USA Basketball has not officially released the names of the team's 12 players, but two people with knowledge of the decision said Confirming the list to The Washington Post on Saturday, Clark acknowledged that he was not on the list.
“I'm excited for the girls that are on the team,” Clark told reporters Sunday. “I know it's the most competitive team in the world and I know it could have gone either way whether I was on the team or not. So I'm excited for them to do well. I'm rooting for them to win the gold medal. I was a kid that grew up watching the Olympics so it's going to be fun to watch them do well.”
“Honestly, I'm not disappointed. I think it just gives me a reason to work hard. It's a dream. I hope I can be there one day. I think it just gives me a little bit more motivation. Remember, I hope I'll be there again in four years.”
Regarding not being selected for the Olympic team, Caitlin Clark had nothing but praise for the 12 who were selected, saying “making the team was the hardest part.”
clip: pic.twitter.com/LX59YA5Bzf
— Chloe Peterson (@chloepeterson67) June 9, 2024
WNBA Indiana Fever coach Christy Sides said Clark knew from Friday that she wouldn't be joining the team.
“She said, 'Coach, they woke up a monster,' and I thought that was awesome,” Sides said. “She's still young and I think she's going to have a lot of opportunities in the future.”
Clark, the No. 1 pick in the WNBA draft and a driving force behind a surge in the league's attendance and television ratings, is still just 22. Team USA, seeking its 10th gold medal since 1984, has no players under 26, along with New York's Sabrina Ionescu and Las Vegas' Jackie Young. The team also includes five-time gold medalist Diana Taurasi, Brittney Griner (playing her first international game since being detained in Russia for 10 months in 2022), Breanna Stewart, A'ja Wilson, Napheesa Collier, Karly Copper, Jewel Lloyd, Alyssa Thomas, Kelsey Plum and Chelsea Gray.
The U.S. has had a No. 1 WNBA draft pick on its Olympic team in previous years: Taurasi in 2004, Candace Parker in 2008 and Stewart in 2016. Parker joined the WNBA after winning back-to-back national championships with Tennessee, while Stewart had just won her fourth consecutive national championship. Taurasi, who turns 42 on Tuesday, had won three consecutive NCAA championships when she was selected to the first team. Nneka Ogwumike, the No. 1 draft pick out of Stanford in 2012, was not included on the U.S. Olympic team.
The team was selected by a committee that included South Carolina coach and former U.S. coach Dawn Staley, three-time Olympian and Louisiana State University assistant coach Seimone Augustus, two-time Olympian and Old Dominion University coach DeLisha Milton-Jones, Connecticut Suns president Jennifer Rizzotti and WNBA league operations chief Bethany Donafin.
“They called me and let me know before everything was revealed, which was really a sign of respect on their part and I appreciated that,” Clark said. “They did the same for every girl that made the team and every girl that didn't make the team. There were a lot of girls in the Olympic pool so I wasn't the only one they had to call. They had to make quite a few calls.”
The USA Basketball Association typically doesn't release the names of replacement players, but it could promote them if there are potential injuries as the WNBA season gets underway. The proposed roster and replacements must be submitted to FIBA, basketball's world governing body, by the end of June.
Clark is arguably one of the most popular players in women's basketball, but she had an up-and-down rookie season: She led the WNBA in turnovers with 5.6 per game, never practiced with the senior national team and missed the final training camp before selection because Iowa's team was in the NCAA Tournament Final Four.
It won't help her that their opponents are going after a U.S. team that has won gold medals in the past seven Olympic Games without dropping a game, including a Breanna Stewart buzzer-beater win over Belgium in February.
Clark's forced rest comes after her Hokies played in the past two NCAA national championships and toured Europe in between seasons. Her addition to the WNBA generated a media frenzy and she led the league in minutes played as Indiana played 11 games through the season's first 20 days. Clark said she welcomes the rest but plans to “work on the things I want to get better at” and hit the weight room.
“It's going to be a really great month,” she said. “I've loved competing every second of it, but it's going to be a great month for my body, first of all, to rest and get healthy and just kind of take a break from basketball and all the craziness that's going on these days and find some peace and quiet for myself.”
