Caitlin Clark has been running rings around her opponents since she was a little kid.
The WNBA superstar and reigning Rookie of the Year ripped up the record books and took women’s basketball to dizzying new heights in 2024.
Clark is the new face of women’s basketballGetty
The Indiana Fever phenom was also destined for greatness, it seems, with throwback footage from her recent appearance on CBS’ 60 Minutes showing her dominating boys back when she was a budding hooper living in Iowa.
Footage shows a young Clark, no older than six or seven, running circles around a group of young boys inside a local gym.
Clark can be seen dribbling the ball with both hands as her opponents haplessly try to steal it off her.
CC toys with the boys before eventually turning around and making a jump shot off the glass which bounces into the basket.
The enthusiastic youngster then runs back down the court and high fives a coach.
The short clip was a clear sign of things to come for Clark, who has spent the last few years dribbling past people with conumsate ease and racking up point after point.
Clark’s love affair with basketball started early on when she took a trip to see the Minnesota Lynx.
She returned home hellbent on adding distance to her shot and immediately started developing her technique.
Clark convinced her dad to start a construction project, which put her on a path to becoming one of the world’s best shooters.
Her dad tore up some grass and poured more concrete so Caitlin would have enough space for a full 3-point line in her driveway.
Throwback footage shows a young Clark dribbling past boys like they aren’t thereX@ccthegoat22
They try to steal it off her but her handles are too goodX@ccthegoat22
Clark eventually turns around and makes a jumperX@ccthegoat22
“Did that really happen? You– you extended your range–,” interviewer Jon Wertheim asks in the CBS 60 Minutes special.
“Oh yeah,” Clark replied.
“By dumpin’ more concrete?” a somewhat confused Wertheim said.
“Yeah. ’cause it was, like, kind of slanted. Our driveway was, like, slanted, so I only had a three-point line on one side of the driveway. So… told my dad he had to tear up all this grass, and he did,” she responded.
The move ultimately enabled Clark to practice deep shooting with way more regularity than her peers, putting her on a path towards superstardom.
Clark’s deadly marksmanship and supreme shooting first lit up the college basketball scene when she was a member of the Iowa Hawkeyes.
She became the NCAA‘s all-time leading scorer — man or woman — and was labelled the ‘Steph Curry of women’s basketball’ because of her ability to pull up from deep like the Golden State Warriors icon himself.
Clark is the biggest thing in women’s sports and one of basketball’s greatest shootersGetty
In her debut season as a pro, Clark led the WNBA in 3-point attempts (355), and makes (122).
Per CBS, the WNBA 3-point line is 22 feet, 1 and 3/4 inches. Clark took 5.7 attempts per game from 25-plus feet, and shot 34.4% on those.
She also took 51 shots from 30-34 feet, and made 33.3% of them. The only other player in double figures in attempts from that distance was New York Liberty star Sabrina Ionescu with 13.
Just like Curry, Clark’s trademark shot is a jumper from just inside mid-court, ‘the Logo 3’.
However, she only starts pulling up from the logo once she’s found a shooting groove.
“I only shoot from back there in games if I’ve, like, made a couple,” Clark said. “Then you get a free pass to, like, launch a long three.”
“I would always want to see how big the logo is,” she added. “Some people have, like, bigger logos at center court, some have smaller ones. So it’s if it’s pretty big, I can usually get there.”
“I know when I’m going to miss. I know when I’m going to make it. The worst is when it feels good and you still miss.”
Clark has taken women’s basketball to new heights this seasonGetty
Clark’s debut season in the W recently came to an end at the hands of the Connecticut Sun, who swept the Fever out of the postseason in their first-round playoff series.
In her first year, including the playoffs, Clark scored 805 points, recorded 354 assists and pulled down 237 rebounds in 42 games. That averages out at 19.2 points per game, 8.4 assists per game and 5.7 rebounds per game.
She also led the league in assists, setting regular-season WNBA records for assists in a season (337), while also setting the record for points scored or assisted on in a season (1,520), points by a rookie (769).
And that’s not to mention her seismic off-court impact, which has seen TV viewings figures, social media engagement, and jersey and ticket sales reach unprecedented levels.
Not bad for a rookie.
