The Indiana Fever had the opportunity to qualify for the playoffs on Thursday night itself, but they have instead gifted the Dallas Wings a chance to cement their place in the top half of the table. And apart from Wings head coach Jose Fernandez’s plan of stopping Fever star guard Caitlin Clark’s offense working out to perfection, WNBA analyst Rosalina Lee believes the brutality of the Fever’s scheduling has also played a part in the Fever’s 91-85 loss.

“I’m telling you, everyone brings their A-game against Indiana. And when Indiana is on this kind of road trip, to me, they just looked gassed. Because it wasn’t just Caitlin, it wasn’t just AB (Aliyah Boston). Kelsey was putting the points on her back. And listen, Kelsey only took three more shots than Caitlin, so it’s not like she was ballhogging all night,” Lee said on her YouTube channel.

The Wings extended their record to 21-16 for the season, and with only the expansion side, Portland Fire, trailing them with a 15-20 record, it seems likely that Jose Fernandez’s team will be one of the eight teams to qualify for the playoffs, and might even become a top contender for the title. Especially if their defense learns to neutralize more top creators as they did with Clark.

Clark played one of her worst games in recent memory, recording only 10 points on 4-of-15 field goal efficiency and 2-of-8 from outside the arc. While Kelsey Mitchell held the fort with a dominant 37-point game, it was clear that the Fever were collectively a step behind the Wings, and Lee blaming the scheduling makes a lot of sense.

Following the team’s first-ever game in Canada versus the expansion Toronto Tempo, the Fever travelled all the way down South to the American Airlines Center to play the Wings in Dallas. Now, the Fever are heading to Brooklyn to take on the New York Liberty on Saturday, and exactly 24 hours later, they are slated to take on the Chicago Sky in, well, Chicago.

What makes this road trip even more brutal is that, bar the Tempo, all three teams the Fever face are still in playoff contention, and with just a month left for the biggest event in women’s basketball to begin, the teams are bound to bring out their A-game against Stephanie White’s team, as stated by Lee.

All of this comes after they were just in Atlanta to play Angel Reese’s Dream last Sunday. That makes for a five-game road trip in only eight days. When factoring in the travel between games and the lack of rest afforded, even a team like the Fever with an unbeatable offense can come up short in a few games, and Dallas took great advantage of that.

But good news follows for Clark and the Fever after this stretch, as the team will return to the Gainbridge Fieldhouse on August 28 with four games left in the regular season, that too against a Connecticut Sun side that is already out of playoff contention. After that, the Fever will not play any games until September 18, when they travel to Toronto again.

This is because the FIBA Women’s World Cup will commence next month, and while both Clark and Boston are part of the squad, it is unlikely they will see a heavy workload. Considering how much talent is in the squad in every single position, head coach Kara Lawson will have a hard time deciding her starting lineup in every game.

Regardless, the Fever’s top priority for next month will be staying healthy. With the offense we have witnessed from the team, especially their backcourt duo, the Fever look like a team that can beat anyone at full strength.