{"id":148697,"date":"2025-09-16T19:22:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T19:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/148697\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T19:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T19:22:08","slug":"indiana-frustrated-by-fouls-refs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/148697\/","title":{"rendered":"Indiana frustrated by fouls, refs"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"play\"<\/p>\n

Fever players, coach talk about Game 1 loss to Atlanta Dream<\/p>\n

Kelsey Mitchell, Lexie Hull and Stephanie White meet with reporters following Indiana’s Game 1 loss to Atlanta in WNBA playoffs.<\/p>\n

Atlanta’s physical style of play and numerous foul calls disrupted the Fever’s offensive rhythm.The Fever struggled in transition, scoring only nine points, a key part of their usual offensive strategy.<\/p>\n

ATLANTA \u2013 The Indiana Fever<\/a> never really could find a consistent rhythm against Atlanta in Game 1 of their WNBA playoffs<\/a> first-round series Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n

Indiana got off to a hot start, outscoring Atlanta 15-6 in the first five minutes of the game. And they had spurts at times, including a 7-0 run to start the third quarter, but they couldn\u2019t maintain that kind of scoring consistently, leading to an 80-68 loss<\/a> that put the Fever on the brink of elimination from the playoffs.<\/p>\n

Atlanta is one of the most physical teams in the league, with Brionna Jones, Rhyne Howard, Allisha Gray and Naz Hillmon bringing significant size to the starting lineup. Brittney Griner, standing at 6-9, brings even more size off the bench.<\/p>\n

‘We shot ourselves in the foot.’ Fever must clean up the small things if they’re going to extend season<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe knew coming in, it’s playoffs, it’s going to be physical, and we’re going to have to learn how to play with that, especially this team is inherently a physical team,\u201d Fever guard Lexie Hull said. \u201cSo for us, knowing that’s the case and being able to respond, I think there’s things that we’re able to watch in film on how to handle that better, not letting the refs determine how that physicality is impacting us.\u201d<\/p>\n

That physicality, from both sides, led to fouls that impacted the flow of the game. Indiana was called for 19 fouls, along with two technical fouls<\/a>, while Atlanta picked up 24 fouls.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get momentum, and then there’s four or five foul calls in a row, and they get some opportunities, I think it stopped the flow of the game,\u201d White said. \u201cIt didn’t allow us to get up and down in transition. You know, I think that their physicality took us, took us out of our rhythm.\u201d<\/p>\n

Getting out in transition is a hallmark of the Fever\u2019s offensive scheme \u2014 they thrive on getting out ahead of the defense and finding easy buckets. On Sunday, the Fever had just nine points in transition.<\/p>\n

There were multiple portions of the game that dragged because of constant fouling, especially to begin the fourth quarter. Aliyah Boston picked up her fourth and fifth fouls within six seconds of each other to start the quarter, forcing her to the bench for most of the rest of the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

White, who had been irate with the referees all game after having to use both of her challenges in the first half, became enraged just a little bit later after she there was no call when Shey Peddy was thrown to the ground by Atlanta’s Rhyne Howard. White marched up to the refs at the midcourt sideline, yelling and pointing at them from behind Kelsey Mitchell, who blocked her from getting closer.<\/p>\n

She didn\u2019t stop after the refs gave her a technical foul, and Caitlin Clark, Boston, and assistant coach Austin Kelly guided her back to the Fever bench. Odyssey Sims also got called for a technical foul on the Fever\u2019s next possession, saying something to the refs after she was fouled by Jordin Canada.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s very frustrating, very frustrating,\u201d White said. \u201cNobody likes to use their challenges in the first half, especially when they’re successful, you know? And look, it is what it is. This is not anything that’s new. You know, I think how we adjust, how we use it to our advantage on one end and try to be disciplined enough to not (foul) on the other end, it’s an equal chess match as it is for playing an opponent, right? I think that’s just an area that we’re going to have to dive into, how we get an advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Multiple coaches across the league, including White, have had issues with refereeing throughout the regular season and early in the postseason. Golden State Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase also got a technical on Sunday during her team\u2019s first-round playoff game against No. 1 Minnesota, and she said postgame she wants officials to give her team \u201ca fair fight.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

On the Fever side, going up against Atlanta\u2019s physicality, it\u2019s something they\u2019re going to have to work through. Indiana will need to find a flow to the game on Tuesday, even with a higher rate of fouling that is likely to come, if the Fever want to advance in the postseason.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen they punched us, they punched us hard,\u201d said Mitchell, who finished with a game-high 27 points. \u201cAnd so we have to do the same thing, vice versa, in order to get our momentum and get our rhythm running fast and off the ground early, we got to be early in our communication with defense. And I think we’ll have to compete.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chloe Peterson is the Indiana Fever beat reporter for IndyStar. Reach her at capeterson@gannett.com or follow her on X at\u00a0@chloepeterson67<\/a>.\u00a0Get IndyStar’s Indiana Fever and Caitlin Clark coverage sent directly to your inbox with our\u00a0Caitlin Clark Fever newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fever players, coach talk about Game 1 loss to Atlanta Dream Kelsey Mitchell, Lexie Hull and Stephanie White…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148698,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[62,75997,4643,505,732,461,79197,6739,8440,23311,49,7075,735,48,7076,8522,1322,6003,6279,63448,75996,1321,79199,14177,7078,5904,2803,2315,79200,24809,26677,4650,7077,7086,26678,79198,39661,44051,44,45878,38383,1333,44056,14176,6740,17845,82,865,1320,1339,630,4134,4143],"class_list":["post-148697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ai","tag-allisha","tag-allisha-gray","tag-atlanta","tag-atlanta-dream","tag-basketball","tag-brionna","tag-brionna-jones","tag-brittney","tag-brittney-griner","tag-ca","tag-caitlin","tag-caitlin-clark","tag-canada","tag-clark","tag-dream","tag-enabled","tag-fever","tag-ga","tag-gray","tag-griner","tag-highlights","tag-hillmon","tag-howard","tag-hull","tag-indiana","tag-indiana-fever","tag-jones","tag-jordin","tag-jordin-canada","tag-kelsey","tag-kelsey-mitchell","tag-lexie","tag-lexie-hull","tag-mitchell","tag-naz","tag-naz-hillmon","tag-negative","tag-news","tag-odyssey","tag-odyssey-sims","tag-overall","tag-overall-negative","tag-rhyne","tag-rhyne-howard","tag-sims","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-story","tag-story-highlights-ai-enabled","tag-wnba","tag-womens","tag-womens-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148697"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148697\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}