The Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark rivalry is alive and well in 2026. The latest installment happened Thursday night in Chicago, and Reese made sure everyone in the building knew exactly what she thought about Clark’s flopping.
During the third quarter of the Sky-Fever matchup, Clark went down hard after a screen and stayed on the floor longer than the contact warranted. Reese, standing nearby, mockingly waved her hand and pretended to fall over herself. The Wintrust Arena crowd ate it up.
The clip went viral within minutes. WNBA Twitter ran with it for the rest of the night. By Friday morning, every sports talk show had it on rotation.
This is the WNBA in 2026. It has become must-watch television in a way the league has not been since the early 2000s, and the Reese-Clark feud is a huge reason why.
The on-court product backs it up. Reese had 18 points and 14 rebounds in the Sky’s overtime loss. Clark finished with 32 points, 9 assists, and 5 turnovers. Both players are in the MVP conversation again, and both teams are fighting for playoff position in the brutal Eastern Conference.
The flopping accusation is not without merit, by the way. Clark has been called for one offensive foul this season because she initiated contact on what looked like an obvious sell. The Fever guard has also picked up multiple technicals for arguing with officials, which has become a pattern.
That said, every star in the league embellishes contact. James Harden built a Hall of Fame career on it. Trae Young weaponized it in the NBA. Clark playing the foul-drawing game is just part of being a high-usage scorer in a league that calls fouls inconsistently.
Reese knows that. She also knows that public mockery of a rival gets more attention than anything else in the WNBA right now. The two players have driven ratings and ticket sales since they entered the league together in 2024, and the cultural moment has only grown.
The Fever ended up winning the game in overtime behind Clark’s late-game heroics. She hit a step-back three with 12 seconds left, then drew a foul on the inbound to ice it. Reese was on the bench for those plays, which only added to the drama.
Postgame, neither player addressed the moment directly. Clark told reporters the game was competitive, like it always is. Reese said she was focused on getting the Sky into playoff position and not worried about all that other stuff.
The other stuff is what people want, though. WNBA broadcasts have set new viewership records every year since Clark and Reese entered the league. The All-Star Game ratings have tripled. Merchandise sales for both players are at the top of the league.
The rivalry has also raised the level of every other team in the WNBA. The Storm, Aces, and Liberty have all upgraded their rosters to compete in a league that suddenly has television money to spend.
For Reese’s part, the mockery moment was perfectly executed. It was short, it was visible, and it did not draw a technical foul. That is the line star athletes have to walk when they want to send a message without getting punished for it.
The next Sky-Fever game is in Indianapolis on July 2. Bet on a sellout. Bet on a national broadcast. And bet on more theatrics, because that is what this league has become, and the league is much better for it.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
