Almost 20 years in the past, Conrad Piccirillo attended his first Indiana Fever recreation. The WNBA franchise was simply 5 years into its existence and getting ready to its greatest yr so far, however he admittedly was not there for the basketball. His daughters, 10-year-old Caitlyn and 11-year-old Claire, have been members of the Fever Inferno’s youth dance workforce, and he was there to cheer them on throughout their performances.
Finally, his daughters aged out of the dance troupe, however by that time, Piccirillo was hooked. He purchased six season tickets and invited associates, reveling within the Fever’s 2012 WNBA championship. But, when the Fever hit arduous occasions with constant dropping data for practically a decade, Piccirillo discovered it tougher to persuade associates to hitch him at Fever video games in his free courtside seats.
Flash ahead to 2024 and he hasn’t had that downside once more due to Caitlin Clark. His cohort is a part of the legion of followers who’ve made Fever video games the most well liked ticket within the WNBA. He attended all however one recreation at Gainbridge Fieldhouse this season, soaking within the vitality and atmosphere as he watched waves of followers fall in love with the Fever and the WNBA the identical approach he did.
“I feel she’s the proper gas on a fireplace that had been actually rising,” Piccirillo stated about Clark.
Clark’s rookie season marks a brand new period not just for the Fever franchise, but additionally the town of Indianapolis, the state and the WNBA. Clark was a spectacle at Iowa in contrast to anybody ladies’s school basketball has ever seen together with her emblem 3s and aggressive hearth. The WNBA and the Fever — who had the No. 1 draft choose — hoped her dazzle and enchantment would carry over to offer an identical spark for the league.
This was a blast! Greatest followers in @WNBA – @GainbridgeFH – FEVER NATION is alive & nicely! @IndianaFever pic.twitter.com/LYrCfGHqCh
— Eddie White (@eddiewhite3) September 16, 2024
Because the playoffs started Sunday — even with a gap loss by the Fever at Connecticut — the payoff of banking on Clark is clear on TV, within the stands and within the market. Earlier than Clark even stepped on the court docket in a Fever jersey, she surpassed expectations.
Solely as soon as within the 2000s had a WNBA recreation garnered 2.4 million viewers on TV, however on draft night time, much more followers tuned in to look at the league commissioner name Clark’s title. Since then, Clark has continued to assist the Fever and WNBA smash tv data.
Six totally different league tv companions set viewership data this yr for its highest considered WNBA recreation, and all six included the Fever. ION, which broadcast 43 WNBA video games, skilled a 133 % enhance in viewership yr over yr, and every of its seven broadcasts that topped 1 million viewers included Fever video games. Per Yahoo Sports activities, NBA TV set its personal WNBA viewership document eight occasions this season — every of these a Fever recreation.
ESPN, a longtime WNBA associate, had its most profitable yr of broadcasting the league.
The 2024 #WNBA common season on ESPN platforms was the most-watched EVER! 🎉
🏀 1.2M avg. viewers
🏀 WNBA Countdown: 508K avg. viewers pic.twitter.com/FrnWHOp11h— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) September 11, 2024
The primary regular-season Fever-Sky recreation — with Clark and rookie rival Angel Reese taking middle stage — marked the most-viewed WNBA recreation in 23 years throughout any community, with 2.35 million viewers. That document was damaged a month later when the WNBA All-Star Recreation introduced in a whopping 3.4 million viewers, making it the third most-watched WNBA recreation in historical past.
But it surely’s at Fever house video games the place the excitement is palpable.
Attendance in Indianapolis hit a document excessive — 17,036 per house recreation to steer the league in attendance for the primary time. Fever season ticket gross sales have been already on the uptick, however when Clark introduced in February that she was forgoing her fifth season of faculty eligibility, demand for Fever tickets grew to become unprecedented.
In keeping with Throughout the Timeline, the Fever hadn’t been within the high half of WNBA common attendance since 2016.
Piccirillo, the longtime Fever season ticket holder, now wears earplugs inside Gainbridge Fieldhouse, and his AppleWatch regularly notifies him throughout video games that the decibels he experiences could possibly be reaching damaging ranges. “It’s like watching Pacers playoff video games — that’s how loud it’s,” he stated. “In my thoughts, I feel it’s even louder.”
It wasn’t simply in Indiana the place Clark bumped attendance. Earlier than the season began, 4 Fever opponents — Las Vegas, Atlanta, Washington and Los Angeles — moved a minimum of considered one of their house video games in opposition to Indiana to bigger arenas to accommodate extra followers.
Tamika Catchings, a Corridor of Fame ahead who spent her complete 14-year profession with the Fever, nonetheless lives in Indianapolis. She was excited final season when Indiana, led by 2023 No. 1 choose Aliyah Boston, skilled an eight-win enhance. “However final yr to this yr is insane, how a lot vitality is round,” she stated.
She’s observed big-box shops that by no means bought Fever gear now displaying merchandise entrance and middle. Followers enter her native tea store, Tea’s Me Cafe, and ask her about Clark, Boston and Kelsey Mitchell. “(Followers) get excited after they see me as a result of they need to discuss in regards to the Fever,” she stated. “In (previous) years, it is perhaps that they get enthusiastic about seeing me, however that’s it. You’ll be able to inform there’s a real vitality and curiosity in: ‘What are your ideas in regards to the Indiana Fever?’”
Indianapolis involves life when the Fever play. An govt with the town’s tourism division stated lodge and leases spiked this summer time when the Fever performed.
Through the 2024 ladies’s NCAA Match, Brent Drescher, common supervisor of the downtown Indianapolis bar The District Faucet, stated followers started stopping in to look at Iowa ladies’s basketball, anticipating Clark’s future arrival to city. Followers of the Pacers, who made a run to the NBA’s Jap Convention finals, usually frequented his bar, displaying up round 5 p.m. for late tip-offs, Drescher stated. Fever followers are much more engaged. “They’re coming in as early as 4,” he stated.
Jeff Metson, common supervisor of Taxman CityWay, notices an identical buzz. A brew pub with a beer backyard and solely 4 TVs inside, it isn’t a typical sports activities bar, however as a result of it’s on the identical block because the Fever’s enviornment, it’s change into a pregame vacation spot — to the purpose that he’s usually needed to double his workers. Throughout Fever house video games, he stated, the Taxman welcomes as many as 400 patrons in comparison with about 250 on a typical Friday or Saturday night time.
“Not solely will we refill your entire restaurant pregame, however like clockwork, two hours after the sport begins we’ve got individuals beginning to stroll down the road, proper in entrance of us,” he stated. “In contrast to the others — Pacers and Colts video games — our postgame crowd fills the restaurant once more. The opposite sports activities don’t do this.”
Jaden Brown and his fiancee had by no means purchased season tickets for any sport earlier than shopping for them for the Fever this yr. They have been surprised to see even a small pizza shock filled with followers earlier than the Fever’s first preseason recreation.
“You simply see this flood of Fever, Clark, Iowa jerseys,” Brown stated. “It’s like a pregame with strangers. However they’re not strangers since you’re all there supporting the identical workforce.”
Nevertheless, it’s not simply bars and eating places within the Indy space which have seen the Caitlin Clark Impact up shut. Portland’s The Sports activities Bra — a bar that has created buzz by displaying solely ladies’s sports activities on its TVs since opening in 2022 — is greater than 2,000 miles away from Indianapolis and in a metropolis at present with out a WNBA workforce. When the Fever play, proprietor Jenny Nguyen stated, there’s a 56 % enhance within the variety of bar payments and a 52 % enhance in income.
A framed Clark No. 22 Iowa jersey, subsequent to photographs of Serena Williams and Diana Taurasi, hangs on a wall on the bar. However that’s not stunning, contemplating Clark attire may be discovered wherever.
The legal guidelines of provide and demand are evident round Fever video games. Followers didn’t flinch to shell out cash regardless of vital ticket worth will increase for Fever video games.
Heading into the playoffs, the get-in worth for the Fever-Solar recreation as of Saturday was considerably greater on TicketMaster at $89 than the league’s different three Sunday video games, which averaged $15 per recreation. This follows a season-long pattern. The 5 highest common ticket costs this season all featured the Fever.
Hottest WNBA tickets of 2024
Indiana Fever @ | Common bought worth | Date |
---|---|---|
$346 |
June 23 |
|
$286 |
Aug. 30 |
|
$269 |
Sept. 1 |
|
$262 |
July 17 |
|
$217 |
Sept. 19 |
These numbers alone are spectacular, however examine them to the identical matchups from final season. The common worth when the Fever visited the Sky in June 2023 was $45. When Indiana traveled to Washington twice in July 2023, tickets went for $59 on common in July 2023 when the Mystics hosted the Fever, they usually bought for $55 when Indiana performed at Dallas final September. The most popular ticket for any recreation final season was $120 for a regular-season recreation between the Aces and the Dream.
Throughout the board, WNBA ticket pricing adopted go well with — leaping from $62 per recreation in 2023 to $109 per recreation in 2024 (by way of mid-September), in response to Vivid Seats. However no workforce skilled fairly as drastic a leap because the Fever, whose house recreation tickets averaged $110 this season, in comparison with the remainder of the W, which averaged $79 per house recreation.
Regardless of the upper worth level, much more tickets have been bought this yr.
“The followers in Indiana love basketball, and I’m glad to see them again within the seats, particularly for the Fever,” stated Briann January, who performed the primary 9 seasons of her profession with the Fever and is now an assistant coach with the Solar. “For that workforce to be acknowledged and supported the best way they need to be makes me so comfortable.”
Through the first week of the season, the WNBA stated it noticed a 236 % enhance yr over yr in merchandise gross sales, with jerseys for Clark, Reese and Cameron Brink all within the high 5. By way of the primary two months of the season, 4 Fever house video games set single-game gross sales data on the enviornment’s workforce retailer, in response to the Fever. Whole gadgets bought grew 694 % yr over yr, and the shop’s web gross sales elevated greater than 1,000 %. Jersey gross sales have been up 1,193 % heading into the All-Star break.
Clark collectibles have been in excessive demand as nicely. Her signature Wilson basketball bought out in 40 minutes earlier this month, prompting a restock for the newest drop on Monday. A one-of-a-kind autographed Clark WNBA Draft card — the primary displaying her in a Fever jersey — bought at public sale for $84,000.
The sense one thing large was coming in Indianapolis was looming for months. Earlier than Clark’s Fever debut, the town hung a 150-foot banner of her on a constructing close to Gainbridge Fieldhouse. Clark’s picture appears to be staring throughout the town.
Now, for the primary time in eight years, the Fever are again within the playoffs. Indy’s previous greats already can acknowledge and admire her influence. “Taking part in basketball in Indiana is totally different, whether or not it’s in Indianapolis or one of many smaller cities, basketball is bred in another way,” Indiana Pacers legend Reggie Miller stated in an electronic mail. “So watching the joy the Fever have delivered to the town and state has been enjoyable to witness.”
A Fever street win over the Solar on Wednesday would assure a series-clinching Recreation 3 in Indianapolis. Catchings predicts a crazed crowd displaying as much as watch Clark attempt to lead the Fever to their first semifinals since 2015.
“It’s like Fever basketball and girls’s basketball has been rejuvenated,” Catchings stated. “Particularly right here in Indy.”
(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletic; Visible information: John Bradford / The Athletic; Pictures: Luke Hales / Getty Photographs, G Fiume / Getty Photographs, Brian Spurlock / Icon Sportswire through Getty Photographs)