Caitlin Clark’s WNBA Draft still dominates viewership ratings despite Paige Bueckers’ stardom

Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers have been the two most popular women's basketball players to come through the WNBA Draft.

Caitlin Clark’s WNBA Draft still dominates viewership ratings despite Paige Bueckers’ stardom

Caitlin Clark drew twice as more viewers as Paige Bueckers at the WNBA Draft

There is no doubt that Caitlin Clark is a crowd puller. She has dominated the viewership charts all the way from college to the WNBA. But now the league is set to grow further after Paige Bueckers officially became a pro.

Paige Bueckers has millions of followers across her social media pages. She has a large following on Tik Tok which Clark does not have. That should even the playing field as both superstars look to help the WNBA continue its upward trajectory.

Bueckers’ last few games for UConn were an example of that stardom as fans packed the arenas when she led her Huskies to the NCAA national title. Heading into the WNBA draft, everyone knew the Dallas Wings would draft her, but even then, the excitement was high.

The league was a bit late but still put together a string of clips and pictures on their pages to promote the event. That led to a lot of traffic on their pages and on ESPN’s who were broadcasting the draft. Now their PR page revealed that the 2025 WNBA Draft garnered an average of 1.25 million viewers.

Those are impressive numbers as ESPN revealed that they make this draft, the second highest viewed in the history of the league. That also means that Caitlin Clark’s 2024 WNBA Draft still ranks top with a staggering 2.45 million average viewers.

Essentially, the Indiana Fever superstar drew twice the number of viewers even if she and Paige Bueckers are considered the most popular women’s basketball players ever. But what fans found interesting is how ESPN compared their numbers to the 2023 draft to look like it was much better.

ESPN analyst clarifies why network compared numbers to 2023

Some fans quickly noticed that when mentioning the percentage increase, ESPN compared this Draft to the 2023 WNBA Draft. When one fan responded to their X post, women’s basketball analyst and SportsCenter host Elle Duncan decided to clarify.

So, we all know last year was pretty anomalous with CC being who she is. So, to track actual growth, since she isn’t gonna ever be drafted again or play in college again, we use 2023 metric to track actual growth and progress- 2023 was record setting as well!

Elle Duncan wrote

Elle Duncan was pointing out that Caitlin Clark‘s 2024 WNBA Draft was an anomaly. Therefore, comparing with it is fruitless. Instead, to get a better understanding of how much better their ratings were, ESPN compared the numbers to the 2023 draft.

Her logic might have some sense to it considering it has been made abundantly clear that Caitlin Clark’s numbers are always a league above. Paige Bueckers’ national championship viewership numbers further prove the point as they were nowhere near Clark’s 2024 final.

Paige Bueckers and Caitlin Clark clash pushing ticket prices through the roof

Last season, Caitlin Clark managed to sell out a lot of arenas. This season, teams started to shift some of their home games to cater to the demand from Indiana Fever fans. One of them are the Dallas Wings, who shifted their June 27th clash to the much larger American Airlines Center.

Clark wanted the Wings to change their second home game against the Fever to the arena used by the Dallas Mavericks. Maybe the recent jump in ticket prices can persuade them. As soon as the WNBA released the 2025 schedule, the Wings officially opened ticket sales for that game.

But after the draft, they have been promoting the clash between Clark and Bueckers. Since then, the lowest price as per Ticketmaster is now hovering around $255. Some courtside seats are five times that, and these prices may continue to rise depending on how the Wings and Fever fare.