Women’s College Basketball: A New Arena for Race and Gender Politics

Photo via ESPN

TAYLOR MOSES: After decades of remaining in the shadow of their male counterparts, women’s college basketball in the 2023-2024 season took the media by storm. At the middle of the storm of press, TikToks, and fan pages were major names such as the Iowa Hawkeyes’ Caitlin Clark and the Louisiana State University Tigers’ Angel Reese. Although the new eyes on the women’s league brought the sport immense progress, there also came with it a wave of racial politics–specifically in the Final Four game between the two aforementioned players’ teams. 

With Reese and Clark gaining notoriety this season, the LSU and Iowa game was one of the most anticipated matches in the sport’s history. According to ESPN, the game, which aired on April 1st, 2024, averaged 12.3 million viewers and peaked at just over 16 million. However, much of the press coverage in the days leading up to the match had an unexpected racial undertone. Before their matchup with Iowa, the Tigers played the UCLA Bruins, which the Los Angeles Times covered with a controversial article entitled, “UCLA-LSU is America’s sweethearts vs. its basketball villains.” Within the article, the author further refers to the Louisiana team as “dirty debutantes.” 

Branding the LSU team, a group of predominantly black women, as the villains in direct contrast to UCLA’s primarily white team elicits strong racist undertones. Although the original author of the piece, Ben Bloch, has since apologized for the problematic language of his article, this rhetoric exemplifies the racial politics at play. Players from the LSU team, such as Hailey Van Lith, who is white, directly called out the racism of such a title. Commenting on the article in an interview, Van Lith stated, “We do have a lot of black women on this team, and unfortunately, that bias does exist still today, and a lot of the people that are making those comments are being racist towards my teammates.” 

Major names in the sport such as Dawn Staley, South Carolina’s head coach, also commented on the dehumanizing nature of the press coverage from this season. In a post-game interview, Staley stated, “We're not bar fighters. We're not thugs. We're not monkeys. We're not street fighters.” 

The press covering these young women has taken an aggressive turn, going far beyond the rhetoric used to discuss their male counterparts. Early in the season, LSU’s head coach, Kim Mulkey, commented on a possible “hit piece” the Washington Post was planning to release. The article itself, titled “The Kim Mulkey Way,” details the harsh nature of her coaching, suggesting abuse and discrimination. Mulkey threatened to sue the newspaper for its allegations in an interview before its release. 

There has been a newfound animosity towards both coaches and players, calling out the figures for being aggressive, dirty, and overly competitive. These characterizations closely align with common stereotypes attributed to women, specifically those who are high-achieving and in positions of power. Although there have been few official statements by politicians discussing the game and its players, the season has nevertheless become a press frenzy of race and gender politics. 

Regardless of whether this shift is a conscious decision by writers and interviewers, it brings to light the biases in media, specifically against black women. Beyond the matchups, there has been discourse covering the white savior Caitlin Clark has become, functioning as the white face of a predominantly black sport. In an Atlantic article, Jemele Hill discusses the rich black history that is often overshadowed by the white players within the leagues. Opening her piece, Hill comments on how white players’ fame comes at the expense of “the black women who helped nurture and grow the sport when it was considered an afterthought.” This is not the first instance of the villainization of black women in basketball; for instance, there was also the controversy surrounding Brittney Grinder and her imprisonment. 

This is a consistent pattern in the political sway of the media surrounding the sport. Calitin Clark and other white players such as UConn’s Paige Bueckers deserve attention for their achievements within the sport; however, it should not come at the expense of the hundreds of black women who have given their lives to create the platform they profit from. 

Taylor Moses is a columnist for On the Record. She is a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences, studying Government and English.