A Utah State cheerleader who went viral for her emotional response to her team’s March Madness loss has acknowledged the flood of social media attention.
Ashlyn Whimpey was captured by cameras tearing up and quivering during Utah’s loss to Missouri during the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament earlier this week. Video clips of the moment racked up millions of views and generated a massive response on social media.
Ms Whimpey acknowledged the attention in a TikTok captioned “And now I’m a meme,” featuring a song entitled “World’s Smallest Violin”.
Utah lost to Missouri 76-65 during the March Madness tournament’s first round, The New York Post reported. Bleacher Report’s video of the tearful moment racked up more than 3 million views, along with more than 1,000 retweets.
Scores of supporters responded to Bleach Report’s tweet offering condolences.
“Actually think it’s awesome she cares that much…not sure why it needs to be mocked on social media…” one user wrote.
“This so absurd man, it’s probably her last game ever cheerleading and everyone ripping on her for showing emotions,” another user added.
On Instagram, Ms Whimpey, a senior, indicated it was her last time cheering and wrote that she was “going out with a bang”.
