Letter to Caitlin

Dear Caitlin Clark, Recently, I was lucky enough to see you play in person. I brought my 5-yearold daughter to Williams Arena in Minneapolis, where I live with my wife and two girls. You dominated as usual and were playing at a different level than anyone else on the court.

To be honest, we really don’t have much in common. I’m a first-generation Sri Lankan immigrant, and my parents didn’t know much about American sports, so I found my own path. I remember watching a VHS tape with a documentary I found of Michael Jordan and was amazed by him. I watched “Space Jam” and joined my middle school basketball team. I was terrible.

In late middle school I discovered tennis. I was good, not great, but harnessed the energy of MJ and learned how to outwork and out-hustle my opponents, and ended up playing in high school and college. I learned a lot of life lessons from sports along the way and told myself I would teach my kids how to play sports early so they wouldn’t be playing catch up like me.

For better or worse, this imaginary future kid I was teaching was always a boy.

Fast-forward a few years, and I now am the proud dad to two girls.

My youngest daughter was an easy egg to crack. We both love cinnamon rolls and have regular daddy-daughter dates exploring various cinnamon roll shops around the Twin Cities. My eldest daughter has been more complex. It took a while, but I found my cheat code: Caitlin Clark.

Our daddy-daughter dates occur whenever you play. We sit back, relax, and watch you dominate. I see the same transformation in her as I did in myself when I first learned of the grit and tenacity that was “like Mike.” Together, I’ve watched my daughter’s confidence soar as we have learned about how practice helps you get better, how to be a good teammate, and how sometimes we win and sometimes we lose, but we always try to our best.

I spent an outrageous amount of money to see you in person with my 5-year-old daughter. You were electric as usual, and we jumped and danced and cheered. At one point, my daughter leaned over to me and said, “She hits that shot in the game because she works on it a lot in practice, right, daddy?” It was worth every penny.

You even graciously stuck around and signed our jersey at the end of the game. I said, “Thank you! You are amazing!” I wanted to say so much more, but there were hundreds of other little girls with their moms and dads waiting.

Allow me to try one more time now that the throngs of adoring fans are gone:

Dear Caitlin Clark,

If you read this, I want to say thank you. Thank you for being an electrifying, transcendent athlete who is actively changing the world of sport. But mostly, thank you for helping me be a better dad.