Fever fall by two in Phoenix — 111-109 — while Boston and Clark top the All-Star voting. So the talent's on the ballot and the loss is on the board the same night. If you're just joining: with Indiana, the contender question has been control more than ceiling. Early wins came with blown double-digit leads; then a 113-91 rout of Toronto looked cleaner — and then back-to-back losses to Atlanta shoved the focus right back to defense and giveaways, after the Dream hung a franchise-record 113 on the Fever. This is the Indiana Fever Daily Podcast — and today we've got a two-point heartbreaker, the All-Star numbers that make it sting more, and a serious off-court charge we're going to handle straight. Let's start in Phoenix — the Indy Star says missed chances cost them. So let's actually find those chances. ESPN has the final. Final from Indy: Mercury 111, Fever 109. And that consistency test we had after Atlanta? It just got another ugly data point — Phoenix walks into your building and wins a track meet. A two-point loss to a 6-13 team. I watched the whole thing and I still don't totally believe it. Look at the quarters — 35 in the first, then 20, 30, 24. You score 35 to open and still lose by two, you can't pin that one on the shooting. Right, the points were there. Phoenix put up 29 in three different quarters — they just never stopped scoring, and at 6-13, that's the part that stings for the playoff math. The Indianapolis Star's Brian Haenchen is tracking this. 111-109 in Phoenix, and the Indy Star lands on the stuff we've been talking about all week: the Kelsey Mitchell charge, the no-timeout, the rebound they didn't get. Missed chances, now with a final score attached. Yeah, and that's the one that stings. A blowout you shrug off. Losing by two on a charge call and a possession you don't ice — that's the kind of game you replay at two in the morning. And talent isn't the issue, Joey. We've spent two episodes asking how high the Clark-Boston engine can take them — they posted enough to win this. The gap was the margins, the crunch-time stuff. Right, if you're looking for the problem, don't start with the box score. Start with the late-game execution. Mitchell drives into a charge, no timeout to set up the look, no rebound when they need one stop — those are the exact possessions we said would haunt a tight one. Here's where I keep landing: did White go to those Clark-Boston two-man actions early enough, or only when it was already a track meet? Because a two-point loss is where that decision shows up on the scoreboard. And the in-game stuff — challenge usage, when you spend that timeout. That's where I want the tape. Phoenix ran the same paint-and-second-chance formula they've run on us all week. This time it cost two points instead of twenty. This one's from Athlon Sports:
The WNBA released its second returns of All-Star fan voting. Boston moved up to first overall with 683,996 votes, while Clark climbed to second after tallying 670,510. The two opened third and fifth, respectively, in the first returns released last week.
The second All-Star fan returns are out, and Indiana's two pillars are at the top — Boston first overall at 683,996, Clark right behind at 670,510. Boston's tracking her fourth All-Star nod, Clark her third. And Boston jumped from third to first, Clark from fifth to second. The Indiana campaign machine works, apparently. Put those numbers next to the Phoenix game we just hit — Boston at 16.6, 8.6, and 2.8; Clark at a career-high 21.3 and 8.2 assists. Two All-Star lines, and a 10-7 team losing by two on missed chances. Right, that's the part that lands tonight. Both your No. 1 picks are playing like All-Stars. So when you lose 111-109 anyway, you're talking margins and crunch-time stuff, not talent. Which is why the All-Star love almost feels like its own lane. Decorated core, votes pouring in — and the roster around them still didn't close a two-point game. Two former No. 1 overall picks, back-to-back, '23 and '24. That's about as much draft capital as anybody's stacked. Talent's there. Execution still owes us. Indianapolis Star writes:
An Indiana man has been accused of stalking Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham. Kevin Singh, 48, was taken into custody June 23, 2026, the Marion County Prosecutor's Office announced in a news release. According to a probable cause affidavit, Singh allegedly sent Cunningham numerous "threatening and explicit messages" using social media accounts, and his behavior began to escalate in February.
We're stepping off the floor for this one, and we're handling it straight. The Marion County Prosecutor's Office says Kevin Singh, 48, was taken into custody June 23rd and charged with stalking Fever guard Sophie Cunningham. That's from the Indianapolis Star's reporting. And per the probable cause affidavit, this goes back to at least September 30th, 2025 — explicit, threatening messages on social media, with the behavior escalating in February. And the part that stops you cold — security footage from last September has him walking into Gainbridge Fieldhouse and leaving a package with a guard. So we're beyond anonymous messages on a screen here. He was allegedly in the building. We spent all week watching Cunningham light up box scores. This is the stuff that never makes the highlight reel — what these players carry off the floor while we're grading their crunch-time defense. It's a serious charge and it'll move through the courts. We name it, we credit the reporting, and we let the process be the process. Indianapolis Star, with Joshua Heron:
Six technicals were given in eight seconds during the Indiana Fever’s 86-77 win over the Phoenix Mercury on Monday. The madness started with 7:57 left in the fourth. With the Fever holding a 73-56 lead, Fever guard Caitlin Clark committed a personal foul on DeWanna Bonner with 7:57 remaining in the fourth as she tried to defend Bonner’s post-up at the elbow.
The Indy Star's got a number for the temperature we've been talking about — six technicals in eight seconds, Monday, in that 86-77 win over Phoenix. Clark fouls Bonner on a post-up at the elbow, Bonner turns to clear her off, and then it goes. And Clark says she got T'd up for clapping. Clapping. She straight-up told the refs they don't like competitive basketball. The longer-term detail: Voepel's got it as her fifth technical of the season. That's a number that starts carrying league-discipline weight once it climbs, so it's not just a fun Reggie Miller throwback. Right, and Hines-Allen got tossed in the middle of it for shoving Alyssa Thomas. Eight seconds. That's all it took. Blink and you're down a player. I'm stuck on this: it happened in a game they won by nine. The next night in Phoenix, they lose by two on missed chances. So I do wonder whether that emotional spike cost them any composure when it actually mattered. Yeah, no— that's the part. You light a fire up 17, fine. But did any of that carry over into the crunch-time execution that fell apart in the 111-109 loss we just talked about? Hard to prove, but it's a fair ask. If you're enjoying Indiana Fever Daily Podcast, take a second to subscribe and leave a review wherever you're listening. It helps more Fever fans find the show, and it keeps you caught up every day.
You'll find links to every story we touched on today in the show notes, so if something caught your ear, that's the place to dig in a little more.
That's Indiana Fever Daily Podcast for today. This is a Lantern Podcast.