Women’s basketball takes the spotlight with sensational performances … on and off the court

We just witnessed the greatest weekend in the history of women’s college basketball at the end of the best women’s college basketball season ever.

It was a perfect storm: One of the top single-season teams of all time, one of the most historic programs ever and, mostly, a generational talent — perhaps the greatest college basketball player the game has ever seen — combined to make this a weekend that we will never forget.

And the season might have changed the sport forever.

When the numbers come out today, Sunday’s national basketball championship game between Iowa and South Carolina on ABC is expected to be the most-watched women’s college basketball game of all time. The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch tweeted the number could be 20 million, which would be astonishing.

That would smash the mark set just two days earlier when Iowa, featuring the all-time Division I (men and women) leading scorer Caitlin Clark defeated legendary program UConn in a game that had a controversial ending. (Sorry UConn fans, but it was absolutely a foul for an illegal screen and, yes, it absolutely should have been called.)

The Iowa-UConn game on ESPN averaged 14.2 million viewers, making it — get this — the most-watched basketball game ever on ESPN. We’re talking men and women, college and professional. That’s right. It outdrew even the most-watched NBA game ever on ESPN, which was the 2018 NBA Eastern Conference finals between Cleveland and Boston. That game, featuring LeBron James, had an average of 13.51 million fans.

ESPN said it was the network’s second-highest audience for a non-American football broadcast — in other words, not college football or the NFL. The only game that had more was the United States-Portugal match during group play in the 2014 men's soccer World Cup. That averaged 18.22 million viewers.

It has been an amazing TV run for women’s college hoops, mostly because of Clark’s incredible play and overwhelming popularity. It seemed like every time she played in recent weeks, her games became appointment television and set some sort of TV record. And that popularity carried over to other women’s games in the tournament. It has rivaled and may even surpass the men’s tournament when the numbers are added up.

This year, the women were better than the men, possibly in terms of TV numbers and certainly in terms of buzz and expectations delivered.

ESPN also deserves praise for how well it covered women’s basketball this season, especially during the NCAA Tournament with excellent coverage in both the games and studio shows. Deitsch, who has covered women’s college basketball as well as sports media, tweeted, “In all my years of covering women’s basketball and writing mediocre sports media pieces, this was the best coverage espn has given women’s college basketball by far. They went all-in and they were rewarded.”

But it wasn’t just what happened on the court that made the women a winner this past weekend. There’s more.

A MESSAGE FROM POYNTER

Career-minded journalists need this in their toolkits

This six-week seminar equips reporters with the tools and one-on-one coaching they need to hit the ground running and build a successful career.

Read more and apply now.

Winning on and off the court …

Dawn Staley is one of the coolest customers you can find. She was an elite basketball player, first at the University of Virginia, and then in the WNBA. She was a two-time Naismith college player of the year, a six-time WNBA all-star and a three-time Olympic gold medal winner. She was the American flag bearer at the opening ceremony of the 2004 Summer Olympics.

Then she went on to be one of the best college coaches in the country. She’s a four-time Naismith coach of the year, including this year, and her South Carolina Gamecocks went undefeated and won their third national championship under her leadership against Iowa on Sunday. The 87-75 victory avenged last year’s loss to Clark’s Iowa team in the national semifinals.

But Staley’s second-best performance of the weekend might have been how she handled a sensitive question on Saturday during a press conference at the women’s Final Four. A reporter from OutKick asked her a question about trans athletes. OutKick is owned by Fox and was founded by conservative radio and TV host Clay Travis. There’s no mistaking its political stance even though it’s mostly a sports site. They take what many consider “anti-woke” and right-leaning opinions on sports-related topics.

The reporter, Dan Zaksheske, asked Staley, “One of the major issues facing women’s sports right now is the debate, the discussion topic, about the inclusion of transgender athletes, biological males, in women’s sports. I was wondering if you would tell me your position on that issue.”

What followed was a master class in how to handle what many believed was meant to be a “gotcha” type of question. Staley, clearly aware that this was a pivotal moment, didn’t rush into her answer. She paused, took a drink from a cup in front of her and then acknowledged the weight of the question, telling Zaksheske, “Damn, you got deep on me, didn’t you?”

Then measuredly she said, “I’m of the opinion … if you’re a woman, you should play. If you consider yourself a woman and you want to play sports or vice versa, you should be able to play. That’s my opinion.”

She then looked at Zaksheske and said, “You want me to go deeper.”

Zaksheske started the follow-up, “Do you think transgender women should be able to participate …”

At that moment, Staley had perfectly, yet calmly pushed the reporter to get to his real question, saying, “That’s the question you want to ask, I’ll give you that. Yes, yes. So now the barnstormer people are going to flood my timeline and be a distraction to me on one of the biggest days of our game, and I’m OK with that. I really am.”

Whether you agree or disagree with Staley’s stance, you can’t help but appreciate how she handled the situation. She was never confrontational. She was completely respectful. She gave a direct answer to the question and acknowledged what everyone in the room was thinking — that this was a question and answer full of landmines and could blow up into a story the day before the biggest game of the year. Yet she didn’t want her response to come off as dodgy. And she did it all in less than two minutes.

USA Today columnist Nancy Armour tweeted that Zaksheske “scurried away” after Staley’s answer, adding, “Confirming he was only there to try and stir up faux outrage.”

Emily Adams, a reporter who covers UConn for The Hartford Courant, tweeted, “It is insanely hard to get questions in during these huge press conferences, which makes it SO frustrating to see time wasted on outlets that do not cover women’s sports inventing controversy for their own benefit. Staley handled this perfectly, but she shouldn’t have had to.”

Travis tweeted out the Zaksheske-Staley exchange, writing, “23 million video views for this question just on Twitter/X. I bet this is the most watched question and answer in any sports press conference this year. Well done @RealDanZak & @outkick, ask real questions, get real answers. That’s the job of honest media.”

It’s amusing that Travis is defining what “honest media” is. However, it’s an open press conference and any credentialed media member should be able to ask whatever questions they want. Often, it’s big championship press conferences like these that draw a lot of media attention and are a fertile place to ask about the state of the game or topics that stray a bit away from the moment at hand. But Armour and Adams made fair points. It did feel like a question meant to stir up trouble, and ultimately it backfired because of how Staley handled it.

Of course, OutKick might argue that it turned out to be a question that certainly brought lots of attention, much of it positive, to Staley and trans athletes, although I'm guessing that wasn’t the intention behind the question.

For the record, Zaksheske did ask the same question of Iowa coach Lisa Bluder, who said, “I understand it’s a topic that people are interested in. But today my focus is on the game tomorrow, my players. It’s an important game we have tomorrow, and that’s what I want to be here to talk about. But I know it’s an important issue for another time.”

More praise

Mediaite’s Joe DePaolo did a good job rounding up some of the celebrities getting amped on social media about Sunday’s South Carolina-Iowa game

My favorite was from NBA star LeBron James, who tweeted, “If you don’t rock with Caitlin Clark game you’re just a FLAT OUT HATER!!!!! Stay far away from them people!! PLEASE.”

And finally …

One more classy moment from Staley. During the trophy presentation, Staley took one last moment to appreciate what Clark did for women’s basketball.

Staley said, “I want to personally thank Caitlin Clark for lifting up our sport. She carried a heavy load for our sport.”

Staley acknowledged what Clark did for college basketball, and what she will do for the WNBA, adding, “You are one of the GOATs of our games and we appreciate you.

Disturbing story

Here’s a troubling story out of Colorado. A reporter from The Colorado Sun, an online news outlet based in Denver, was kicked out of the state GOP assembly because party chairman Dave Williams found her “current reporting to be very unfair.”

Sandra Fish has been covering politics since 1982. Early Saturday morning, around 3:45 a.m., she said she received a text from a Colorado Republican Party event organizer saying she was not welcome at the assembly at the Colorado State Fairgrounds in Pueblo. Like a good reporter, she went anyway and got a press credential at the door.

But an hour later, she was asked to leave. When she refused, she was escorted out by law enforcement officers, who told her, “You have to be invited here. They don’t want you here. We have to get you out of here.” (Here’s a video of that on social media from Pueblo Chieftain politics reporter Anna Lynn Winfrey.)

The Guardian’s Michael Sainato wrote, “The Colorado Republican state party chair, Dave Williams, is currently running for Congress in the state’s fifth congressional district. Fish has reported on the state party sending out a pro-Trump mailer in the district that attacked his primary opponent in the race. Williams was elected party chair in 2023 after supporting conspiracy theories that Trump won the 2020 election, and he introduced a resolution in the state house in 2022 to thank a state representative and others who participated in the January 6 insurrection. He also tried to include the ‘let’s go Brandon’ phrase as part of his name on the 2020 ballot.”

The Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition, a nonpartisan alliance of journalists, tweeted, “Booting a credentialed journalist from a political party assembly, especially one who represents a statewide news organization like the @ColoradoSun, undermines the vital role of the free press and directly impacts thousands of Coloradans who rely on The Sun for coverage.”

Several Republican leaders in Colorado criticized the decision to ban Fish.

Republican state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer tweeted, “Sandra Fish is a fair; honest and respected reporter. As a Republican I’m embarrassed by the GOP chair. As a State Senator I’m stunned by the blatant disregard for our Constitution - and by a former Legislator no less. Disgusting.”

Kristi Burton Brown, the GOP state chair before Williams, tweeted, “This is a dangerous take by the current @cologop. Removing the Times Recorder that pretends to be real news is one thing. But removing a journalist who’s widely known to be hard-hitting but fair is quite another. Transparency is necessary for our nation.”

Republican state Rep. Matt Soper tweeted, “A healthy and transparent republic means you allow the public and media to observe the process of selecting candidates to represent our state in public office. This is regardless of if you agree or disagree with the reporter.”

When asked by the Sun’s Jennifer Brown about what happened, Williams called Fish a “fake journalist” and said that the Sun was “just an extension of the Democrat Party’s PR efforts, and the only backlash we see is from the fake news media, radical Democrats, and establishment RINOs who hate our conservative base and who always look for opportunities to boot lick the crooked press or pundits who hate true Republicans and President Trump.”

Media tidbits and other interesting links to start your week

• Today’s the eclipse. Video from The Associated Press: “What to know about April’s total solar eclipse.”
• CNN’s Caitlin Kaiser, Elisa Raffa and Allison Chinchar with “Severe storms may pose a threat to solar eclipse viewers.”
• Sabine Stanley, a Bloomberg distinguished professor in Earth and planetary sciences at Johns Hopkins University, wrote this for The Washington Post: “I’m a planetary physicist. An eclipse is wondrous — don’t underestimate it.”
• The Los Angeles Times’ Karen Kaplan with “These scientists think an ‘awe’-some eclipse could help unite Americans in troubled times.”
• My Poynter colleague Angela Fu with “Associated Press Stylebook makes Merriam-Webster its official dictionary.”
• The Wall Street Journal’s Samantha Pearson with “Elon Musk Vows to Defy Brazil Order to Block Some X Accounts Amid Hate-Speech Clampdown.”
• Semafor’s Max Tani writes about billionaire George Soros in “Soros fund is building an audio empire.”
• The Associated Press’ Ali Swenson and Melissa Goldin with “Anonymous users are dominating right-wing discussions online. They also spread false information.”
• The New York Times’ David Segal with “Q: Who Found a Way to Crack the U.K.’s Premier Quiz Show?”

More resources for journalists

• Get an AI ethics framework for your newsroom. Start here.
• TV producers, consider our Poynter Producer Project. Apply by April 14.
• Editorial Integrity and Leadership Initiative is a fellowship for public media journalists. Applications due April 22.
• Beat Academy offers eight trainings for one low price.

Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at [email protected].