Kelsey Mitchell quietly leading star-studded Indiana Fever through trying times

If the upside of the promising young core is realized, the Indiana Fever will have one of the most star-studded rosters in the WNBA. Aliyah Boston, Caitlin Clark, and NaLyssa Smith rank among the best young trios in the game and represent true building blocks for Indiana to focus on.

As the Fever begin to recover from an 0-5 start to the 2024 WNBA season, however, it's veteran Kelsey Mitchell who has stepped up as the leader of this young team's resurgence.

Mitchell, selected at No. 2 overall in the 2018 WNBA Draft, has spent seven seasons trying to keep Indiana from drifting into obscurity. She's led the team in scoring in every season since 2019 and is currently just 0.2 points per game off the pace of doing it once more in 2024.

The arrival of Boston, Clark, and Smith, all of whom were top-two picks in their own right, represents the potential for buoyancy, but let it be known that it's Mitchell who has kept the Fever from sinking.

In 2024, Mitchell is again bailing Indiana out of precarious positions. She's averaging 15.4 points per game through 14 appearances, starting 12 times and stepping up in the most pivotal moments during Indiana's recent uptick in performance.

That all began on May 24, when Mitchell overcame a tough individual start to the season to get the Fever back on the winning track.

Kelsey Mitchell is thriving under pressure

With Indiana 0-5 and well on its way to yet another season at the bottom of the WNBA, Mitchell put the team on her back. She scored a then season-high 18 points in a 78-73 victory over the Los Angeles Sparks, helping her team win its first game of the year.

That's impressive enough, but what makes her showing even more remarkable is that Mitchell scored 13 of those 18 points in the final six minutes and 18 seconds of the five-point win—and Indiana was losing when she took over.

Another three tough losses put a damper on that success, but Mitchell again showed out by scoring seven of her 18 points in the fourth quarter of a 71-70 win over the Chicago Sky. It was the start of the Fever's current five-game resurgence, during which it's gone 3-2.

That includes an 85-83 win over the Washington Mystics, during which Mitchell posted 16 points, four assists, and three steals, including five points in the final 6:14.

Most recently, Mitchell scored a season-high 24 points, including eight in the fourth quarter, to lead Indiana to a 91-84 win over the Atlanta Dream. It was yet another example of how the veteran on the squad has managed to take over when the game is on the line and alleviate pressure from her less experienced teammates.

With Indiana now just 1.5 games behind the postseason pace, the Fever mainstay has taken center stage in making her team a factor again.