The team that ended Indiana's season is now one loss from ending its own. Las Vegas dropped Game 2 in San Francisco last night and heads home down 0-2 to Golden State. We'll get to it. First, two pieces this week on what the Fever should change before 2027. It's Thursday, October 8, and this is the Indiana Fever Daily Podcast. On the rundown: a defensive blueprint built around Caitlin Clark, the names turning up on Fever trade lists, and the Aces on the brink. If today's show was useful, follow us wherever you're listening — the next one will be waiting.
Ojus Verma at EssentiallySports, on former college player Rachel DeMita's case for how Indiana should build:
Indiana’s 117 offensive rating ranked first in the WNBA this season, but its 110.3 defensive rating ranked only ninth. The Fever also allowed 90.4 points per game, which placed them 11th in the league.
Best offense in the league at 96 points a game, and a defense opponents could pick apart. DeMita's fix, from her Tuesday podcast, is to stop asking Clark to pick up full court or chase the other team's best scorer. She compares it to how the Warriors handle Stephen Curry. I'm all for it. She runs an offense like that and then she's supposed to hound somebody's best guard all night? Save her legs for the fourth quarter. The roster part is sharper. DeMita wants defensive wings, six-one, six-two, who play bigger than that. She noted Mitchell is five-eight, and said adding Ty Harris meant another undersized guard next to the undersized guard Indiana had just drafted. Careful with Ty, though. DeMita herself called her great. This is about the mix, not the player. Right. And the paint numbers back her up. Verma cites NBC Sports reporting from midseason that Indiana was allowing a league-high 44 points in the paint. Then Game 1 against Vegas: 102 allowed, 38 and 16 from A'ja Wilson, and Clark grading the defense an F. I'll take the wing defenders. What I won't take is DeMita calling next year a rebuild season regardless. This team just won 28 games.
Mervin LR, writing for College Sports Network, on three Fever trade candidates:
Lexie Hull generated plenty of chatter as a trade candidate leading up to the 2026 season, and it would not be surprising if this carries over into the summer. This is especially true considering she had a down season, averaging 5.2 points and 0.7 assists despite starting 41 of the 44 regular-season games, 11 more starts than last season.
To be clear, this is a columnist's list, not reporting on any talks. The other two names are Monique Billings, who has a year left on her deal and played under ten minutes a night in the playoffs, and Raven Johnson, as part of a bigger package. Raven? She just found her footing in that series. You don't sell the one young guard who got better in the playoffs. That's the tension the piece names. Indiana has a surplus of guards, and if DeMita is right that the next addition has to be bigger, Johnson is the asset other teams would ask about. And on Lexie, her value was never the box score. Even this piece calls her a solid defensive guard. That's the exact thing we just spent a segment saying we need. She had her own read at exit interviews last Saturday, via Rodney Knuppel at Sporting News. Hull said the margin for error in the playoffs is really small, and that Vegas does a good job of being the aggressor. Her line was, you can't take a play off. That's a player who gets it. Keep her and go find the bigger wing too.
Danny Webster, writing in the Las Vegas Review-Journal:
The defending WNBA champions rallied from 17 points down to take the lead in the final minutes but lost 83-81 to the Golden State Valkyries in Game 2 of the semifinals at Chase Center in San Francisco on Wednesday.
Vegas went up 76-74 with 1:36 left, its first lead of the series since 18-17 in Game 1. Gabby Williams answered with a jumper, and Veronica Burton hit the go-ahead three with 41.5 seconds to go. And that finish! Sean Keane at Golden State of Mind has Jackie Young making one free throw and missing the second on purpose, Chelsea Gray getting the ball back, and Kiah Stokes, playing on five fouls, blocking it with 1.2 seconds left. Golden State's first block of the night. Wilson had 24 again, 18 of them after halftime, and Gray had 19. But the Valkyries' bench outscored Las Vegas 34-14, with Tiffany Hayes scoring 21 in 17 minutes. I'll admit it, I'm enjoying this a little. Same team that bounced us, and somebody finally made them look small. Bench depth and size beating the Aces. If you're Amber Cox, that's the film to study. Game 3 is Friday in Las Vegas, and Keane notes no WNBA team has ever come back from 0-2 in a playoff series.
Your turn. Who would you move this offseason, and who's untouchable? Write to us at indianafeverdailyfancast at lantern podcasts dot com. Spot a number we got wrong? Same inbox.
That's Thursday. Links to all three stories are in the episode notes. We're back tomorrow, with the Aces playing for their season in Game 3 that night. The Indiana Fever Daily Podcast is a Lantern Podcasts show. Talk soon.