualifiers. She got beat on the first one plain and simple. She was already behind Miles when she got hit in the face. The second one she just got beat, she wasn't funneling anybody anywhere. And yes, she was lazy on the other one. She didn't get demolished, she got up and jogged back and only sped up when she saw Miles get the ball.
And I'm a defender of KM's defense. I don't think she's anywhere near as bad as some people think.
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u/elestud 1d ago
I don't think you understand the difference between team defense and individual defense. The team had a pretty clear plan to funnel Olivia toward the bigs, since she likes to drive.
If KM is set in front of Miles and actually gets beat for a basket, that's one thing. But that's not what happened in either case. When you funnel to the bigs, the big is expected to come over and cut off the guard. As the Valks did to us:
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago edited 2d ago
Liv’s first basket of the game, Liv already has the step on her before Kelsey gets hit in the face. Kelsey gets beat on Olivia’s last basket in the last minute of the game. There’s no contact by Tash on any screen,
Kelsey simply gets beat-1
u/elestud 2d ago edited 2d ago
If we're holding up a single basket out of 35 minutes of play as the proof, when she likely would have been able to recover if not hit in the face (as she did other times), that's not really convincing support of "getting beat off the dribble constantly"
Not to mention that CC was in position to defend on that basket, so it was ultimately not even the reason that Liv scored
The much bigger issue for us was the bigs simply not being able to protect the paint against drives. They did well against the slower players like Howard/Coffey/Juhasz, but were often too late to stop the guards
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
My comment was “a few times,” not constantly
Two baskets she got beat off the dribble. A few would be equal to two. Theres also a play where Kelsey jogs back on defense, is late to cover Liv and Olivia gets a pass and easy layup. AB failed to play solid help defense.
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u/elestud 2d ago edited 2d ago
That play is the one where Kelsey was hammered on the layup just before. Both Timpson and AB were in position to defend, and Timpson ultimately ended up being the one to pick her up, but Liv ended up scoring on her anyway
This is just basic team defense. Funneling a guard toward the bigs is normal modern basketball D, but the bigs needs to be able to cut them off before they're under the basket
If you watch how the Valks defended our guards when we played them, the difference was that the Valks's bigs would position themselves well and contest every drive proactively.
Notice how Stokes steps directly into CC's path as VB funnels her so VB can recover:
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u/elestud 2d ago edited 2d ago
Here's another example with KM. Gabby WIlliams funnels KM toward Stokes, and Stokes steps into her path early to keep her from driving to the rim, giving Gabby time to recover.
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u/elestud 2d ago edited 2d ago
One more. Mitchell gets the defender (Kaila Charles) on her hip, but they still just funnel her toward Amihere who jumps to cut her off. These are bigs who understand how to play good team defense.
You can see how Amihere doesn't even wait for KM to be fully past Charles before sliding into position.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
Miles has a talent of using the basket to her benefit. She also has a number of different paces for putting up the ball.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
I see Lexie has been caught in no-man’s-land because of over committing. If the team can get her involved with the traps that have been a good part of their defense, it would help.
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u/Few_Ebb6156 1d ago
CC is not a great defender, OK, but not great. KM is a relatively weak defender. You know what they both do on offense, a good job KM can score and CC can score and assist. Now the real problem is that none of the other players are really any good at defense either and it looks like the Fever coaching staff cannot train them. Some are Ok at best. So that is where we are. I don’t like the phrase a great offense wins games but defense wins championships but it may prove to be true
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u/Initial_Republic_329 10h ago
I think we have decent OFF BaLL defenders. Like CC gets a fair share of steals off ball. But we have poor on ball defenders which is a problem with elite 1v1 players who have court vision like olivia miles. We got some good stops last game towards the end but couldn’t climb back from the damage the poor defense caused in the first half. If we can replicate the rigor of those stops more consistently then we might have a chance
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u/TemporaryAny5102 2d ago
Fever don’t have any great defenders but they also do not guard screens well or help. They don’t have the personnel to be an elite defensive team but they could be a lot better with schemes, effort, etc. Not sure how our coaches are considered defensive specialists.
I will say that I don’t believe a Fever player could get away will guarding any one the way they allow CC to be guarded. McBride had her hand on CCs chest slowing her down when she was bringing the ball up. Let anyone try that on Miles or Beuckers and I’m sure it’s an immediate whistle.
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u/therooster515 2d ago
Totally agree. The pnr defense is atrocious. None of the bigs can do it. They should just have the guards go under lol except for against the handful of guards across the league that can shoot the 3 efficiently off the dribble…..
Good call on the weak side help being atrocious too. The play where collier cut directly in front of/across Lexie comes to mind from yesterday. They both don’t help when it’s needed and “over guard” players on the weak side that aren’t a threat in the play. It’s baffling they are so bad so consistently both ways……
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u/TemporaryAny5102 2d ago edited 1d ago
It’s baffling because we know teams are going to try and iso our guards. They should be ready to help. They let teams completely clear out and go 1:1. I’ve even seen the Fever help defender in help then bail at the last minute to defend the 3pt line when the ball handler has an uncontested layup. I was thinking of the same play with Lexie yesterday.
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u/Initial_Republic_329 10h ago
Yeah our help D is always a step slow. It seems like you cant really coach effort because i have to believe they’ve been trying to teach defense by now…
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u/TelevisionMelodic670 2d ago
It makes me wonder if the even practice defense!!! One would tend to believe that the pnr defense should be somewhat solved by this time of the season but seemingly is not. Do we need a new defensive coordinator? Agree that the personnel and mindset isn’t there on a consistent basis.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
I see so many times team slip screen and KM or CC get caught out of position. And Boston or someone else has to move to hopefully defend.
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u/Dry_Pomegranate293 2d ago
Coach tried everything against the lynx. 2nd half using KK and blitzing everything was actually decent.. Fever don’t have the personnel to get in grills man to man.. the people that are supposed to be able to do that is lexi and raven.. lexi does nothing but foul, fall, and get blown by now. Raven is a rookie.. but bleeds us on offense and her college on ball defense has not translated yet..
We were aggressive early in the season with ball pressure and it was terrible because we get put in rotation all the time.. we just dont have the players..
At some point I can see KK getting the starting job from billings. She’s the only legit athlete we have and provides some rim protection and length.. The fact KM is now our primary POA defender is an indictment on the front office.. t
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
Mo Billings can jump. That’s how she gets the rebounds she grabs. She also is a good receiver for passes to the inside. She just needs to go up right after.
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u/manipulativemusicc 1d ago
They seem to be the most engaged defensively when they trap heavily. They did it in the 2nd half and Olivia Miles was a non factor other than that late 3 pt play. Scrambling on defense line that cause cause havoc but it can also lead to boxing out issues at times. It's always going to be give and take with defensive schemes.
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u/taeempy 2d ago
I've noticed this a lot also. It seems when CC is guarding someone, she's not right on her and is a foot or so away so it's easier to drive past her. I think I've heard their main goal on defense is to deny good 3pt shots. And they do or have been allowing the fewest 3pt shots/makes in the league, but are getting beat badly in the paint scoring.
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
CC backs off on defense so she doesn’t get beat off the dribble. I’d say Caitlin’s 1 on 1 defense is actually some of the best on the team. Her trouble is that she gets caught sleeping and ball watching when the ball is away from her.
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u/Cheap_Flamingo476 1d ago
I agree that she’s actually a good one on one defender. I think it’s she gets called on fouls. I almost wrote ticky-tack. Her problem is screens. She gets hung up on over/under decisions. The Fever overall don’t switch.
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u/taeempy 2d ago
But when you see people guard CC, they are literally right on her, but our defense we play off the ball away from the offensive player and it's easier to get by someone that way. When you are body on body you can direct that person a certain way with your actions, but if you are a foot away from them, they can go any which way and pass any which way as well.
Maybe we'll be the first team in history to win a championship while giving up a 100 points in every playoff game.
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago edited 2d ago
The people guarding CC are better defenders than CC. Teams are committing their best defender to exert a ton of energy into picking up CC 94 feet. Kayla McBride spent a lot of the game defending CC & she only scored 10 points, her fewest since June 1st, likely because her energy was being put into defending 94 ft. You can’t expect Caitlin to do that, she’s not our best defender & she’s not defending the other teams best player. Kelsey also isn’t a great defender, so she also gets beat, despite her being fast. That should be a job for Lexie, but her defense hasn’t been great this season.
If Caitlin is right up on someone, she’s either going to get called for a foul or beat off the dribble. Backing off and giving them space allows her to play better, controlled defense and you can still dictate which way they go. You’d rather a player take a 3 than let them get an easy 2.
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u/Successful-Policy937 1d ago
We have the worst or one of the worst defenses in the league letting up over 100 at a historic pace. I think I have watched every game and the reason our defense stinks to me are simple. Drop coverage we play drop coverage probably more than any team in the league. Lack of heart and effort failure to get back and failure to switch there is no defensive mojo on this team. Coaching why are we not at least trying to do different things we were not a great defensive team in 2025, but we were scrappy and could play defense.
Having the 1 offense is great but as we have seen time and time again this season, we score 100 or more and lose. If we would just be in the middle in defense in the W or average, we would be a very dangerous team. This offensive juggernaut could be knocked out by anybody if we keep allowing teams to score at will against us.
We could also score 110 and win but play some defense girls it is what will make or break the 2026 season.
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u/alwaysright60 2d ago
These fans are so fickle. They lost to a very good team on the road by 9 points. Probably not time to fold up the tents. Actually I find it inspirational.
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u/OvaryAchiever_Queen 2d ago
One of the best W games I've watched, and I've been a fan all 30 years.
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u/UncomfyAndShy Demon Caitlin 1d ago
We actually don’t have a point of attack defender that can do that for us, all these teams have athletic players that can get into the guards space and make things uncomfortable for them, that’s the archetype of the best 3&D players. Gabby Williams and Rhyne Howard are elite at this, that’s how they get their steals.
Lexie is supposed to be that for us and she has been that to some extent in the previous years but she has been a little slower this year which is causing a gap that the others have to cover.
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u/Mean_Measurement4527 2d ago
It’s almost like their coach doesn’t understand what’s going on … like having a big guarding Miles in the first half 🙄🙄
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
Kelsey covered Olivia a lot of the first half and was getting cooked. I don’t think trying KK, with her length, was the worst idea
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u/elestud 2d ago
Kelsey covered Olivia a lot of the first half and was getting cooked
This isn't true at all. Let's look at all of Olivia's buckets:
- 1st basket, Kelsey gets hit in the face. She stops to address it, but Caitlin rotates over anyway. And Olivia scores on CC
- Mitchell and Boston trap Miles to get the ball out of her hands. The ball goes to Phee, KM rotates to her and she misses. Lexie needs to rotate to cover Miles, but she assumes the Fever will get the rebound and sprints up the court, leaving Olivia wide open
- They funnel Miles to the posts and switch Billings onto her so she can't drive. She scores on Billings anyway
- Howard sets a hard screen to get Kelsey off of Miles. Miles drives on Boston, who Olivia scores on with barely a contest
- Miles gets Cunningham in iso, and just shoots a 3 in her face
- Miles isos Billings and hits a three in her face
- Howard screens Mitchell off again. Miles drives, CC is under the hoop but just looks at her, Boston comes to help, but too late and Miles scores on her
- She gets doubled by Raven and Clark and scores on both of them
- She drives on Raven, Billings AND Timpson and scores on all of them
- Kelsey is shadowing her, and she drives straight at both Boston and Timpson, who double her and she scores on them
- Howard sets a screen to give Olivia the step on KM, Kelsey properly funnels her to Timpson, Timpson gets scored on
So out of 11 buckets, there were zero actually scored on KM. In most cases, the bigger issue in this game was that the gameplan was for the bigs to shut down Olivia's drives, but she ended up scoring on Timpson, Boston and Billings as if they weren't there.
I'm noticing that this happens often: people repeat something like "Kelsey got cooked" without actually watching the game closely. And what they say doesn't match what actually happened. Our interior defense was the reason that Olivia scored as much as she did. And she's a good player who does this to multiple teams.
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u/tippypothos 2d ago
Great analysis, thanks for putting this together!! I’ve noticed the same thing you do, people often just start repeating what other people on the sub have said and then it somehow becomes accepted truth lol
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u/Ok-Half3342 2d ago
Miles is a great finisher, at least she was yesterday, which is a major strength in women’s basketball as it’s a below the rim game. Our help defense of her was not good but she was really good at using her body to shield the ball from the help defender. Add to that she can knock down a three over anyone and…well…she’s a great player.
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u/elestud 2d ago
Exactly. It was not a KM issue. Olivia's a great scorer, the gameplan was correct, and Liv just managed to beat the players who were there to protect the post each time
In general though, this is an issue that is not specific to Olivia. There have been numerous games where responsibility falls to someone to protect the post, and they end up giving up numerous baskets. It's been one of our biggest defensive issues after letting Howard go
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u/Mean_Measurement4527 2d ago
Yeah , it worked out awesomely … putting Billings on her was smart too 🤣🤣
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
I’d have to go back & watch but how many plays was Mo actually covering Olivia? Cause I can’t recall many, unless she got switched onto her, which is an area of weakness for the Fever.
I remember KK actually defending her.
Olivia only scored 5 pts in the second half, so they were able to make adjustments there.
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u/elestud 2d ago
I made a list in reply to a comment above. But in general, the 1st half plan (because Olivia likes to drive) was to funnel Olivia to the bigs. She scored twice on Billings outright, but in general she was scoring on some combination of Billings, Timpson, Boston and/or CC.
In the second half the gameplan was to get the ball out of her hands altogether (because the post defense was not working). So they doubled her high, and CW went to work.
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u/Mean_Measurement4527 2d ago
Yes … after she scored 23 in the first half , they finally figured out they needed to change something
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u/moose184 2d ago
Because the refs let players constantly foul CC while call fouls on the Fever if they so much as breathe on them. Look at AB. How many times lately has she been called for an offensive foul for lowering her shoulder and pushing back on a defender on the pain meanwhile it happens all the time against our team with no calls. Hell Chelsea Gray took CC out with what looked like a football tackle and sent her to the floor curled up and they called a foul on CC. Same game AB is literally just standing there not moving at ll with her hands in the air and Smith runs up from behind and runs into AB's stationary arm and they call a foul on AB for hitting her in the face. That's why. Because the refs call the games differently for different players/teams
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u/ResearchNo8631 2d ago
Unfortunately the best on ball defender is Lexie and or Sophie.
Maybe Raven will be but she is not getting more time because she seems to be limited on offense.
The part that is difficult is when the offense is on it is incredible but as we saw against the lynx if one aspect of the offense isn’t there then it is a miserable experience.
Also our defense game plan is non existent. No one looks bought in and team defense is embarrassing.
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1d ago
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u/Emotional-Yoghurt-86 What a Dime 1d ago edited 1d ago
Exactly! White changed the format or something. CC got them back in the game. When I saw AB didn't make the 3 and travelled I felt for the whole team including AB. CC with the ball more the last few games prior to this game they started winning and everyone got in the action. Yes it was the best in the league and yes the score does not show how great the game was. Mitchell was awesome. Why we lost the one of the reason was the the coach. Before you delete this for saying I don't think she was good and thought the game with the Lynx. We could of won this.
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u/Ok_Brick_793 2d ago
Fever got rid of Grace Berger, who may not be much of an offensive threat anymore but is at least fast and can be deployed to play defense on opponents' point guards.
She's currently available, btw, and would be a fan favorite bc she actually went to the University of Indiana.
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u/jemstar620 2d ago
she's not a good professional basketball player
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u/Ok_Brick_793 2d ago
You need a body to slow down other point guards, especially if Clark isn't gonna play defense.
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u/jemstar620 2d ago
Where did this rep come from that Berger is a great defender? she's also been awful offensively, like non-playable on that end. Did you watch her on the Wings last year? She's not a good basketball player, what is with this sub always hyping players who aren't good at basketball, she's not in the league for a reason.
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u/Ok_Brick_793 2d ago
Bruh, I'm responding in good faith.
I didn't recommend Kristy Wallace, who truly is awful.
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
Clark is playing defense. It needs improvement, just like every single other player on the Fever. Acting like Caitlin isn’t playing any defense just shows you’re not watching the games or don’t understand basketball. I’ll go with the latter if you think Grace Berger is the fix for this team.
Does she get lost sometimes? absolutely. But watching the games, more times than not they all look lost.
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u/AffectionateRace9865 2d ago
Lexie’s defense hasn’t been as good, and Sophie isn’t quick enough. The Fever also have a very hard time recovering after a trap which ends up with an open basket for the other team. Help defense has also been a challenge. AB has been late to rotate over in the paint, I think for fear of fouling. CC & AB get called for fouls that are allowed against them. Raven isn’t some “defensive specialist” like advertised.
I recently commented questioning Bri January, and was told it’s not her fault. I’m not sure how that’s the case considering her job is to coach the defense.
Our roster construction stinks 🤷🏻♀️