NCAA scoring chief Plum completely happy to see Iowa’s Clark break mark

As Iowa’s Caitlin Clark nears the NCAA girls’s basketball profession scoring mark, report holder Kelsey Plum of the Las Vegas Aces is applauding the senior guard.

“I am truly very grateful to go that baton. I am very completely happy for her,” Plum mentioned Friday on a video name from a USA Basketball girls’s staff camp that runs Friday-Sunday at Barclays Middle in New York.

Then-Washington star Plum set the report on Feb. 25, 2017, when she scored 57 factors within the Huskies’ 84-77 victory over Utah in Seattle. She completed her school profession with 3,527 factors. Clark is presently at 3,424 and is averaging a Division I-leading 32.1 factors per sport.

The No. 3 Hawkeyes face Maryland on Saturday (8 p.m. ET, Fox), and if Clark maintains her present scoring common, the report will come Feb. 15 when the Hawkeyes host Michigan.

Plum was the WNBA’s No. 1 draft decide by San Antonio in April 2017, and has received the previous two WNBA titles with the Aces. She additionally received a gold medal with the US’ 3×3 girls’s hoops staff on the Tokyo Olympics, and now hopes to make the 5-on-5 staff for the Paris Video games this summer time.

Plum mentioned she remembers the chase for the NCAA scoring report — she broke the mark of three,393 set by Missouri State guard Jackie Stiles in 2001 — as being a disturbing time.

“I bear in mind, to be sincere, [the record] was very a lot a low level in my life,” Plum mentioned. “It felt like a whole lot of strain, and my id was sort of caught up in that report. I hope everybody within the media takes time to know that [Clark] isn’t just a basketball participant however a younger lady that has emotions and feelings. She carries it with grace, however there’s rather a lot to deal with there.

“If something, make it possible for we present her love outdoors of her efficiency. She’ll break it. I am excited for her.”

Clark typically has referenced each Plum and New York Liberty guard Sabrina Ionescu, who set the NCAA report for triple-doubles (26) whereas at Oregon from 2016 to 2020, as gamers she has watched and admired. Each Plum and Ionescu have been No. 1 WNBA draft picks, and Clark is predicted to be in April if she declares. Due to the COVID-19 waiver for 2020-21, although, Clark might return for a fifth season at Iowa. Gamers have till 48 hours after their final school sport this yr to declare for the draft.

Whether or not Clark goes to the WNBA this yr or not, is there an opportunity she might play with execs this summer time on the Olympic staff? Over the previous 20 years, USA Basketball has taken three WNBA rookies to the Olympics: UConn’s Diana Taurasi (2004) and Breanna Stewart (2016) and Tennessee’s Candace Parker (2008).

Nevertheless, the following U.S. coaching camp is April 4-7 in Cleveland, coinciding with the ladies’s Last 4. Thus, any school gamers taking part in within the Last 4 could not participate with USA Basketball until their groups misplaced within the semifinals and so they joined the camp late.

“There’s positively been some consideration about inviting school youngsters to [April’s] camp,” U.S. nationwide staff choice chair Jennifer Rizzotti mentioned Friday on the video name. “Once we invite folks, typically it is a watch to the long run. It is giving them that publicity. It is one thing we have performed previously.”

Requested in regards to the potential impression of a faculty participant going professional this summer time or opting to remain in class, Rizzotti mentioned she did not suppose that might be a think about making the Olympic staff.

“In the event that they determine to return to school, we’re not going to carry that towards them,” she mentioned. “We wish to be in search of the easiest of the most effective. We all know that there is a enormous bounce from school to the WNBA.”

That is the apparent impediment for any present school participant making an attempt to make the U.S. staff for the 2024 Video games. The Individuals — going for his or her eighth consecutive Olympic gold — have an unlimited quantity of expertise vying for the 12 Olympic spots.

That is true in any respect positions together with guard, regardless of five-time Olympian Sue Fowl’s retirement in 2022 after 20 years taking part in level guard for Crew USA. The present veterans at guard on this week’s camp embody three from the two-time WNBA champion Aces: Plum, Jackie Younger and Chelsea Grey. Plum and Younger have been each on the 2020 3×3 gold-medal squad, whereas Grey was on the 5-on-5 staff. Grey is presently rehabbing a foot harm suffered within the WNBA Finals however remains to be on the USA camp.

Among the many different guards at camp are five-time Olympian Diana Taurasi (Phoenix Mercury) and 2020 Olympians Jewell Loyd (Seattle Storm), Ariel Atkins (Washington Mystics) and Allisha Grey (Atlanta Dream.) Grey was on the 3×3 staff.

Additionally within the camp are guards Ionescu, Rhyne Howard (No. 1 decide by Dream in 2022) and Arike Ogunbowale (Dallas Wings), plus guard-forwards Kahleah Copper (Chicago Sky) and Betnijah Laney (Liberty).

Following this coaching camp, 12 gamers shall be chosen to signify the US on the 2024 FIBA Girls’s Olympic Qualifying Event Feb. 8-11 in Antwerp, Belgium.

Crew USA coach Cheryl Reeve mentioned it is as much as the choice committee to select the gamers for the upcoming event and the Olympics, saying her job is teaching.

“I’ve a possibility to specific what I would like in a staff and the way I wish to play,” mentioned Reeve, longtime coach of the Minnesota Lynx. “However we do not get granular on the personnel. I simply wish to deal with who finally ends up on the roster and the way can I greatest place us to achieve success.”