Dawn Staley, a member of the selection committee for the U.S. women’s Olympic basketball team, admitted the group might have looked differently at Caitlin Clark after seeing the first half of her WNBA career.
The South Carolina coach joined NBC’s Mike Tirico for a look ahead to Team USA’s first 2024 Olympic contest — which will be against Japan on Monday — and discussed Caitlin Clark’s omission from the team.
“As a committee member, you’re charged with putting together the best team,” Staley said. “The best players, the best talent. Caitlin is just a rookie in the WNBA. [She] wasn’t playing bad, but wasn’t playing like she’s playing now.
“If we had to do it all over again, the way that she’s playing, she would be in really high consideration of making the team because she is playing head and shoulders above a lot of people.
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Clark, of course, wasn’t the only high-profile American left off the roster, but her fame made her the player whose standing was debated throughout the summer as it was announced that she was not among the final 12 heading to Paris.
“Shooting the ball really well, she’s an elite passer,” Staley continued, “She’s just got a great basketball IQ in a couple of months than she was two months ago.”
Selection committee chair Jen Rizzotti said in a statement in June that leaving Clark off the team came down to basketball criteria — and not the attention Clark would bring to the games.
At the time of Team USA’s official roster announcement on June 11, Clark had been averaging 16.3 points, 6.0 assists, 4.9 rebounds and 5.4 turnovers per game while shooting 37 percent from the field and 33 percent from 3-point range for the Indiana Fever.
That was across her first 13 games of the season after being selected No. 1 overall in the 2024 WNBA Draft our of Iowa.
In exactly 13 games since then, she’s up to 17.9 points, 10.4 assists, 6.7 rebounds and 5.8 turnovers per contest while shooting 43.4 percent from the field and 32.4 percent from 3 and has Indiana in a playoff spot as the No. 7 seed.