Jason Burgos
The ongoing rivalry between popular WNBA stars Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese has been a big story this week. However, popular FOX talking head Nick Wright believes they have a one-sided rivalry because Reese is over hyped.
Clark and Reese renewed their years-long rivalry on the opening weekend of the 2025 WNBA season. During Saturday’s matchup between the Indiana Fever and Chicago Sky, the pair of fan-favorites had an on-court altercation that had to be broken up by teammates. It created a lot of discussions about the rivalry, potentially helping lift the league to new heights in the years ahead. However, just like the Fever’s 93-58 victory, the skill level between the two players isn’t even close in Wright’s opinion.
“Angel Reese needs to be better at basketball. I’m not talking about as a person, or a podcaster, or at the Met Gala. She needs to be better as a player if we want this rivalry to be able to have some staying power,” Wright said on his “What’s Wright Show” this week.
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“She had a very busy offseason. But it does not seem, at this moment, that the offseason involved a lot of [George] Mikan drills of left-handed layups. Right now, Angel Reese is a wildly famous rebounder,” he added. “… I love the idea of this being a real rivalry. Because they clearly don’t like each other. But both parties have to hold up their end of the bargain.”
Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese’s issues date back to their years in college. When the former’s Iowa Hawkeyes battled the latter’s LSU Tigers in the 2023 women’s national championship game. LSU won that matchup. But Clark would make a second trip to the title game the next year (losing to Stanford). And be the No. 1 pick in the 2024 WNBA Draft.
They continued their conflict in their rookie season last year, and the WNBA has made of point of showcasing it again in 2025. The league’s marketing teams are likely hoping it can be as beneficial as Magic Johnson and Larry Bird’s rivalry in the 1980s was for the NBA.
