Caitlin Clark David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports
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Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark has struggled a bit on the court early on in her WNBA career. But Monday’s game between the Fever and the Connecticut Sun proved that Clark is still a massive draw in terms of ratings.

Monday’s WNBA game between the Fever and the Sun was a rematch of each team’s first game of the season, a game where the Sun blew out Clark and the Fever in a rather uncompetitive game.

This latest game on ESPN between the two teams went completely differently, coming down to the wire in an extremely competitive back and forth affair.

It turns out, fans want to see Caitlin Clark in close and competitive games. According to ESPN VP of Research Flora Kelly, Monday’s game brought in 1.56 million average viewers, peaking at 2.97 million viewers which is a record high for a WNBA game on ESPN.

These viewership numbers are a drastic increase over the average WNBA game on ESPN last season, signaling a 353-percent increase over last year’s average viewership.

It shouldn’t come as all that much of a surprise considering Clark helped set numerous record-highs for viewership of a collegiate basketball game on ESPN during her time in college last season.

But still, many fans took to social media and offer some praise to Clark for all that she has done to help grow the sport.

These record numbers in viewership show just how valuable Clark truly is to the WNBA. The Fever are 0-4 to start the year after Monday’s loss.

Any other 0-4 team in any league would never draw this drastic of an increase to the league’s viewership. But the Caitlin Clark affect is very real, and this is further proof of that.

[Flora Kelly on X]

About Reice Shipley

Reice Shipley is a staff writer for Comeback Media that graduated from Ithaca College with a degree in Sports Media. He previously worked at Barrett Sports Media and is a fan of all things Syracuse sports.

View all posts by Reice Shipley