March madness has come to a close as the victors of the 2023 NCAA Championship for both men’s and women’s basketball have proven themselves worthy of the title. The end of the season surprisingly started a larger conversation.
Men’s and women’s sports have evidently proven to hold double standards for their male and female players. While men are encouraged and applauded for their “trash talk” on and off the court, women have always been held to a higher standard– deemed solely by misogynistic expectations of femininity.
Ballplayers in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League – which ran from 1943-1954– required players to maintain “feminine standards” both in public and in private by agreeing to wear skirts and uniforms, take etiquette classes, and never wear their hair short or smoke in public.
The latest women’s championship game has sparked an even larger conversation engaging in a dispute over the conduct of sportsmanship with an additional component– race.
Louisianna State University’s Tigers – regarded as the “underdog” throughout the college basketball season– proved victorious against the Iowa Buckeyes in a 102-85 defeat. At the forefront of the conversation are two players dominating college sports overall: Angel Reese (LSU) and Caitlin Clark (Iowa). The final tournament was a historic night of firsts and dramatic moments.
Here’s what happened:
LSU forward Angel Reese celebrated the Tigers’ fourth-quarter lead by waving one front in front of her face– popularly known as John Cena’s “You Can’t See Me” gesture– and tapping her ring finger while looking at Hawkeyes guard Caitlin Clark.
The moment instantly went viral as critics called Reese a “disgrace” and “classless” and referred to the gesture as “unsportsmanlike” in an effort to taunt Clark.
Reese is Black. Clark is white.
The “You Can’t See Me” Gesture:
Two games prior to the title game, Iowa beat Louisville to enter the final four– marking what has been deemed a historic performance by Clark. After scoring her sixth 3-pointer, Clark hit the “you can’t see me” gesture, for which she earned praise, including from John Cena himself. The Hawkeyes went on to the Final Four.
In the final stages of the March Madness bracket, Iowa defeated South Carolina in a close race 77-73. During the game, Iowa dared the South Carolina guards to make their shots and Clark disregarded star point guard Raven Johnson (South Carolina) by flicking her wrist and stepping back– leaving Johnson completely unguarded.
Clark received praise for this moment as it went viral for her confidence and dominance on the court.
Leading to the title game, LSU players spoke out against Clark’s viral moment saying they wouldn’t “tolerate” the same disrespect during their game against Iowa.
Reese later said this led to her decision on the court to have her teammate draw a band around her ring finger and reciprocate Clark’s viral gesture to her in the Tigers’ final moments before their victory.
Aftermath:
Both players have been asked extensively to comment on the controversy.
While Clark has said at a postgame briefing that she had “no idea” that Reese was taunting her she took the time to focus on uplifting her team and celebrate how far they had come in the competition.
Reese, in a postgame briefing, told ESPN that she had been eager to whip out the move, saying “Caitlin Clark is a hell of a player for sure, but I don’t take disrespect lightly.”
“I wanted to pick her pocket,” Reese added. “But I had a moment at the end of the game … I was just in my bag, in my moment.”
Reese later went on to comment on the backlash saying she had faced personal attacks all year for not fitting the narrative.
“I don’t fit in the box that you all want me to be in. I’m too hood, I’m too ghetto. You told me that all year. But when other people do it, y’all don’t say nothing,” Reese said. “So this is for the girls that look like me, that want to speak up on what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you. It was bigger than me tonight.”
She noted that Twitter will always “go in a rage,” but she feels happy for all that she’s done to help grow women’s basketball this year.
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