The IX - Women’s basketball needs a wider frame

[BRS24]

Women's basketball needs a wider frame — Hear from South Carolina

Women's basketball is South Carolina. And UConn. And Tennessee. And so many others. It's time for a wider lens on this sport.

www.theixsports.com

Lots of good links, SC & UConn mentions. Referencing the men's game and casting a wider net on coverage, where it can be 1 AND 2, and not 1 OR 2 all the time.

"It felt a lot like the conversation around South Carolina’s Aliyah Boston and Iowa’s Caitlin Clark earlier this season. The idea seems to be that when the coverage of women’s basketball is so limited, the expectation can and should be that there needs to be one story with supremacy over all the others.

That’s not going to cut it."

 

[topogigio]

Excellent article with a great perspective on women's college basketball in general. I would like to see more writers speaking out about another issue, keeping women's sports, "WOMEN" sports!

 

[visitingcock]

I agree with this article 99% (nobody gets a 100 in my class)

But I'm gonna change gears. Stanford and the PAC-12. Marketing, visibility and attendance.

Why is one of the game's most important conferences so poorly supported in liberal, strongly feminist regions of the country?

1. Late games reduces national interest especially Friday nights.

2. The poorly run PAC Network, Larry Scott's legacy of failure.

3. Little fan support which I attribute to poor promotion by the schools/conference (exception: Oregon 2020)

4. Fans of PAC teams often say "too much to do." That argument might fly for Southern Cal, But for Corvallis/Portland.Eugene in the rainy months? Seattle?

PAC needs to step up their game. Okay, not their "game" but their visibility. Fill those gyms even if its with middle schoolers! Dump the PAC network and make games avalable through more viewable outlets. Stanford? Promote your talented women and legendary coach.

A more visible PAC is something that would benefit the whole game on a national level.

 

[CocoHusky]

Either the author lacks a fundamental understanding of Title IX or fully understand what Title IX is and despite that use title IX in the title of article as click bait. The latter is a great disservice. The thesis of the article is there are many story lines across women's basketball and that more people need to be watching and there needs to be more coverage of the NCAA tournament specifically. I fully agree with this thesis as well as the suggestion to build a bigger sandbox for the sport of WBB. But other than a unconnected mention of Title IX at the end of the article - this thesis and suggestion literally have nothing to do with Title IX. The NCAA tournaments are run and conducted by the NCAA. Title IX is not applicable to the NCAA, it is applicable to the individual institutions that make up the NCAA. There is a common huge misconception that Title IX requires the NCAA to have a women's tournament because it has a men's tournament. If this is the misconception the author is working under they have spoil a perfectly good article with some great intentions.

 

[cockhrnleghrn]

I agree with this article 99% (nobody gets a 100 in my class)

But I'm gonna change gears. Stanford and the PAC-12. Marketing, visibility and attendance.

Why is one of the game's most important conferences so poorly supported in liberal, strongly feminist regions of the country?

1. Late games reduces national interest especially Friday nights.

2. The poorly run PAC Network, Larry Scott's legacy of failure.

3. Little fan support which I attribute to poor promotion by the schools/conference (exception: Oregon 2020)

4. Fans of PAC teams often say "too much to do." That argument might fly for Southern Cal, But for Corvallis/Portland.Eugene in the rainy months? Seattle?

PAC needs to step up their game. Okay, not their "game" but their visibility. Fill those gyms even if its with middle schoolers! Dump the PAC network and make games avalable through more viewable outlets. Stanford? Promote your talented women and legendary coach.

A more visible PAC is something that would benefit the whole game on a national level.

College sports in pro markets typically have relatively poor attendance. In football, look at Miami, Southern Cal, Cal, Stanford, Maryland, etc.

 

[Orangutan]

Either the author lacks a fundamental understanding of Title IX or fully understand what Title IX is and despite that use title IX in the title of article as click bait. The latter is a great disservice. The thesis of the article is there are many story lines across women's basketball and that more people need to be watching and there needs to be more coverage of the NCAA tournament specifically. I fully agree with this thesis as well as the suggestion to build a bigger sandbox for the sport of WBB. But other than a unconnected mention of Title IX at the end of the article - this thesis and suggestion literally have nothing to do with Title IX. The NCAA tournaments are run and conducted by the NCAA. Title IX is not applicable to the NCAA, it is applicable to the individual institutions that make up the NCAA. There is a common huge misconception that Title IX requires the NCAA to have a women's tournament because it has a men's tournament. If this is the misconception the author is working under they have spoil a perfectly good article with some great intentions.

"The IX" is just the name of the website. You are right that the article has nothing to do with Title IX itself.

 

[Pharos]

And so in the same way the mission of what we do here at The IX and The Next is to build a bigger sandbox, to allow for that lens to pan out so more people can get in the shot, can be seen and heard, I urge you all to think about women’s basketball that way, whatever your team allegiances. Let’s celebrate greatness without using it as a means of limiting who gets to claim it.
And for the love of god, think bigger.

The article and this conclusion suggest that the goal is more attention for more college women's basketball participants. I wonder if it quite gets at the question, "What makes people want to pay attention?" If it's marketing or buzz, then turn it into a reality show or, even worse, something like WWF. If it's about promoting a sort of hero-worship oriented "hey girls, you can play basketball, too," then make it all about personalities (and it's gone a ways in this direction)

I'm 70, my dad was a high school basketball coach, and I like WBB for two reasons. I got watching UConn when DT was a freshman, and realized that the game was elegant, dependent on skill, and, I'll say, cerebral. I felt like I could almost see the Xs and Os on the court (Princeton). Back then the men's game, post Wooden (and others like Larry Brown) became less elegant (ok, Valvano kept it interesting) was all slash and dish and crash the boards. Shot clocks and eliminating the 4-corner offense, were losses that took away from the "on any given night" and clever coaching.
The other reason I watch is that, at least at UConn, Geno stressed(es) team and de-emphasized(es) "individual" (Gabby's shoulder patches) in the sense that it wasn't about egos taking over a game. Players close to a double-double would get substituted for at the end of games when a couple more minutes might get them a milestone. Poor practicers don't play as much, even if they are stars. It's about playing "the right way."
So are these things appealing anymore? If not, then it will be all about the drama of socio-cultural advancement. If it is, then use WBB to teach kids how to play basketball "the right way" (Cuomo's Court Vision? - more instructive clips on YouTube?) and how to learn from BB lessons that bear fruit in later life (Maria Conlon? Maya Moore?)

The tricky bit: people are gonna watch what they want to watch... and money has a lot to say about how WBB will get promoted to influence that attention.