Caitlin Clark's Records: Look at the Legends She Passed

The Numbers Tell One Story. The Names Caitlin Clark Has Passed Tell Another.

I was working on another Caitlin Clark record graphic this morning. If you follow The Hawkeye State, you know that’s hardly unusual.

This one started with a number: 59.

Caitlin Clark needed just 59 WNBA games to reach 1,000 career points and 500 career assists. The previous record was 82 games, meaning Clark got there 23 games faster.

That’s remarkable on its own. But 82 isn’t what makes this particular record extraordinary.

Sue Bird does.

Bird isn’t just a name that happened to occupy a line in the record book before Clark arrived. She’s one of the greatest point guards basketball has ever seen: four WNBA championships, five Olympic gold medals, two NCAA championships and more career assists than anyone in WNBA history.

For an entire generation, Sue Bird was one of the standards by which greatness at the point guard position was measured.

And Caitlin got there 23 games faster.

That’s when it occurred to me: Maybe we spend so much time talking about the numbers Caitlin Clark keeps breaking that we don’t spend enough time talking about the names attached to them.

Because those names tell one heck of a story.

Kelsey Plum

Before Caitlin, there was Kelsey Plum.

Plum left Washington with 3,527 career points, the NCAA Division I women’s scoring record. She went on to become an Olympic gold medalist, WNBA champion and one of the defining scorers of her generation.

Then came February 15, 2024. Caitlin needed eight points to pass Plum, and she didn’t exactly sneak past her with a free throw. She pulled up from somewhere around the logo.

Of course she did.

Clark eventually left Iowa with 3,951 career points, the most in NCAA Division I basketball history, men or women.

But that’s the thing about these records. The number 3,527 means more when you remember Kelsey Plum was the player who established it.

Lynette Woodard

Then came Lynette Woodard, and this is where understanding the name really matters.

Woodard scored 3,649 points at Kansas from 1977 to 1981, before the NCAA even governed women’s basketball. Think about the game she played and the resources, television audiences, investment and opportunities that simply weren’t there.

Woodard was a four-time All-American, an Olympic gold medalist and the first woman to play for the Harlem Globetrotters.

She helped build this thing.

When Clark passed Woodard’s major-college women’s scoring mark in February 2024, she was passing more than a number. She was crossing paths with a pioneer whose accomplishments helped create opportunities for the generations that followed.

You can’t properly appreciate Caitlin Clark’s place in women’s basketball without appreciating the women who built the game before her.

Woodard is one of them.

Pete Maravich

And then we got to Pistol Pete.

Pete Maravich scored 3,667 points at LSU. He did it in three seasons, without a three-point line, and his NCAA Division I career scoring record stood for 54 years.

Think about that.

Entire generations of basketball came and went. The three-point line arrived. The shot clock arrived. The game evolved.

Pete’s name stayed.

Until March 3, 2024.

That’s when Caitlin passed Maravich to become the leading scorer in NCAA Division I basketball history — men or women.

I don’t think acknowledging the enormous differences between their eras takes anything away from either player. Quite the opposite. Pete Maravich’s greatness is precisely why Caitlin Clark being mentioned alongside him meant so much.

Even Clark understood that. As those records fell, she repeatedly showed appreciation for the players whose names she was joining and passing.

That’s respect. And that’s perspective.

Stephen Curry

Then there’s Steph Curry.

This one fascinates me because Curry isn’t simply a great player with great numbers.

He changed basketball.

The shots players take changed. The distance from which they’re willing to take them changed. Defenses changed. Kids watching at home started believing that a shot coaches once considered ridiculous might actually be a good shot.

During Caitlin’s final season at Iowa, she passed Curry’s NCAA single-season mark for made three-pointers.

But the connection between these two feels bigger than a number.

We’ve all seen the range. We’ve seen Caitlin pull up from places on the floor where, not that long ago, a coach might have immediately called timeout.

Then she adds the passing, the vision and the ability to see something developing before everyone else in the building sees it.

Curry changed the way basketball is played.

I think we’re watching Caitlin change something even bigger around women’s basketball — not just how it’s played, but how it’s watched.

How it’s talked about. How kids connect with it. How much attention follows it. How networks treat it. How brands value it.

That’s a different kind of record.

And there’s no number big enough to put on a graphic for that.

Diana Taurasi

Then there’s Diana Taurasi.

If we’re going to lift up the names, we better lift this one up.

Three NCAA championships. Three WNBA championships. Six Olympic gold medals. The WNBA’s all-time leading scorer.

Taurasi didn’t just play women’s basketball for two decades. She helped define an era of it.

During Iowa’s 2024 NCAA Tournament run, Clark passed Taurasi for the most career three-pointers in women’s NCAA Tournament history.

Read that again.

Before Caitlin had played a single minute in the WNBA, her name was already moving past Diana Taurasi in an NCAA Tournament record book.

That isn’t a reason to make Taurasi smaller.

It’s the exact reason Caitlin’s accomplishment feels so enormous.

Courtney Vandersloot

Then Caitlin got to the WNBA.

Surely this would slow down.

Right?

During her rookie season, Clark recorded 19 assists in a single game, breaking the WNBA record of 18 held by Courtney Vandersloot.

And again, look at the name.

Courtney Vandersloot has been one of the finest passers women’s basketball has ever seen. She led the NCAA in assists at Gonzaga, became a WNBA champion and built a professional career defined by her ability to distribute the basketball.

Clark broke her WNBA single-game record as a rookie.

Nineteen assists is impressive.

Courtney Vandersloot is what tells you how impressive.

Ticha Penicheiro

Before Caitlin broke Vandersloot’s overall record, the WNBA rookie standard belonged to another legendary passer: Ticha Penicheiro.

Penicheiro recorded 16 assists in a game as a rookie in 1998. She would go on to lead the WNBA in assists seven times and become one of the defining point guards of the league’s early generations.

Clark went past that rookie benchmark on her way to 19.

Another generation. Another great point guard.

Another name worth knowing.

And Back to Sue Bird

Which brings me back to the graphic I was trying to make this morning.

Sue Bird: 82 games. Caitlin Clark: 59.

Both reaching 1,000 career points and 500 career assists.

Twenty-three games apart.

When you follow Caitlin closely, it’s easy for numbers like these to start feeling almost normal. Another record. Another “fastest ever.” Another graphic. Another post. Another night wondering what she’s going to do next.

Maybe that’s exactly why every once in a while we need to stop looking at the number and look at the name beside it.

Plum. Woodard. Maravich. Curry. Taurasi. Vandersloot. Penicheiro. Bird.

Read those names again.

That’s not a collection of statistical footnotes. That’s basketball history.

Different generations. Different circumstances. Different styles of basketball.

Some played when women’s basketball was fighting just to be seen. Some helped build the WNBA into something that could survive and grow for decades. Some became champions. Some became icons. One fundamentally changed the way the entire sport is played.

Every one of them helped move basketball forward.

And every one of them helped build the road Caitlin Clark is now traveling.

The Part I Don’t Want Us to Miss

This is where I landed after staring at that graphic this morning.

Caitlin Clark passing a legend doesn’t make the legend smaller. It makes Caitlin’s accomplishment bigger.

Sue Bird’s greatness is what makes 59 games unbelievable.

Lynette Woodard’s place in basketball history is what gave that scoring milestone meaning.

Pete Maravich holding onto a record for 54 years is what made the day it finally fell historic.

Stephen Curry changing basketball is why seeing his name anywhere near Caitlin’s feels different.

Diana Taurasi’s career is why passing one of her marks makes you stop.

The names give the numbers their weight.

And there’s another part of this I love.

Some kid who started watching women’s basketball because of Caitlin Clark might now know who Lynette Woodard is. Someone who never watched the early years of the WNBA might learn about Ticha Penicheiro. A new fan might understand why Sue Bird’s name means so much to this league.

Caitlin isn’t erasing that history.

In an interesting way, she’s introducing an enormous new audience to it.

And maybe that’s part of what makes this moment in basketball so special.

There will be more Caitlin Clark records. I’m pretty comfortable making that prediction.

There will be more numbers for me to put in giant type on another THS graphic. More milestones. More “fastest ever” moments. More times when we collectively ask, How in the world did she already do that?

But someday, Caitlin’s own career won’t ultimately be defined by a number either.

Because the truly transformational athletes leave something behind that statistics can’t fully capture. Stephen Curry did. Sue Bird did. Lynette Woodard did. Pete Maravich did.

And we’re watching Caitlin Clark build her own version of that legacy right now.

I sat down this morning to make a graphic about 59. I ended up thinking about the names. I’m glad I did.

Because the numbers will keep changing. But the names already tell us what we’re watching.