"It wasn't like 'I hate her, here I go'" - Marina Mabrey admits that she overreacted when she decked Caitlin earlier this season
WNBA guard Marina Mabrey was villainized after putting Caitlin Clark to the ground during an altercation earlier this season in a game between the Connecticut Sun and Indiana Fever. Mabrey further incensed Clark's fan base with her "Damned if I do, damned if I don't" reaction to the incident.
During a recent interview with Mark Medina of Sporskeeda, Mabrey stood by her statement but denied that she was trying to hurt Clark or specifically targeting her during that incident.
"I thought it only got upgraded to a flagrant 2 because of the way the fans reacted to it," Mabrey said. "They gave me a tech for it. I don't care, honestly. I really don't. Obviously, I'm not trying to hurt anybody. I'm not trying to go after certain players for certain s–t."
Mabrey got overexcited
Although she has 20 total technical fouls in her WNBA career, Mabrey does not have a reputation as a troublemaker. She has never been ejected in a WNBA game and only had one flagrant foul called on her prior to that incident. As Marina mentioned, she was only given a technical foul for her shove on Caitlin, and it was only upgraded to a flagrant foul 2 the following day after review and heavy criticism from fans.
Mabrey went on to mention that when the Sun faced the Fever during last season's playoffs, there was an incident when Clark shoved her to the bench while going after the ball. She and her teammates did not go after CC because it was just part of competing. However, as far as her latest incident with Caitlin is concerned, Marina admitted that she may have gotten a little too excited.
"So at the end of the day, it was a play on the ball when she did it," Mabrey added. "And I probably overreacted a little bit. But my teammate is getting hit, and I'm not okay with that. It wasn't like, 'I hate her! Here I go!' I don't do stuff like that. Everybody knows that I've never done that before."The refs justified why it wasn't a Flagrant 2, but the league overruled them
The teammate Mabrey is talking about is Jacy Sheldon, who got too physical defending and poked Clark in the eye. Caitlin didn't appreciate it and pushed Jacy away. That's when Marina and Tina Charles joined the fray, and Mabrey ended up shoving Clark to the ground. Sheldon was assessed a Flagrant Foul 1 for her act, while CC was given a technical foul for reacting with a shove.
Charles and Mabrey were also whistled for a tech, and officiating crew chief Ashley Gloss explained after the game why Marina wasn't ejected or even called for a flagrant foul:
"The contact made by Mabrey did not rise to the level of an ejection. Additionally, it did not meet the criteria for a flagrant foul penalty two," she said.
However, after an additional review by the league, the technical foul was upgraded to a flagrant foul 2. Had that call been made during the game, it would have resulted in an automatic ejection, which would have been a first for Marina. But since it wasn't, she ended up paying a fine for her "overreaction."This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Aug 12, 2025, where it first appeared.
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