Angel Reese’s viral taunting gesture towards Caitlin Clark when Reese’s LSU Tigers beat Clark’s Iowa Hawkeyes in 2023 ignited a rivalry perhaps never seen in the WNBA in recent years. However, when it comes to Team USA, there is simply one goal: Get that fifth straight World Cup while putting all personal rivalries aside.
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And fans couldn’t stop talking about how Clark and Reese displayed their chemistry after Bleacher Report revisited the time Team USA faced Spain in the FIBA qualifying tournament back in March in a video shared on Instagram on Thursday, which garnered over 1.4 million views in less than six hours.
“All it takes is for people to have a common goal and all the bs gets pushed to the back… simple💯,” one fan said while revisiting the clip of the USA-Spain game, in which Clark dishes out a fabulous pass to Reese for the bucket.
“Angel’s game is about to be so much more elevated now,” another fan wrote.
Playing for the national team, it’s not hard to see that both Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese complement each other’s game. Clark operates as a transcendent perimeter guard and elite playmaker, known for historic three-point range and high assist numbers.
Angel Reese dominates as a rugged, elite rebounder and interior presence, consistently averaging a high-volume double-double with elite offensive rebounding skills. So Clark finds Reese for the buckets, and Reese, in turn, grabs those loose balls for Clark to shoot again. A win-win for Team USA.
“The name on the front of the Jersey means more than the one on the back. Egos aside, playing for the USA,” one fan remarked.
“They bout to kill together lol,” said another fan online.
It’s not hard to see why anyone would make such a claim, especially when you look at the stat line and records that the duo of Clark and Reese has posted this season.
Just in August, Clark rewrote the record books, registering a league-record 44.7 points per game through her own scoring and assists, per an Indiana Fever release. Clark also put up 24.4 points per contest—the highest single-month scoring average ever by a WNBA point guard.
Along the way, she stacked five separate 20-point, 10-assist games, topping the entire league’s five-year combined total and becoming the first player in WNBA history to deliver back-to-back 30-point, 10-assist masterclasses.
Angel Reese has also been in career-best form this season. She recorded her 29th double-double of the season in an 89–81 win over the Minnesota Lynx last week, surpassing Alyssa Thomas’ previous league record of 28 set in 2023.
Reese also broke the WNBA single-season rebounding record by reaching 458 total rebounds (and counting), eclipsing A’ja Wilson’s previous mark of 451. Additionally, Reese has set the single-season franchise record for the Atlanta Dream for the most offensive rebounds in a season. Across 39 games this year, she is averaging 16.1 points and 12.4 rebounds per game.
“See what happens when we come together,” one fan wrote watching Clark and Reese truly team up.
“They would be a dynamic duo,” another fan said, insisting that all personal differences are set aside when both the players put on the red, white, and blue jersey.
It’s not far-fetched for fans to demand that their elite WNBA players play in tandem for the national team. The US team has won all four World Cup gold medals from 2010, when they beat the Czech Republic, to 2022, when they won the final against China.
As the USA takes on China again in the opener for this year’s World Cup on September 4, there will be extra responsibility on the duo of Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese, since the American team is missing some key veteran players, A’ja Wilson and Kelsey Plum, out with injury, which could certainly make things a bit tougher for them in the tournament.
The fans just want that trophy back home.