SPRINGFIELD -- On Monday, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame continued their Hoophall Hangout program with Iowa’s Caitlin Clark as she discussed her journey as a young athlete and how she is approaching the upcoming basketball season.
Coming off her award-winning and record-breaking sophomore season, the expectations are high for Clark. But after reaching the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA Tournament as a freshman in 2021, Iowa’s exit in the second round to 10th-seed Creighton last season was a stark difference.
“That’s why I think March Madness is the greatest tournament, it’s because it can end in the blink of an eye,” Clark said. “But when you’re on the wrong side of it, you’re not too happy.”
While there is a focus on Clark’s individual performance, the rising junior is also honed in on doing all that she can to help push her team to greater heights.
“We have that fire (now), we have that pain in our stomach that we need, and we didn’t have that last year,” Clark said, “... that burn (of our tournament run) ending in a sour manner is really going to fuel us and want us to get better, and I think that I’ve already felt that this summer. That loss is sitting in the back of our minds and we’re gonna be fired up to have a great year.”
As a young girl growing up in Des Moines, Iowa, Clark played a wide range of sports, including basketball, soccer and tennis. Often times, Clark competed against boys, and even when she began playing in girls’ leagues as a pre-teen and as a teenager, she regularly competed against older girls.
“I continued to play with the boys until like fourth grade, so it really made me develop my skillset at a very young age, and I give that a lot of credit for the player I am today,” Clark said.
During Clark’s time at Dowling Catholic High School, she played two years of varsity soccer before deciding to focus solely on basketball. This was a difficult decision for Clark, as soccer was her first sport, but ultimately Clark knew that basketball was her future.
“I did a lot of different things to find out what I really liked, and meet new friends, meet new people,” Clark said. “I think really that’s a kind of a lost art, I think kids should really try a lot of different things (and) not just focus on something from a very young age, and I give (my background) a lot of credit for who I am today.”
Clark’s journey over the past few years has brought her immense success and a number of accolades. Clark has won three gold medals at the youth international level, representing the United States at the 2017 FIBA Americas Under-16 Championship in Argentina, the 2019 FIBA U-19 World Cup in Hungary and the 2021 FIBA U-19 World Cup in Thailand.
At the collegiate level, she is a two-time winner of the Big Ten Player of the Year award, and last season she received both the Nancy Lieberman Award and the Dawn Staley Award, the latter of which she already had won after her freshman year at Iowa. She was named as a first-team All-American by both the Associated Press and the United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA), with the AP naming her to the team unanimously.
In many ways, Clark’s invitation to speak at the Hoophall Hangout this summer was an acknowledgement of all that she has accomplished and how her journey thus far has been an inspiration for the next generation of young athletes.
“I’m just honored and super grateful that (the Basketball Hall of Fame) asked me to do this, so thank you,” Clark said. “As a little kid growing up, one - time goes so fast, so enjoy every single second - but also, this is what I trained for, this is what I worked for, but I don’t think that I’ve arrived yet and I’m excited about the future.”
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