Grant Williams, who’s at the moment on the bottom on the Paris Olympics, known as out the sharp disparity in media protection between the boys’s and ladies’s basketball groups.
“The distinction between the boys’s vs ladies’s postgame is disrespectful and the ladies deserve higher,” Williams wrote on X shortly after the U.S. ladies beat Australia to advance to the gold medal recreation.
If we actually wish to transfer the W recreation ahead it’s not simply upto followers it’s additionally the protection they obtain. Being behind the scenes right here at Olympics the distinction between males’s vs ladies’s postgame is disrespectful and the ladies deserve higher. Internationally and domestically!
— Grant Williams (@Grant2Will) August 9, 2024
The fact is that the U.S. ladies’s basketball workforce is among the most dominant groups on the Olympics. They’ve received 60 consecutive Olympic video games, have led by double-digits for practically your entire match, and can go for an eighth straight Olympic gold medal on Sunday.
The roster contains among the sports activities greats: Diana Taurasi, the WNBA’s all-time main scorer; A’ja Wilson, the indeniable finest participant within the WNBA; Kelsey Plum, who broke the all-time NCAA Division I scoring document; Sabrina Ionescu, the most effective shooters on this planet; Breanna Stewart, as embellished an athlete as any — and the record goes on.
Nonetheless, when the workforce’s greatness is talked about, many individuals’s first intuition is to deliver up the participant who’s not on the roster: Caitlin Clark.
It’s an comprehensible intuition. In any case, Clark has introduced unequalled consideration to ladies’s basketball this yr, with WNBA viewership and ticket gross sales each at an all-time excessive. It’s additionally indeniable that had Clark made the roster, there can be extra media protection of those video games.
And, from a basketball standpoint, she might have simply made the roster — after a considerably gradual begin to her rookie season, she hit her stride within the weeks main as much as the midseason break, and is now averaging 17.1 factors and a league-high 8.2 assists per recreation on the yr. Final month, she even broke the WNBA’s single-game help document with a 19-assist outing towards the Wings.
Daybreak Staley, the present coach of South Carolina’s ladies’s basketball workforce and a member of the USA Basketball Olympic committee, just lately acknowledged that Clark would have possible made the roster had she hit her stride a little bit bit sooner.
“As a committee member, you’re charged with placing collectively one of the best workforce,” Staley mentioned. “Caitlin is only a rookie within the WNBA. She wasn’t taking part in unhealthy, however she wasn’t taking part in like she’s taking part in now. If we needed to do it yet again, the best way she’s taking part in, she’d be in actually excessive consideration of creating the workforce.”
However, there’s no purpose for USA Basketball to stress the choice an excessive amount of — not from a basketball standpoint, anyhow. That’s as a result of Group USA has been steamrolling their opponents, most just lately defeating Australia by 21. They seem like a shoe-in for gold, and everybody has performed their function practically completely.
The continuity on the roster is obvious, as is the the buy-in from all twelve gamers on the roster. A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart have been two of probably the most dominant gamers of the Olympics, and Jackie Younger has been glorious on each ends of the ground. All twelve gamers have been common contributors, and the workforce’s defensive connectivity has been simple.
So, whereas one might argue that Clark ought to have been on the roster, the gamers on the roster are clearly doing their job and profitable basketball video games. Olympic choice choices shouldn’t be made with marketability in thoughts — they need to be made purely from a basketball perspective. When the U.S. roster was assembled, Clark was simply starting her skilled profession.
If there’s an absence of pleasure about this U.S. ladies’s basketball workforce, it’s not as a result of the chosen gamers aren’t thrilling to look at — it’s as a result of these gamers haven’t been sufficiently coated all through their careers to the identical extent as Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, and among the youthful gamers within the recreation. Their tales haven’t been informed on the nationwide degree, not less than not on the scale and with the eye that Clark’s has.
That’s to not say there haven’t been particular person media entities and reporters who’ve devoted their lives to this protection — as a result of there definitely have been revolutionaries on this subject. This protection simply hasn’t benefited from the identical degree of economic funding.
From a basketball perspective alone, Kahleah Copper is as thrilling because it will get. Kobe Bryant known as Jewell Loyd the Gold Mamba for a very good purpose. When Sabrina Ionescu is feeling it (which is usually) her three-point capturing is nothing in need of spectacular. And should you’re a basketball purist, you’ll be mesmerized by Jackie Younger’s two-way excellence.
Grant Williams famous that after the ladies’s recreation, there have been “3-4 media retailers pushing the sport ahead”, whereas after the boys’s video games, there have been between 60 and 80 media retailers doing postgame protection.
“Viewership isn’t the battle, it’s the advertising,” he wrote.
He additionally importantly famous that if folks had acknowledged Diana Taurasi’s greatness, they wouldn’t have questioned this system’s choice to call her to the Olympic roster.
A part of which is why i’m saying that if there was higher advertising folks would then perceive why DT was picked over her. Nobody questioned Larry hen making the dream workforce roster at his age along with his again damage and his efficiency. That’s as a result of ppl knew him to be a legend! https://t.co/7RPD8T5Csq
— Grant Williams (@Grant2Will) August 9, 2024
The excellent news is that previous points with media protection are nonetheless correctable. The 12 gamers on the U.S. ladies’s basketball roster are proficient, marketable, and price investing in. Their video games are partaking, as are their personalities — when given the prospect to meaningfully showcase themselves.
Most significantly, they’re getting ready to an Olympic gold medal — this system’s eighth straight — and lots of of them will quickly contend for a WNBA championship. It’s not too late.
Caitlin Clark will quickly be the most effective gamers on this planet, if she’s not already. She’s virtually a lock for the following Olympics. However, her ascension within the sport must also spur followers and media alike to be taught in regards to the older gamers who’ve lengthy been doing this — the gamers who’ve been hitting deep threes, doling out loopy passes, and taking part in this sport at an elite degree for a really very long time.
Undecided you realize these gamers? An awesome place to start out can be tuning into the U.S. ladies’s workforce gold medal recreation on Sunday.
