The Indiana Fever were a top-three title contender at the start of the season. Now, after a rash of injuries, the preseason darlings are in danger of falling out of playoff contention.
Caitlin Clark’s WNBA arrival in 2024 fueled a charmed season for the Fever with record attendance, massive viewership and a return to the postseason for the first time in eight seasons. Her preseason quad injury this year was the first indicator that Indiana’s next step into contention became more challenging than expected. Now, the Fever sit in eighth place in the WNBA standings, one game ahead of ninth-place Los Angeles.
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Indiana did well to weather Clark’s initial absence, bringing in fifth-year guard Aari McDonald to provide a different look at point guard with her downhill attacking and defensive peskiness. The Fever won the Commissioner’s Cup title over Minnesota, the 2024 champ, and were riding a five-game winning streak even after Clark’s injury recurred before their luck turned. First, McDonald and Sydney Colson suffered season-ending injuries in the same game against Phoenix, completely depleting Indiana’s point guard depth. Ten days later, veteran Sophie Cunningham hurt her knee and was also ruled out for the season.
“We’ve been dealt a crappy hand, but we gotta play it,” coach Stephanie White said.
Clark has missed 15 straight games (25 total games this season) and has an uncertain timeline for a return from groin and ankle injuries. On Sunday, according to reports, she participated in shootaround and warmups in Minnesota. But the Fever’s push for the playoffs must start with stronger performances from the remaining four Fever starters: Aliyah Boston, Kelsey Mitchell, Natasha Howard and Lexie Hull. Boston and Mitchell have retained their All-Star form — the Indiana staff even wore Mitchell MVP shirts to a recent game against the Lynx. Howard has been her most impactful defensively since her last All-Star season in New York, and Hull has been significantly better as a starter than off the bench, making nearly half of her 3s compared to 22 percent as a reserve.
However, Mitchell and Boston have sometimes been a little slow to get involved, like when Mitchell had four first-half points against the Sun or Boston had one field-goal attempt in the first half of Friday’s game against Minnesota. They have to be more consistently aggressive early, because Indiana doesn’t have enough in the reserves to play from behind.
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The Fever have also had to navigate the waiver wire to replenish their backcourt rotation, setting a franchise record for players in a season with 17. Former All-Star Odyssey Sims, who spent the first part of the season with the Los Angeles Sparks, came aboard after McDonald and Colson went down. Sims teamed with Mitchell to rally Indiana from 21 down against Connecticut the day Cunningham was lost; her 19 points and seven assists paired with Mitchell’s 38 in a must-win for the Fever.
More machinations were required after the Cunningham injury. Indiana had signed Kyra Lambert to her first WNBA contract but had to terminate it before the seven days were up as the team needed a veteran who could immediately play minutes. That veteran became Shey Peddy, who filled in for Sims in Los Angeles as a replacement player earlier in 2025 and had to do so again Friday, when Sims had to leave with a groin injury.
The Fever also added Aerial Powers as a little more insurance on the wing, where Hull is their only active player. Powers’ appearance Sunday made her the 17th player to suit up for Indiana this season.
The Fever take on a different identity with their new additions. Neither Sims nor Peddy is a 3-point shooter of Cunningham’s caliber (43.2 percent this season); both are below league-average for their careers, even if Peddy has been on fire in her first two games. That changes the spacing for the bigs, who have to work in tighter confines without Cunningham and eventually Clark pulling defenders out of the paint. As a result, Indiana is pulling Boston away from the basket to conduct the offense at the top of the key.
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“It takes some pressure off of our guards,” White said. “Most post players are not going to hound one another 94 feet, so we’re going to be able to get the ball across halfcourt in a timely manner to run our stuff. And she’s a great decision maker and understands which actions to get us into.”
It helps to get into half court offense more quickly, because Indiana’s transition offense is severely lacking without Clark, and now without Cunningham. Clark delivered better outlet passes than just about anyone in the WNBA, and Cunningham filled the wings on the break to open the lane. Despite scoring 90 points against Minnesota on Friday, only four of them came in transition.
Defensively, Indiana has more talent, but it doesn’t all fit together. Sims doesn’t have the speed of McDonald at the point of attack, and without Colson, the Fever aren’t able to pressure the ball as much. They’re also lacking wing defenders, which has necessitated some creativity, such as using Brianna Turner in that spot, even though she has mostly played center in recent years.
Indiana likely needs to finish at .500 to assure itself a playoff spot, so at 19 wins, the Fever need three more. Their best opportunities will be against Chicago and Washington and probably Minnesota in the final game of the regular season, when the Lynx likely will have sewn up the No. 1 seed and can rest their starters.
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Pivotal games remain against teams closest to Indiana in the standings: Seattle, Golden State and Los Angeles, each of which is within one game of the Fever. Indiana has swept the Storm thus far but is winless against the Valkyries and the Sparks. No tiebreakers are at stake, but with fewer than 10 games remaining in the regular season, the Fever need as many wins as possible.
“You can tell everybody here is together, they still want to fight, they still know we have a chance to make the playoffs, nobody has given up,” Peddy said.
Clark has yet to return to practice, and if she can’t play, any Indiana playoff appearance would be short-lived. It might even benefit the team more in the long run to get one more lottery pick to add to the young core.
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The Fever still have enough top-end talent to make the postseason. But the goalposts have moved. A playoff berth is a big drop off from Indiana’s original aim of winning a championship. It has been a season of adjustments for the Fever in more ways than one.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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