Story By: Erin Zollars
Photos By: Sol Tucker
Phoenix, AZ–
Coming into the 2024 WNBA All Star Game there was a bit of hype behind the WNBA team facing the Team USA women that was packed with hometown stars like Diana Taurasi and Britney Griner, but it was another star of her own, Arike Ogunbowale that stole the show scoring 34 points and setting a WNBA All Star record.
Watching the first half of the game many fans and plenty of us in the media would have never guessed that Ogunbowale would had a shot at winning MVP let alone lead her team to victory, at that point down 2 points.
WNBA All Stars Head Coach Cheryl Miller looked at Ogunbowale at halftime and said its your time to take this game over.
“I wasn’t expecting her to say my name,” Ogunbowale said. “She just told me to take a deep breath and play my game.”
The 34 points by Ogunbowale made her the fourth player to earn multiple WNBA All-Star Game MVPs, joining Lisa Leslie and Maya Moore, who each had three, and Swin Cash, who had two.
For Team USA, this was the final tune up before heading to Paris and many of the players know what they have to work on at this point if they expect to compete for Gold.
Many fans wanted to see Caitlin Clark grab one more assist to tie Sue Bird’s WNBA All Star record of 10, but Clark finished with 9 and said after the game that she didn’t want to grab another record to her every growing list as a rookie.
“That’s Sue’s record, I can’t take that from her,” said Clark. “That’s my homie.”
Bird who sat courtside with her wife Megan Rapinoe, seemed to be in awe at the playing style of Caitlin during the game with a few direct smiles as Clark passed their seats.
