Earlier this week, Caitlin Clark spoke out against Indiana Fever fans who booed head coach Stephanie White ahead of Tuesday’s game against the New York Liberty. Now, more players are taking a stand in support of White.
White faced criticism this week after some believed she didn’t show enough support for Fever guard Sophie Cunningham after she was fouled hard by Chicago Sky guard DiJonai Carrington, who was ejected from the game as a result of the foul. That criticism culminated in some fans booing White during her introduction on Saturday, and that did not sit well with the players.
“I hated that our fans booed, to be honest, and you can disagree with this and that, I get it,” Clark said after the game on Tuesday. “It’s professional sports, people are going to boo. But, at the end of the day, that’s our head coach and we’re going to ride for her and we’re always going to have her back and that’s never going to tear our locker room apart.”
Clark was not the only player to voice an opinion like this. Ahead of the team’s practice session on Thursday, Indiana Fever All-Stars Aliyah Boston and Kelsey Mitchell also offered their support for their head coach.
“I think Steph does a great job with us,” Boston said before practice via ESPN. “We love her and appreciate her and so to hear [boos], it was really annoying, honestly, and disrespectful. But for us, the main thing is the main thing, and we said we’re going to come out here and get that win.”
“I told her to her face, I said, ‘Coach, you know this is for you,’ in terms of a sense of confidence, a sense of awareness that she’s not alone,” Mitchell said, referring to Tuesday’s pregame conversation. “It’s like it really hurt my feelings to see her kind of have emotions in terms of not feeling valued and not feeling wanted in a place where she has to coach. At the end of the day, this is her job and she has to show up, too, and I think people don’t really realize that, but it’s our job to remind her.”
Regardless of what the conversation may or may not be on the outside, it’s clear that White’s players have her back.
About Kevin Harrish