Carla Leite called for the iso.

Dribbling out the clock, the 5’9 guard shooed away her teammates with confidence. The only thing standing between the 22-year-old and the Barclays Center basket?

Stewart is an elite defender — one of the WNBA’s most consistent. She’s also 6’4. But that didn’t matter. Leite, a 17.3% career three-point shooter in the WNBA, pulled up for three.

Leite smiled, knowing she had just iced the game. Thanks to her big triple, the Portland Fire led the New York Liberty by 6 points with 14.4 seconds to spare. Liberty guard Marine Johannes responded with a three-pointer of her own, but the game was out of reach.

The pull-up three was Leite’s second consecutive clutch basket in the final seconds of Monday night’s 81-74 Fire win over the Liberty. Twenty-five seconds earlier, Leite drove to the basket to give the Fire a 5-point lead with 40 seconds to play.

And, Monday wasn’t the first time she took over in the clutch, either.

Two weeks earlier, when the Fire pulled out the franchise’s first-ever win, Leite also stepped up down the stretch against the Liberty. She drove to the basket with 27.1 seconds to play, tying up the game against New York. A Sarah Ashlee Barker game-winner ended up securing that May 12th win.

Leite is having a strong all-around season. On Monday, she scored a team-high 18 points on 8-14 shooting; the Fire outscored the Liberty by 8 points in her 22 minutes on the floor.

Leite’s points, rebounds, and assists per game have all more than doubled; she averaged 7.2 points, 1.3 rebounds, and 2 assists per game, and has seen those numbers rise to 15 points, 2.8 rebounds, and 4.8 assists per game this season. Her efficiency has also risen; she averaged 38.7% in her rookie campaign and is shooting 5% better this year in Portland.

The Fire are 3-2 in the five games the sophomore guard has played.

Leite is far from the only reason why the Fire, one of two 2026 expansion teams, have begun the season 4-3. Bridget Carleton, the No. 1 overall pick in the expansion draft, is averaging 16.5 points per game, 10 more than she averaged last year as a role player on the Minnesota Lynx. Emily Engslter, Megan Gustafson, Nyadiew Puoch, and Luisa Geiselsoder have all been key contributors.

And, Ashlee Barker, who is averaging 10.3 points off the bench, has also been a monster in the clutch. In addition to her game-winner earlier in the month, Barker completed an and-one driving layup in the final minute of a crunch-time victory over the Connecticut Sun. In Monday’s win over the Liberty, she hit a go-ahead corner three to give the Fire a one-point edge with just under four minutes to spare. The Fire never trailed again.

But, Leite — left unprotected by the Golden State Valkyries after her rookie season — has been the primary scoring option in the clutch.

And, on Monday, she did it again.

INDIANAPOLIS — What should have been a straightforward situation for Caitlin Clark in the Fever became something much bigger over the last week.

For the first time this season, the Fever will be without Caitlin Clark on Wednesday after the star guard was a late scratch due to a back injury.

According to head coach Stephanie White, Clark woke up on Wednesday with back stiffness. After going through a workout, the Fever opted not to risk it and ruled her out. However, eyebrow-raiser, White later said that Clark did not participate in practice on Tuesday and received treatment instead, which raises questions about the timeline of events.

“Just woke up with some stiffness and some soreness,” White said. “Like we always say, how do you respond after a workout? For us, it’s not the time to take a chance. We just really want to be cautious.”

Last year’s Fever side was far more familiar with not having Clark available after she played just 13 games due to multiple injuries. However, White said pregame that this is not a matter of the team managing Clark’s workload but, instead, this is a legitimate injury.

“No, absolutely not. There’s no managing,” White said. “She’s healthy. We’re not managing anything. This is just a back issue that we want to make sure we give the time to be ready.”

While Clark had not been listed on any injury report with a back issue, it is not a new injury that has popped up. In the opening game of the season, Clark went into the tunnel on multiple occasions to get her back readjusted.

At the same time, Clark has also repeatedly said her body has felt fine throughout this season, after a 2025 season that never really got off the ground.

“I feel good,” Clark said after the recent loss to the Mystics. “Obviously, I’m sore, as is everybody. And we have one day in-between [games], so that’ll be my focus tonight.”

Clark has been available for a particularly busy stretch to open the season. She played all three games in a five-day span against the Sparks, Mystics and Storm, the first of those on the road. In fact, Wednesday’s game is the fourth in eight days with the Fever playing again on Friday before having six days off.

In theory, it would make sense that the Fever are limiting her minutes and workload this season after an injury-riddled sophomore campaign. In signing a number of guards and largely limiting her minutes this season, signs would point to the team making sure her body doesn’t break down again.

Except for the messaging from the team, at least for now.

“Don’t anticipate [ongoing issues],” White said, “but you know I’m not a doctor.”

INDIANAPOLIS — For three quarters of Friday’s game against the Mystics, Caitlin Clark could hardly hit a shot. In the fourth quarter, she could hardly miss.

Clark scored 17 of her 32 points, including five 3-pointers, in a wild final frame of regulation and dragged the Fever back into a game against the Mystics they looked set to lose. Her fifth 3-pointer was the biggest of the night as it forced overtime in the waning seconds.

Even though Clark’s heroics would not be enough as the Fever fell to Washington in the extra session in one of the best finishes of the young WNBA season, it still highlighted just how quickly things can change with Clark on the floor.

“I felt like I could have made another like five [threes],” Clark said postgame. “They’re all like right there and, obviously, it’s great to break through and get some to go down.”

Clark hit a pair of threes on successive possessions midway through the first quarter. As it would turn out, those would be her only two makes through the first three periods.

Clark was an ice cold 2-15 from the field and 2-7 from three heading into the fourth, mirroring the Fever’s offensive struggles as team as they were shooting just 32.8% from the field in that span.

But back-to-back threes from Clark in the first 90 seconds of the fourth were a precursor of what was to come in the final 10 minutes.

Clark scored or assisted on 11 of the first 12 points of the period. The only point she didn’t directly create was a Monique Billings free throw…which came on a foul after a Clark pass. She would go on to assist or score on 18 of the first 21 points for the Fever as they pulled themselves back into the game.

Her third three gave the Fever a short-lived 70-69 lead. By the time she connected on her fourth three, the Fever trailed by four with just over 90 seconds left. That deficit grew to eight with 51 seconds left, leaving Indiana in need of a miracle.

After a Myisha Hines-Allen layup, a Mystics turnover led to a Kelsey Mitchell 3-pointer, cutting the deficit to just three. The two teams traded free throws, leaving the Fever down three with 5.1 seconds left.

A great play design from Indiana head coach Stephanie White created just enough room for Clark to get off a shot as she drifted out-of-bounds. It was all the space she would need as the shot found nylon, tying the game with 1.7 seconds left.

“That’s like the hardest thing as a basketball player is when you’re not making shots to really stay in it,” Clark said. “So I’m certainly proud of myself. Really, really battled.”

The Fever were given one more scare in the wild fourth quarter as Sonia Citron’s half-court heave swished through the net, but it came after the buzzer, sending the sides to overtime.

Unfortunately, all those heroics to force the extra session were for naught as the Mystics responded again, building a multi-possession lead in the closing minutes. Again, though, they left the door open as missed free throws and a timely 3-pointer from Lexie Hull gave Indiana a chance in the final seconds.

However, a desperation shot from Mitchell fell short at the buzzer, allowing Washington to escape with a dramatic win.

For the Fever, as much as they can take away from their fight in the fourth and overtime, it was the middle quarters that were the most costly. Indiana shot 10-42 in the second and third periods, including 3-19 from range.

“If we don’t have three clunky quarters, we don’t force ourselves into basketball heroics,“ Clark said. ”We don’t want to play that way. Like I know it’s exciting for the crowd, but we should have had ourselves in a position, especially after the first quarter, to control this ballgame and we really didn’t.”

Friday was the second time in three games the Fever have eclipsed 100 points. Ironically, they have lost both of those contests, a sign of both how great this team can be offensively and how much work they still have on the other end.

“We put a lot of pressure on our offense to be perfect when we don’t consistently defend,” head coach Stephanie White said. “Again, this is on us as coaches. This is our responsibility. We’ve got to be disciplined the entire game. We’ve got to be disciplined every possession. We’re taking chances. We’re fouling shooters who are about to shoot tough shots. We’ve got breakdowns in coverages. We’ve got to find combinations of players and rotations that’s net efficiency can be good.

“We can’t wait to play defense in situations where we feel good and we’re making shots. It seems like we’re making shots and everything’s flowing and we’ve got energy on the defensive end, and when we’re not, we don’t. It’s got to be the other way around. The energy has to be dictated on that end of the floor and that’s a mindset.”

As dramatic and exciting as Friday’s fourth quarter was, the game as a whole highlighted where the Fever need to grow. No team wants to have to rely on “basketball heroics” to potentially win a game.

But it was also a sign of just how special Clark can be and how quickly she can deliver those heroics to try to save the Fever from defeat.

The Portland Fire’s roster doesn’t include many big-name WNBA players.

One of two expansion teams to join the league this season, their roster is headlined by strong role players like Bridget Carleton, Carle Leite, and Emily Engslter, players who have never been primary options in the WNBA, and fought tooth and nail to make it.

But on Tuesday night in Portland, as streamers inundated the stands, the roster’s relative name recognition didn’t matter.

Thanks to a Sarah Ashlee-Barker game-winning putback layup, the Fire defeated the New York Liberty 98-96, toppling a veteran squad that boasts stars like Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones.

Important disclaimer: the Liberty have not been healthy to begin the season; two of their most important players — Sabrina Ionescu and Satou Sabally — are both sidelined. Still, few would have predicted that the Fire, who fell to the Chicago Sky on opening night, would come away with their first win of the season on Tuesday against.

Bridget Carleton did everything she could to ensure it would happen. The 28-year-old was selected No. 1 overall in the expansion draft, and subsequently signed a 3-year, $3.75 million maximum contract.

Some scoffed at the size of that deal — she’d never before averaged double-figures, and while she was a strong role player for the Minnesota Lynx, she appeared to be just that: a role player.

But, in Tuesday’s win, the Fire’s Carleton vision came to fruition. The Canadian sharpshooter tallied a career-high 26 points on 9-16 shooting, hitting 5 of 11 three-point attempts, while also racking up 4 steals. In her 33 minutes on the floor, the Fire outscored the Liberty by 12 points.

But the victory was far more than just Carleton’s doing.

The 22-year-old Carla Leite appears to be a rising star of her own. Leite showed flashes of potential in her rookie season on the Golden State Valkyries, but is already seeing more opportunities in Portland. She led the way with 21 points in the season opener, and followed that up with another 21-point performance on Tuesday, hitting 8 of 14 field goal attempts alongside 6 assists.

Leite’s most pivotal play came with just 27 seconds to spare, when she blew past Jonquel Jones for a clutch-time layup to tie up the ball game.

Then, it was Sarah Ashlee-Barker who quickly became a franchise hero; the second-year forward corralled Carleton’s missed three-point attempt, and beat the buzzer with the putback.

Immediately, Ashlee-Barker’s teammates piled on top of her in celebration, while the fans at Moda Center went berserk.

A Fire team that didn’t even have players just a few months ago had toppled one of the most talented squads in the WNBA.

And, the fire they played with on Tuesday night suggested it just might be the first of many big-time victories in their inaugural season.