Caitlin Clark hopes to dazzle fans in return to Carver-Hawkeye Arena
Former Iowa guard Caitlin Clark spoke with the media for about 12 minutes ahead of the Indiana Fever exhibition vs. the Brazilian National Team.
IOWA CITY – Iowa women’s basketball season-ticket holder Bridget Schlegel is due to have a baby on May 9. But she was not going to miss this.
Schlegel, 39, sat with her two-year-old daughter Jane on the steps of Carver-Hawkeye Arena on May 3 as fans began packing the building to see a preseason game between the Indiana Fever and the Brazilian National Team.
“Jane’s first Hawkeye game was at five days old, so she’s a huge Hawkeye fan,” Schlegel said.
Schlegel grew up in Iowa City and said she has been going to women’s basketball games for years. She said Clark’s work off the court, including with the Caitlin Clark Foundation, has reinforced her role as a model for women and girls like her two daughters.
“When I was a kid, we didn’t have such big role models,” Schlegel said. “We would go to games from time to time, but it was not nearly the craziness that it is now. They would give these tickets away for free, so it’s just insane that you have to fight for tickets.”
Fans encircle Carver
Schlegel was one of many mother-daughter duos who came to Carver to take in Clark and the Fever. Hundreds of fans eagerly awaited the opening of the doors more than two hours before the game was set to tip.
Around the various nearby parking lots, fans set up folding tables and chairs, grilled hot dogs and hamburgers and enjoyed a sunny spring afternoon. Some were out as early as 11 a.m.
Jackie and Rick Mason, long-time football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball season-ticket holders, came from Cedar Rapids to catch the Fever in action. It was their first professional women’s basketball game.
“It’s exciting to see Caitlin and how much she’s improved and what she’s grown and how this professional team is different from the college team,” Rick Mason said.
Clark was a “once-in-a-lifetime player for this university,” he said. Mason officiated basketball for years and said every time they came to a game, Clark did something he had never seen before.
“There just will never be another Caitlin Clark,” he said.
‘The basketball world finally caught on’
Melissa Einertson, 47, traveled almost three hours with her sister from Mason City to see Clark in action in person again. The season-ticket holder and University of Iowa graduate has been coming to games for more than a decade.
“It’s been so fun to see how Caitlin and all the Hawkeyes over the last few years have really elevated this program,” Einertson said. “And it’s definitely the coaching as well. You don’t just recruit good players through luck.”
Her college roommate even played women’s basketball at the university in 1999, the year before former head coach Lisa Bluder came to town.
“The basketball world finally caught on to what we’ve all known the past few years,” Einterson said. “It’s been fun to see that everybody else finally sees what we’ve been watching and been a part of.”
Ryan Hansen covers local government and crime for the Press-Citizen. He can be reached at rhansen@press-citizen.com or on X, formerly known as Twitter, @ryanhansen01.