Stephanie White needed a moment to collect herself to regroup before entering the visitors locker room at Mohegan Sun Arena on Aug. 17.
Already without Caitlin Clark and 10 days removed from losing Aari McDonald and Sydney Colson to season-ending injuries in the same game, the Fever lost another key piece when Sophie Cunningham had to be helped off the floor with a knee injury in the second quarter, adding literal injury to the insult of a 48-29 halftime deficit vs. the lowly Connecticut Sun.
“It’s just like, ‘Are you kidding me? God, what are you trying to teach us right now?'” White said Wednesday on IndyStar’s Fever Insider Live.
The vibes were beginning to bottom out by that point of the season.
The Fever were within reach of second place in the WNBA standings a week earlier, but the nightmare in the desert was followed by a disastrous homestand that left them two games above .500 and clinging to a playoff spot.
As Cunningham grabbed her knee and yelled in agony from underneath the basket, it felt like we were witnessing the unofficial end of Indiana’s playoff aspirations.
But White’s confidence never wavered.
She recalled telling her team they’d “been dealt a really crappy hand,” but had to persevere. “This is what we do. This is what you have to do.”
“You get two choices in life when you’re hit with adversity. It’s fight or flight. And I knew we were going to fight,” White continued. “Win, lose or draw, whatever that meant, we were not going to give into circumstance. We were not going to give into our feelings in that moment.”
What followed has been well-documented.
The Fever orchestrated the largest comeback in franchise history, storming back from a 21-point deficit to capture a 99-93 overtime victory.
Among the game’s heroes were point guard Odyssey Sims, who looked fully settled in after signing her initial seven-day hardship contract the week before, and veteran forward Brianna Turner, who’d fallen out of the rotation, but came off the bench and played key minutes defensively, a role she’d reprise throughout the team’s run to the WNBA semifinals.
It was a remarkable display of resiliency and a turning point in the Indiana Fever’s 2025 campaign.
That innate ability to fight through and overcome became the expectation, the norm.
“(The Connecticut comeback) showed our group what we’re capable of doing,” White said. “It doesn’t matter the score, it doesn’t matter the circumstance. We just have to come together and whether we win or not, how we play and how we represent everybody we had lost up until that point mattered. And we had to keep showing up in that way.”
Asked how she maintained her composure, White pointed to life experience, emphasizing the importance of maintaining perspective. She described herself as a problem solver and explained how focusing on the problem allowed her to “keep (her) head above water and avoid getting fully caught up in the emotions of the moment.
“That doesn’t mean I didn’t go home afterwards and (drown), right?” she said.
It also helped that White was able to lean on her entire staff to help lift her up in those moments.
Leadership is best as a collaborative effort, White said, and given her familiarity and trust with her entire staff, she was able to “lead from different positions” throughout the season and didn’t always have to be at the forefront.
“I was allowed to lead from the side at times,” she continued. “I believe we have three head coaches on our staff (assistants Briann January, Austin Kelly and Karima Christmas-Kelly) and (they) would take it and run with it and lift me up. Not everyone has the ability and is surrounded by the people that do that. I’m very fortunate that I am.”
The same approach could be seen among the players, White observed, recalling players â healthy and injured alike â stepping up to lead in the huddle. She recalled specifically handing the clipboard to Colson and allowing her to draw plays.
“That’s the type of team we had and the type of culture we want,” White smiled. “It’s collective, it’s collaborative and our team really embodied that.”
Follow Brian Haenchen on Twitter at @Brian_Haenchen. Get IndyStar’s Indiana Fever and Caitlin Clark coverage sent directly to your inbox with our Caitlin Clark Fever newsletter.
Fever Insider Live is a podcast hosted by Indianapolis Star reporters Chloe Peterson and Brian Haenchen covering all things â you guessed it â Indiana Fever and WNBA. We host weekly shows during the season in addition to live postgame shows after most home games, and will have content throughout the offseason, as well. Find us on YouTube at YouTube.com/@IndianapolisStar.
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