Caitlin Clark-Tyrese Haliburton friendship: How Fever, Pacers stars bonded with assist from Clark's boyfriend

Daniel Mader

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Caitlin Clark-Tyrese Haliburton friendship: How Fever, Pacers stars bonded with assist from Clark's boyfriend image

Pro basketball in Indiana is in good hands over the coming years thanks to a pair of young, talented guards.

Fever star Caitlin Clark and Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton have emerged as offensive threats in their respective leagues, and both are known for their creativity with the ball in their hands and highlight-reel passing ability.

Haliburton is one of the best pure passers in the league, evidenced by his 9.2 assists per game in 2024-25, while Clark has a legitimate shot at becoming the first-ever WNBA player to average over 10 assists per game in 2025.

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As they've each become dangerous offensive weapons for Indiana basketball squads, they've also become fast friends off the court.

Here's what to know about the friendship between the two star guards, including how that relationship grew through Clark's boyfriend, Connor McCaffery.

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Caitlin Clark and Tyrese Haliburton friendship, explained

While Haliburton already enjoyed attending Fever games even before his friendship with Clark, he got to know the 23-year-old Fever guard better through Clark's boyfriend.

McCaffrey, who played college basketball at Iowa during the same period as Clark, worked on the Pacers' staff as a basketball development coordinator for the 2023-24 season, after his playing career with the Hawkeyes ended. Naturally, he developed a relationship with Haliburton during that time.

While he left the Pacers to take a job with Butler in 2024, McCaffrey worked alongside Haliburton while dating Clark. At the Pacers' 2024 media day, Haliburton said he "grew to be pretty close with Caitlin and (McCaffrey)."

Haliburton added that he, his girlfriend Jade, Clark and McCaffrey have a group chat together that they talk in "pretty often," and that if Clark ever wants to talk basketball, he's happy to do so.

As the two stars for Indiana's professional basketball squads, it only makes sense that Clark and Haliburton are friends, and they both continue to ascend as stars in their respective leagues.

"I think she's just so amazing, what she does, I love being able to support her in any way I can," Haliburton said of Clark at the Fever's 2025 season opener. "We're just two point guards looking to lead our groups to do something special."

Haliburton added that he and Clark both try to take things from one another as playmakers. After Clark recorded a triple-double in a Fever win, Haliburton, his girlfriend, and Clark's boyfriend made their way to the court to congratulate her.

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Who is Caitlin Clark's boyfriend, Connor McCaffery?

McCaffrey played basketball at Iowa from 2017-2023 and later joined the Indiana Pacers' staff as a basketball development coordinator.

The 2025-26 season will be McCaffery's second as an assistant coach for the Butler Bulldogs.

During his career at Iowa, McCaffery, the son of Hawkeyes head coach Fran McCaffery, finished with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 3.59, which is the second-best mark in NCAA history. He also played in the second-most games in Iowa men's basketball history.

McCaffery and Clark started dating in April 2023, per People magazine. The two often share social media posts supporting one another and have appeared at public events together in the past.

Daniel Mader

Daniel Mader joined Sporting News as an editorial intern in 2024 following his graduation from Penn State University. Previously, he covered Penn State, high school and local sports beats for NBC Sports, the Centre Daily Times, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Daily Collegian and LancasterOnline. He grew up in Lancaster, Penn., with a love for baseball that’ll never fade, but could also talk basketball or football for days.