The WNBA's Culture War Comes to Portland

📍PORTLAND, Ore. — The Fire's inaugural season, in addition to being more competitive than you'd expect for an expansion team, has been refreshingly free of much of the nonsense that's come with the WNBA's recent explosive growth.

The national headlines that dominate discussion around the league, many coming from people with no actual interest in the sport, haven't made their way into Moda Center. Congressional inquiries into opponents' treatment of Caitlin Clark, frosty relations between players and WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert, online harassment directed towards players—it's all been absent in Portland. The most controversial thing that's happened to the Fire this season has been having to redo the back of Megan Gustafson's jersey midseason when she got married and changed her name to DiLeo.

The good times weren't going to last forever. They never do.

The first time the Indiana Fever came to Portland at the end of May, Clark had possibly her worst game as a pro and the entire country lost their mind about it, Zapruder-ing a clip of a bench interaction with her coach, Stephanie White. That wasn't the Fire's problem. The story that night was the expansion team, powered by Emily Engstler's breakout offensive performance to go along with her typically tenacious defense, picking up their most impressive win of the season.

On Friday, Clark was spectacular, putting up a 26-point triple-double and hitting a couple of the logo threes the sold-out Portland crowd didn't get to see the last time. The Fever, who have won eight of their last 10 games, held off one of the Fire's patented fourth-quarter comebacks on the way to a 112-98 victory. And for once, Clark was an afterthought that had nothing to do with why the WNBA's culture war has finally made its way to Portland.