Women's College Basketball RULES SO HARD

Dawn Staley for president! Caitlin Clark for Secretary of State!

Otters,

I told y’all I wasn’t going to be posting as regularly in the weeks ahead, but did I think I would take the entire week off? Nah. Only losers do that, right??

But it turns out I am one of those losers!

The last week has been…whew. Tough. Stressful as hell. And I feel kind of guilty for saying that because obviously there are bazillions of people who have it worse.

But I haven’t been this stressed in a long time. Also haven’t been this unmotivated. I am literally drowning in final papers. It is truly unreal how deep of a hole I've dug and how many late penalties I’ve had to take. I honestly shouldn’t even be writing this post!

This has all been complicated by the fact that today is a day I’ve been looking forward to for a long time.

And not just because of the eclipse (although it doesn’t affect me since I’m visually impaired),

And not just because it’s the Blue Jays’ home opener today (although it doesn’t affect me because the Jays stink like a sock this year).

I’ll tell you all about it once I get a chance to breathe… because before I leave to attend said mysterious yet exciting thing (aka the time I send this out) I will be writing papers for class, and then when I come home tonight I will be writing more papers for class, and it literally does not stop until I hand all these late papers in. And then I have exams. Woo.)

But you know what has given me a reason to smile, a reason to push forward—hell, even a reason to LIVE—despite all of this stress and work and anxiety?

The University of Iowa women’s basketball team.

I usually don’t care about college basketball, men’s or women’s. But the University of Iowa was nice enough to select me to attend their pretty competitive young writers studio back in the summer of 2021.

Unlike my high school French teacher, who wrote my the kindest reference letter in the history of ever as part of my application, I wasn't even expecting to get in, let alone get a full scholarship (what?!) but both of those things happened thanks to the kindness of Iowans.

It was all online, so I never physically ended up in Iowa, which was a bummer, but I did get to sit down for a few hours and workshop some bad poems I wrote with an (at the time) Iowa MFA student named Janelle Effiwatt, who was a beautiful, effervescent genius. Since then I’ve felt like I need to casually cheer for Iowa every time March Madness rolls around, literally all because they were nice to me once.

I really started paying attention last season, when their women’s deep made a deep run, so I watched them in the national championship game out of curiosity. LSU smoked Iowa, but what I remember most is this shot:

Zoom in.

That’s Caitlin Clark hitting one of the most insane threes you will ever see on one of the grandest stages in all of basketball.

That’s all it took. I was hooked.

So at the start of this season I started tuning into the couple of ESPN games a week that TSN decided to simulcast here in Canada. I was waiting for them to broadcast an Iowa game during the regular season but it never happened, which meant I quickly found myself absorbing information about some of the other great teams and players in the NCAA.

And Lord have mercy there are so many.

yes paige's head is cut off. idk how to fix it stfu.

There are legit unstoppable, undefeated teams like South Carolina, lead by this 6-foot-85 Brazilian freak of nature named Kamilla Cardoso, plus maybe 2837283 other top-tier players I don’t have time to list.

There’s UConn, who, I mean, it’s UConn, they’re always insane, and they have this blondie named Paige Bueckers who won’t be drafted until next year and yet is already an established star.

Oh my god, and the FRESHMEN? Or should I say fresh…women?

Whatever. They rule. Especially because women’s basketball is different than the men’s in that players have to be 22 years old to enter the WNBA Draft. So you better become familiar with the names of rookies JuJu Watkins (USC), MiLaysia Fulwiley (South Carolina), Madison Booker (Texas), and Hannah Hidalgo (Notre Dame), because they are the future of basketball.

Once I had gotten familiar with all these storylines, watching March Madness unfold was a hell of a lot of fun. ESPN’s coverage was kickass. Beth Mowins and Ryan Rucco are amazing PxPs, and the studio desk trio of Elle Duncan, Chiney Ogwumike, and Andraya Carter are hysterical.

And the games themselves? So sick. The men’s tournament couldn’t hold a candle to these girls. Plus, I finally got to watch Iowa!!!

One of my favourite things about sports is the ability every fan has—no matter how passionate they are (or especially a lack thereof!) over any given sport or team or player—to hop onto a bandwagon. The thing about hopping a bandwagon is that you learn a ton about a new team very quickly. So not only did I, in my bandwagon journey, soon become intimately familiar with Caitlin Clark’s GOAT-level game—how she wasn’t just a lights-out shooter, but also an unreal passer—I also learned about and cheered HARD for Kate Martin, Hannah Stuelke, Sydney Affolter, and Gabbie Marshall.

By the way, I listed those names off the top of my head! I didn’t even have to consult Google!!! Am I amazing or WHAT.

But yes. The games. I think I watched every Iowa game. I became so obsessed that I started live-tweeting them, starting when they played a highly anticipated rematch against LSU during the Elite 8.

I would now like to take this time to say that LSU’s coach Kim Mulkey, for a vast number of reasons, may be the most insufferable woman I have never met.

Just look at her. Wearing the wildest fit you’ve ever seen a coach wear, and yet also a secretly raging homophobe. Her middle name might as well be Karen.

ANYWAYS. That game.

One of the sickest basketball games I’ve ever seen, NBA or otherwise.

The speed! The blocked shots!! The incredibly overrated Hailey Van Lith accidentally creating the undisputed best meme of 2024!!!

But Caitlin Clark did not slow down after that game, because she next lit up UConn in the Final Four with passing and shooting so insane that I literally cannot describe it. There was also a VERY controversial call with seconds left in the game that won it for Iowa but I’m not going to get into the nuances of it because you’re not here for my basketball takes!

(My understanding is that you are here for me to make jokes about basketball that can be laughed at even without you knowing a goddamn thing about basketball.)

Then the final happened yesterday. Iowa vs South Carolina. I knew South Carolina would win but I watched anyway and thank god I did because I got to see Clark score 18 points in the first quarter—yet another record she’s broken this season. Truly something to behold. LOOK AT THIS THREE.

And then during the trophy presentation, genius South Carolina coach Dawn Staley shouted out Iowa and Clark and thanked them for their insane run to the final. What a kind gesture. True sportsmanship.

This tweet, though, sums it up for me. More people and women and girls are watching women’s basketball than ever before. Myself included! I for one cannot wait for the WNBA Draft (a week from today!) and then the start of the new WNBA season (May!) We truly have no time to rest. As my boss at the Dean’s office once said, I’ll sleep when I’m dead.

🦦 — O — 🦦