Caitlin Clark's shooting could see major boost despite brutal schedule

Caitlin Clark is 1-17 from deep in her last two games. A dismal shooting performance, that's due to turn around based on who's coming down the highway. The Fever's next three games are against the Storm, Sparks, and Wings. None of those teams are top-five defensive ball clubs.

The Storm are sixth, but Clark should be able to work with that. The other two are in the bottom five, so expect the turnaround to happen quickly for the Iowa-born darling. Fans are used to CC drilling those step-back threes from the logo. Her team is used to it. They lost their last two games, and you can tie that directly to the lack of three-point conversions.

When you take as many as she does, it really hurts the team when they don't fall at a reasonable rate. Valuable possessions are lost, and quite frankly, when you're as off as she's been, they start to look like bad shots. Bad shots affect the team in more ways than one, but everyone struggles from time to time, especially young players.

Sophomore slump or rough stretch?

There's a fair argument to be made that Clark's shooting woes are simply a product of the very common "sophomore slump". Most players go through it, and it doesn't matter how high of a profile they entered the league with. Once the veterans fully understand your game, they're going to play to your weaknesses.

Not only that, but the wear and tear of the long seasons start to get to you as you're in the midst of your second extended campaign since coming out of college or coming from overseas. However, how long it lasts will differ from player to player. As special as Clark is and as determined as we know her to be, I can't see it lasting much longer.

Some of you may be thinking about how they just played the Aces, and Las Vegas' defensive rating isn't the highest, so why didn't she have a better shooting night against them? But shooting slumps don't work that way. If you have one bad performance, it's just an awful night. A "slump" requires at least two games, and nobody decides when it's over.

What we do know is that the best thing for a shooting slump is to play against defenses you can take advantage of. That's what Fever fans have to look forward to. And usually, when the slump is over, the floodgates open. If that's the case, expect a larger-than-life type of performance from CC. The type of stuff that made the country fall in love with her game when she was at Iowa.