SEATTLE — It was a great weekend for women's basketball in just about every way, writ large and small. Maybe even a watershed moment, but we'll have to wait and see about that.
Whatever the long-term ramifications, the Women's Final Four in Dallas captured the zeitgeist of the times, and the eyeballs of more people than ever before. There was an epic semifinal game, mammoth upsets, a breakout individual superstar, another superstar who outplayed her in the championship game, and good old-fashioned controversy. Loads and loads of controversy.
Over the weekend, nothing was "trending" on social media more than Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, championship-game officials, Kim Mulkey's pantsuit, taunting and John Cena's "You Can't See Me" hand gesture.
Even with the competition of the concurrent men's Final Four — with an epic buzzer-beating game of its own in the semis — as well as the first weekend of the baseball season, my Twitter feed was dominated by chatter, discussion and, yes, rants about women's basketball.
Considering that just two years ago the hot topic at the women's tournament was the subpar workout equipment given the women compared to the men, I'd call that a major step forward. When an event can elicit that type of passion, and not just from the aficionados, it bodes well for the sport.
An anecdotal aside: At the women's regional in Seattle last week (a great showcase for the game in its own right), five sports writers — four male and one female — spent a half-hour earnestly discussing the WNBA prospects of Clark vis-à-vis Louisville's Hailey Van Lith, another shining light in the women's game this year. It was a sneak preview of the star power, and emotional investment, that would shine so brightly in Dallas.
Geno Auriemma, the 11-time-title-winning Connecticut coach whose Husky team was unexpectedly left out of the party by virtue of a loss to Ohio State in Seattle, compared the impact of this NCAA Tournament for women's basketball to the 1999 Women's World Cup final.
"Look what one tournament did to galvanize the entire country behind women's soccer," Auriemma told ESPN. "So it takes a moment like that, a tournament like that."
Considering the ratings number, Auriemma might be on to something. The semifinal matchup between Louisiana State and Virginia Tech averaged 3.4 million viewers with a peak of 5 million, up 57% from last year's early game. The main event, Iowa taking down previously undefeated South Carolina behind Clark's 41-point effort, averaged 5.5 million with a peak of 6.6 million, up 72% from last year's late game and the record for a college-basketball game, men's or women's, on ESPN+.
The championship game on Sunday, a 102-85 win for LSU, was an absolute blockbuster, becoming the most-watched women's basketball game in history with 9.9 million viewers (peaking at 12.6 million). In today's media world, that's a massive number, more than (as The Athletic's Stewart Mandel pointed out in a tweet), the Sugar, Orange and Cotton Bowls, the Big 12, Pac-12 and ACC football title games, Notre Dame-USC, LSU-Alabama, Ohio State-Penn State and the Alabama-Texas A&M prime-time game on CBS.
Clark was obviously the galvanizing force that drew people to their television sets and computers. In Seattle, she became the first player to have a 40-point triple-double in a tournament game, then equaled that 41-point effort in spectacular fashion against South Carolina. Her skill set — logo 3-pointers, penetrating drives to the basket, and extrasensory passes — brought to mind a cross between Pete Maravich and Steph Curry.
Clark also plays with a flair and fire that was greeted mostly positively, even when aimed at the opposition. That became an issue when Reese, in the waning moments of a title victory that she helped attain for LSU with 15 points and 10 rebounds, mimicked the Cena gesture Clark had deployed in Iowa's win over Louisville. Reese also went out of her way to point repeatedly to her ring finger in Clark's vicinity. It was an obvious reference to the championship jewelry that will soon be awarded to Reese and her teammates — and not to Clark and hers.
Reese's actions fueled a firestorm of reaction on Twitter, divided among those who thought it was classless taunting, those who noted that few people objected when Clark did something similar and those who felt that no one would have said a thing if they were men. It became a racial issue as well, with well-respected Black columnists William Rhoden and Mike Freeman each writing about the double standard of Black players being vilified for the same type of actions white players are often celebrated for.
It's a provocative and important discussion. It would be naive to think that there are not elements of both racism and sexism involved in the extreme reactions seen on social media. It's also not unreasonable to wonder if the imminent crowning of a championship is the right moment to rub it in the loser's face — for both Reese and Clark.
But even this debate is good for women's basketball, keeping the sport at the forefront of people's minds well beyond the final whistle. When you have public figures as diverse as Geno Smith, Samuel L. Jackson, Keith Olbermann and LeBron James weighing in, not to mention a who's who of WNBA players, a nerve has been touched.
Even better, Clark and Reese are both back next season, as will likely be Paige Bueckers, the Connecticut superstar who missed this season with a knee injury.
Come next year's tournament, with the current momentum and the right matchups, those television numbers could look puny in comparison.
