women's basketball is awesome

Okay this is a long and super informal rant about how much I love that women's professional and college sports are growing. 

Last night I attended the... (not to doxx myself...) DePaul v.s. UConn women's basketball game at the illustrious Wintrust Arena in downtown Chicago. I haven't been to too many sporting events in Chicago yet, but this was easily the best one... probably ever! The gist is, women's college basketball blew up a couple years ago when some of the highest scoring players of all time got some media attention for setting records, transferring to higher ranked programs, and posting on tik tok. I'm not going to do all that research now on why that phenomena/perfect storm shot women's college basketball to the top of every trending board across social media platforms. If anyone was tuned in to that side of the algorithm circa 2022-2023 you were sure to see one thing and that was UConn women's basketball. Quite prolific, empowering, and exciting seeing girls not much older than you headline ESPN and dude bro crap like Barstool because of their record breaking (for lack of a better term...) epic-ness?? 

To walk it back a bit, for someone who wasn't closely tuned into sports, but had a grasp on what was going on a bit (maybe i'm being generous) the female athletes I admired were Simone Biles, Missy Franklin and Alex Morgan. I watched them in the Olympics and leading up to. I was even Missy Franklin for halloween in 2016 when the Olympics were in Rio. They were the best of the best, and role models to have every 4 years or so, maybe cropping up here and there in interviews and school projects, googling them in the school computer lab for an assignment or something. I did summer swim team and soccer during the school year and quit gymnastics because I am not as brave as Simone Biles. There is a disconnect however. My memories of elementary and middle school really show how closely tied we all are to our extracurricular, hobbies, passions, and talents as kids. Its really all we are? Just a blob of regurgitated things we like. Men, from the second they are born are told SPORTS!! Play a sport, get good at it, know your favorite team, your home team, line up, whatever on and on and on. And its not even a direct action of people parents, its just whats on TV, in movies, in schools. Mens sports are just everywhere, year 'round. 

When I was a kid, and I can still hear and smell what Thursday nights felt like in the fall; the NFL was on and my dad and two brothers were on the couch watching while I did homework and my mom made dinner. Doesn't that sound so traditional and strange? Its not like we had a family that forced traditional values on us, it was literally just what was on TV, on our Phones, and about our peers! And the same went for the spring, the days were longer and March and April melted into summer and the NBA blared from the TV. 

Its not that no one told me (or women in general) I couldn't play professional or college sports. It was just culturally and socially not what women are expected or allotted the room to do. Its just the impact of media. Sure I've never been the most athletic, and probably wouldn't be a star athlete even if women's sports were plastered on jerseys, billboards, and memorabilia in every home in America. But I can't help but wonder, if that was a reality, who could have been. 

OKAY major side bar there. It's such a nuanced social thing that happens everywhere I want to take more time to dissect it and I know theres probably thousands of studies about it but let me arrive at the point!!

SO I was ONNNN tik tok when UConn women's basketball and everything under the umbrella of the Caitlyn Clark and Paige Bueckers went viral. I watched many an edit which inspired friends and I to watch many a game. It was a literal shift in the stasis of my relationship with sports. I was carving out hours of my days to watch basketball and kick my brothers off the XBox to do so. I turned into the jock guy that talked during class over the teacher to my friends about the college playoffs. It was like tapping into a stream of something that had never been there before; a consistent team that felt like yours? and the community just grew. Everyone, everywhere knew about women's college basketball. (for me this also bled into other sports. At the time I played Lacrosse for my high school, and I got really into women's college lax. would recommend!) The people that knew the most about it however were.... the Lesbians. Now, I know people are gonna be like "people only got into it because they're hot!" which to that I say; "you patriarchal conditioned pig! get out of my spacehey!" The lesbians were more tuned in because their sisters were on the court! It was a culmination of satiating that desire to reclaim 'masculine spaces' and make them places for women (duh) and also seeing amazing and talented women be the torch bearers for a new generation. Again I was never super close to sports as in I had many other things I'd call closer to my personality, but I hopped on the FUCK YEAH train! 

When we're in this cycle of athleticism being a male dominated space, for people who aren't athletic its just like welp here we are, so I just think its so cool that we are witnessing a shifting of scales where women are't 5% of whats broadcast and you have to download an apple tv WNBA app to watch games because they are streamed on a different platform which they are and I hate that please fucking change that shit its literally a different for of pink tax like why do i have to buy a different streaming service to watch women's sports if they are not championship games like hello thats so gross ANYWAY shifting the scales to where girls in elementary school now see advertisements for women's college basketball when their parents go to turn on the TV in the fall and spring. They see them all over their phones probably on like youtube shorts or something. Its just a signifier of change for the better in an era where we just seem to be regressing. Its a marker that one day all female athletes will get the credit they deserve thanks to these talented college players leading the way today.

At the game last night, DePaul put up a really good fight, and actually leading in the first quarter 6-0 and 12-10. UConn pulled away when they got a feel for how DePaul played (as they usually do), but DePaul closed the gap on them better than Villanova and Seton Hall have in the past. So give it up for that! At the end of the game, I left feeling so freaking excited that there were so many women who attended the game. Everywhere I looked it was groups of college students and younger who had come to see the game. Okay this is getting so corny but to back it up!; it was the best attended women's basketball game in DePaul's history with 8,305 attendees. As the game grows, with each strong team bringing its fans from city to city, the passion for women's sports does too. I left feeling inspired to go to Lacrosse practice... which I have not attended all quarter, but thank you DePaul and UConn wbb you have genuinely inspired me to tap back into that side of myself. A side that everyone has! 

As we left the stadium I saw people begin to crowd around some gates, I connected the dots that that was where the teams would leave to board their busses home. Again, for lack of a better term, I was like fuck it and I went and joined the crowd. I was surprised when I got as close as I could that I could see. I'm pretty short, and I'm used to having to crane my neck around big sweaty guys at these kind of things. I could see because the whole front row were young girls eagerly waiting for the team to exit so they could scream their praises and excitement. Again this genuinely filled me with so much joy to see so many people this excited about college basketball. And the crowd grew and grew. I guess I left the stadium quickly because soon after I joined the crowd 500 people gathered behind us. We waited for a super long time obviously with people chanting team songs, talking about the game, swooning over the players, and talking about what we were all thinking; how awesome women's basketball is. What the cherry on top was the girl I was standing next to. She was probably a sophomore or junior in high school who was jumping with excitement. We talked a bit about how big the crowd was and then being the nosy bitch that I am I looked over her shoulder to see her wallpaper was the Adrienne Lenker album cover 'songs'. She was texting this girl with a heart emoji next to her contact name, and I was just like the baby lesbians are out here healing the world, and maybe we aren't going to die after all. 

We waited for another 30 minuted and finally the team came out one by one. KK Arnold exited the stadium to a roar of screaming and applause. She came over to our corner of the fence and signed all the younger gal's basketballs and my jacket! (not to brag) Everyone's excitement was so infectious. Finally Paige Bueckers opened the door to board the bus and I think both of my eardrums busted from the screaming of hundreds of fans cheering and almost begging for autographs and pictures. 

After they had departed I looked around and people waving the teams goodbye and chanting school songs. I never though I could be as inspired as I felt by a sport. It's like the feeling when you heard your favorite song for the first time. A being in the right place at the right time, just serendipity and discovery that sports should be for everyone regardless of societal pushes for gendered association. As all games grow, I hope so more many young girls get to have year 'round outspoken cool as shit role models like these because women's college basketball is pretty awesome.