Alexa PhilippouJun 18, 2025, 03:23 PM ET
- Covers women's college basketball and the WNBA
- Previously covered UConn and the WNBA Connecticut Sun for the Hartford Courant
- Stanford graduate and Baltimore native with further experience at the Dallas Morning News, Seattle Times and Cincinnati Enquirer
No players will face suspensions after a pair of scuffles broke out in Tuesday's Connecticut Sun-Indiana Fever game, including one in the final minute that resulted in three players getting ejected, the WNBA told ESPN on Wednesday.
Indiana guard Sophie Cunningham, who was handed a flagrant foul 2 and immediately disqualified for her hard foul on Connecticut's Jacy Sheldon with 46.1 seconds remaining in the game, received a subsequent fine in addition to the standard fine that comes with earning a flagrant 2.
Connecticut guard Marina Mabrey's technical foul for forcefully bumping Caitlin Clark to the floor earlier in the game has also been upgraded to a flagrant 2.
The late-game commotion was the culmination of chippiness, physical play and heightened tensions that had been building throughout the evening, with the contest ultimately featuring six technicals and two flagrants.
Things started to escalate when, midway through the third quarter, Sheldon poked Clark in the eye while defending her. Clark pushed Sheldon away before Mabrey knocked Clark to the floor.
Clark, Mabrey and Tina Charles received technical fouls and Sheldon a flagrant 1. Official Ashley Gloss said in the pool report after the game that the contact made by Mabrey did not rise to the level of ejection or meet the criteria for a flagrant 2.
The game ended with a more considerable melee, when Cunningham committed a hard foul on Sheldon as she attempted a breakaway layup, with an altercation ensuing between the players and eventually enveloping teammates, coaches and security as they tried to quell the tensions. Sheldon and teammate Lindsay Allen were deemed "escalators" in the incident, Gloss said in the postgame pool report, and were ejected for fighting.
After the game, both Fever and Sun personnel were critical of the officiating for allowing tensions to intensify throughout the game. Indiana coach Stephanie White said that "everybody [in the league] is getting better, except the officials."
"I started talking to the officials in the first quarter, and we knew this was going to happen," White said. "You could tell it was going to happen. So, they've got to get control of it. They've got to be better."
White has not been fined for her comments, the league told ESPN.
The Sun are back in action Wednesday against the Phoenix Mercury. The Fever head out to the West Coast for a Thursday tilt at Golden State.
