Indiana Fever head coach Christie Sides justifies controversial Caitlin Clark decision… and slams team’s effort during Connecticut Sun loss

Christie Sides defended her decision to bench Caitlin Clark in the third quarter of the Indiana Fever’s 72-89 loss to the Connecticut Sun Monday night.

“We were down 28 and I wanted to put a group in there that was going to go out and play some defense,” she told reporters when asked why she pulled her starters off the floor midway through the third quarter.

“I’m really proud of that group that went there… they played hard,” she added.

Sides also publicly berated her team for a perceived lack of effort during the match at Mohegan Sun Arena.

“I’m going to start with how you can’t make a coaching effort at this level,” Sides explained.

Sides pulled her starters off the floor midway through the third quarter of the game

“I felt like we were just trying to ask them to keep playing hard, keep playing hard. You can’t start there. You can’t play in this league if you have to put in effort as a coach. It’s just too hard.’

Clark finished with her fourth fewest points of the season, going three of eight from the field for 10 points – all in the first half. She picked up her fourth foul with 4:41 left in the third quarter and did not play in the final period.

After the big loss, Clark admitted she thought they “could have played with a lot better energy.”

“This is a team you can’t be lax against, they’re just that good,” No. 1 Draft pick told reporters.

“They’re going to punch you in the mouth, and I don’t think we had it from the jump and that’s obviously a little disappointing,” she continued.

“I thought we let little things frustrate us on the attacking side and we didn’t defend well… it’s not a recipe for winning a lot of games.”

“You can’t play in this league if you have to make an effort from the coach,” the head coach told reporters

Meanwhile, Clark admitted she thought the Fever ‘could have played with a lot better energy’

Sides also faced criticism for revealing a private text message exchange between her and Clark this week

However, fans on social media took issue with Sides’ coaching and the fact that she publicly criticized her team during the post-match press conference.

“You can’t coach efforts, but you can inspire them,” one fan wrote on X.

Another said, “Sides takes no responsibility,” while someone else echoed the sentiment, “I wouldn’t be excited about playing for her or on this team either.”

A fourth fan wrote: ‘Her team is unmotivated and with little self-confidence she lost the dressing room.’

Sides also came under fire for revealing a private text message exchange between her and Clark after the superstar rookie was rejected from the U.S. women’s basketball team heading to Paris this summer.

“She got a call on the bus and texted me to let me know,” Sides told reporters.

‘I just tried to keep her cheerful [up]. What she said was, ‘Coach, they woke up a monster,’ which I thought was amazing.”