How two-day story thinking has guided Caitlin Clark through intense spotlight

Fever superstar Caitlin Clark took many things she learned from Lisa Bluder, her college coach at Iowa, with her to the WNBA, such as a mantra for dealing with “terrible moments.”Clark — during an event celebrating the announcement of her new partnership with Dick’s and Foot Locker on Tuesday in New York — recalled Bluder’s message on dealing with outside noise.“She always said like be where your feet are and I think that’s so true,” Clark said.“So many moments can pass you by and I can’t believe I’m gonna start my fourth year in the WNBA in March, like that’s crazy to even think about.

Everything just goes so fast and you know, whether it’s the good, whether it’s the bad, you have to take all of that with you and you learn a lot from it.“… We always talked about how everything’s a two-day story.There’s gonna be great moments, and there’s going to be terrible moments where everybody thinks you’re the worst player in the world.

“But… you play a game two days later and they want to talk about something that’s the opposite.So I think all of that is kind of what’s built me into being me.”Clark explained that Bluder “was one of the most impactful people that I’ve had in my sports journey” to this point.

“I think the thing that I really always valued the most is the way that she treated everybody,” Clark said.“I was the star of the team, but that didn’t mean she treated me any different than the 15th player that never got off the bench.

And I think that can be true in so many different parts of our lives, like that doesn’t even have to be sports, like everybody should be valued and everybody kind of had a seat at the table.”Bluder coached Clark on the Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball team from 2020-24 as the sharp-shooting point guard became a household name at the start of the Name Image and Likeness (NIL) era.At the time, Clark and the Hawkeyes’ rivalry with Angel Reese and the LSU Tigers play...