Iowa star Caitlin Clark stands alone atop the NCAA women’s basketball scoring chart.
The junior guard notched the 3,528th point of her career on Thursday against Michigan to pass former Washington star Kelsey Plum.
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CAITLIN CLARK PASSES KELSEY PLUM TO BECOME THE ALL-TIME NCAAW LEADING SCORER 🔥
CERTIFIED BUCKET 😤 pic.twitter.com/Xx6HjKnuhr
Clark wasted no time, breaking the record with a deep three-pointer early in the first quarter:
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BROKE THE RECORD IN CAITLIN CLARK FASHION 🐐
(via @BigTenNetwork)pic.twitter.com/LHDWuurWrK
Even before the 2023-24 season tipped off, many thought it was only a matter of time before Plum’s record fell.
Through three years, Clark had scored 2,717 career points, well ahead of Plum’s production (2,418 points) through her junior campaign with the Huskies. Monika Czinano and McKenna Warnock’s departures from Iowa’s national runner-up squad meant its best player would have to shoulder an even heavier offensive burden as a senior.
Sure enough, Clark is putting up more shots (22.4 per game) than ever with her highest-ever usage (40.2 percent), per Her Hoop Stats. In part because of those two factors, she’s leading Division I in scoring average (32.1 points).
Clark’s prodigious offense isn’t merely a byproduct of volume, though. Her field-goal percentage (47.3) is on pace to match her personal best, and she’s shooting 39.3 percent from beyond the arc. She’s not only pouring in the points on a nightly basis but also doing it efficiently.
While Clark’s scoring ability is now unmatched on an all-time scale, her rise also reflects the shifting tides in women’s basketball.
Just as in the NBA, the WNBA has seen a steady rise in the number of three-pointers, which is trickling down into the college game. The NCAA has also instituted rules that opened up offenses and allowed teams to play more uptempo.
When Mississippi Valley State’s Patricia Hoskins passed Drake’s Lorri Bauman for the NCAA Division I scoring record, Bauman had only held the mark for five years. It wasn’t until 2001 that Missouri State’s Jackie Stiles leapfrogged Hoskins, and then another 16 years passed before Plum climbed ahead of Stiles.
Now, the NCAA has seen two different all-time points leaders in less than a decade. Not to mention, Ohio State’s Kelsey Mitchell finished just 125 points shy of Plum when she graduated in 2018.
It’s entirely possible that a contender for Clark’s throne is already in college with USC’s JuJu Watkins and Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo both averaging 25-plus points per game as freshmen. If not, the next challenger may not be too far down the line.
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