First off, I want to thank you so much for your support of the Burn It All Down Kickstarter that I plugged in my last newsletter. We have all been bowled over by the support. Today is the last day to donate, and while we surpassed our initial goal of $10,000, we are trying to reach our stretch goal of $29,0001 in the next few hours and are only about $1,500 away! There are less than six hours left in the campaign, so if you need a deadline to act (like yours truly), this is your time!!

Now, as for Power Plays, last month I promised I’d give you information about the relaunch by the end of that week. Then, literally less than an hour after I published that email, I got a call about a family emergency that upended the next few weeks of life. Everything is fine, but the timing was less than ideal!

But what is delayed will not be denied!!

March might be one of the most chaotic months for me work-wise, but I cannot fathom going through the NCAA tournament without Power Plays in my life, so we are going to make this happen!!

Next week, Power Plays will be migrating over to Beehiiv, a different newsletter platform2. There, we will relaunch with fresh branding and energy but (I hope!) the same spirit and insight and community that made the Power Plays heydays so successful and enjoyable and impactful.

What does this mean for you? Nothing, really, unless the Substack app is the main way you get this newsletter. I’ll still be coming to your inbox — albeit regularly, once again! — and I’ll have all the answers you need — and more! — next week. You just stay right where you are. I’ll do the heavy lifting.

New starts are terrifying, and this move is one that I have been wavering about for literal years. And, I’m not going to lie — I still have some doubts about it! But I know in my heart of hearts that it is time to say goodbye to Substack and start a new era of Power Plays.

Let’s do this.

Goodness, I’m giddy just typing those words. It has been way, way too long, and I know that right now, most of you are thinking this:

And I do, in fact, have explaining to do! And I promise, I will. But today, I just want to re-establish contact and make two exciting announcements.

The first is that Power Plays is officially relaunching next week. This relaunch involves a full brand refresh (CANNOT WAIT FOR YOU TO SEE IT), a platform move, and lots of great writing about women’s sports.

For the Power Plays relaunch, I do not need you to do anything. All payments are on pause and will be for some time — I owe you all so many newsletters, and I am more prepared than I ever have been to deliver them. I will send another email with all of the details later this week, I promise, but first I want to get to the second announcement.

***Drumroll Please***

BURN IT ALL DOWN IS COMING BACK TOO!!!

If you’re new here, Burn It All Down is the feminist sports podcast I launched and co-hosted with the brilliant Dr. Amira Rose Davis, Dr. Jessica Luther, Dr. Brenda Elsey, and Shireen Ahmed way back in 2017. We produced weekly episodes from 2017 to 2022 before taking a hiatus in large part because the podcast had become financially unsustainable.

I know that many of you found Power Plays because of Burn It All Down, and as much as I love this newsletter, I think BIAD is probably the most important work I’ve ever done and ever will do. It’s also some of the most fun work I do, because it involves community, and these days, I need that community more than ever, and I don’t think I’m alone in that.

In order to get BIAD officially back without burning out (pun intended) before we can really get going, we’ve launched a Kickstarter — which is basically a GoFundMe — and set a minimum goal of $10,000.

The response so far has been incredible, but it is really important that we surpass that initial goal quickly so we can stay in the good graces of the algorithm and continue to raise additional funding. (And, it turns out, independent progressive sports media needs all the algorithm help it can get.)

I know times are tight right now, but contributing $2 or simply sharing the Kickstarter link with your friends and family will help us out so much.

And if you’re able to help today, you will have an exponential impact.

Support the BIAD Kickstarter

So, so much has changed in my life over the past year, and it has taken me a while to find my footing. But I’m firmly planted now, and while I didn’t plan to be relaunching Power Plays and Burn It All Down at the same time, adding them both back into my life at this moment is … well, I’m honestly struggling to come up with a single word to describe how I’m feeling right now. But I do know that I’m overcome with gratitude.

I will be back in your inboxes later this week with more information on the Power Plays relaunch. Stay tuned.

And if this email has made you crave some Burn It All Down, I have good news for you: We already put together a few episodes to coincide with the Kickstarter launch. Here’s the first part of our Olympics preview, which you can watch on YouTube or listen to on your podcast platform of choice.

Thank you for still being here. I’m so excited for what’s to come.

This edition of Power Plays is sponsored by the Working Families Party, a progressive political party in the United States that bills itself as “the party of the multiracial working class, fighting for our freedoms and to build a nation that cares for all of us.”

WFP has teamed up with Women’s Sports Rally to launch a fan petition urging the WNBA to pay players what they are owed.

“Now, it’s time for the WNBA to meet this moment,” the petition reads. “The league cannot sustain growth without its players. The WNBA’s future and its integrity depends on a contract that honors those who make it what it is: the players.”

Click here to sign the petition and help them reach their goal of 800 signatures by Friday!

Hi, friends. Happy Labor Day! This holiday isn’t just about the unofficial end to summer, or U.S. Open tennis, or cookouts, or mattress sales. It’s a time to celebrate labor movements, unions, and the contributions that workers have made to our society.

And so it is fitting that today we are taking a deep dive into the current labor strife in the WNBA.

Before we get into the nitty gritty, let’s briefly recap how we got here: The WNBA Players Association (WNBPA) opted out of their current collective bargaining agreement (CBA) at the end of last season. The deadline for a new deal is October 31, 2025, which two months away. The players have repeatedly stressed that they are looking for a “transformational” deal, and WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has echoed that language. But it seems the two sides might have different definitions of that word.

In July in Indianapolis, on the Thursday of All-Star weekend, upwards of 40 players — a pretty unprecedented number — attended a bargaining session with the league; they all left that meeting feeling frustrated at best, and down-right disrespected at worst.

Less than 48 hours later, the players took the court before the All-Star game wearing t-shirts that said, “Pay us what you owe us.” By the time the game tipped off, the message had gone viral online.

The virality, it seems, hasn’t sped up the negotiating process. Annie Costabile of Front Office Sports reported this week that its unlikely there will be a deal by the October 31 deadline. The WNBPA said in a statement that “the league’s lack of urgency leaves players wondering if it is focused on making this work or just running out the clock.”

(In response to Jackson’s statement, a WNBA spokesperson said that “our number one priority is to get a new collective bargaining agreement completed that addresses the players’ priorities while also supporting the long-term growth and success of the league and teams,” adding that the WNBA has been meeting with the WNBPA “throughout the summer” and that “additional sessions” are already on the calendar for the rest of the season.)

But the virality has spurred a lot of takes. Unfortunately, so, so many of those takes are based on information that is misreported, misconstrued, or just plain missing the point.

So, that’s where we come in. The goal is to go beyond the click-bait headlines, filter out the bullshit, and focus in on the reality of what I believe could be one of the most paradigm-shifting contract negotiations in women’s sports history. In the past, labor fights in women’s sports have been about sneaking as many crumbs as possible. This one is about securing a significant slice of an ever-growing pie.

Here’s a look at what the players are asking for; how profitability, revenue sharing, and Caitlin Clark impact negotiations; and what comes next if the October 31 deadline comes and goes without a deal.

It involves a lot of numbers, but stick with me.

You ready? Let’s do this.

Myth: The WNBA players are asking for pay equality with the NBA.

Reality: This one is absolutely FALSE. The players are not asking for anywhere close to equal pay with NBA players.

Still, I think it helps to sit down and really look at the numbers both of these leagues are dealing with.

This season in the WNBA, the minimum salary is $66,079, the max salary is $249,244, and the salary cap for each team is about $1.51 million.

This upcoming NBA season, the minimum salary for players with no experience, is $1,272,870. The maximum salary is $54,126,450. And the salary cap is $154.647 million.

That means that right now, the NBA’s minimum salary is 18.26 times bigger than the WNBA’s minimum salary; the NBA’s max salary is 216.2 times bigger than the WNBA’s max salary; and the NBA’s salary cap is 101.45 times bigger than the WNBA’s salary cap.

So, we’re not talking about a wage gap. We’re talking about a wage abyss.

And yet, I promise, nobody in their right mind is suggesting that WNBA wages jump 10,014.5% overnight! These women are not dumb. WNBA players are well aware the WNBA’s economics are much different than the NBA’s.

According to CNBC, the average NBA team is worth $4.66 billion. The most valuable team, the Los Angeles Lakers, are worth $10 billion and the least valuable team, the Memphis Grizzlies are worth $3.2 billion. The NBA just signed a media rights deal worth $76 billion over 11 years, or $6.9 billion a year. The league collectively made about $13 billion in revenue last year.

In the WNBA, Sportico reports that the average team valuation is $269 million. The most valuable team, the Golden State Valkyries, are worth $500 million, and the least valuable team, the Atlanta Dream, are worth $165 million. The WNBA’s new media deal is worth about $200 million per year, or $2.2 billion overall.

So no, equality isn’t the goal. But equity is.

In the NBA and many other major sports leagues, players receive 50% of the league’s revenue. In the WNBA, the players currently only get about 9.3% of league revenue. *That* is the chasm they’d like to see close.

Of course, that brings us to our next issue …

Myth: The WNBA is not a profitable business

Reality: This is technically true, and I’m not going to pretend otherwise. But it won’t be true for much longer.

To understand this, we have to talk about the structure of the league.

For most of the WNBA’s existence, the NBA has owned 50% of the league, meaning NBA owners split 50% and WNBA owners split the other 50%.

But in 2021, the WNBA raised $75 million of capital at a $400 million valuation, which gave that group of investors an equity share of 16% — half from the NBA’s stake and the other half from the WNBA’s stake.

So now, we’ve got the NBA at 42%, the WNBA at 42%, and the newcomers at 16%.

But even that doesn’t paint a full picture, because these categories are not at all mutually exclusive. Today, six of the 13 WNBA teams are owned by their NBA counterparts. Four of the five expansion teams coming in the next four years are run by NBA owners, too. That means some NBA owners have league equity coming from their NBA and WNBA sides. ALSO, a few NBA owners were part of the $75 million fundraising round, meaning they are triple-dipping in equity shares.

Why does this matter? Well, first of all, it shows how much control the NBA still has over the league. And it also demonstrates that when it comes to WNBA accounting, absolutely nothing is simple and straightforward. There are a lot of different ways to finagle numbers, a lot of different agendas to take into account, and next to no transparency and accountability to help us sort through it.

But let’s take the numbers we’re given at face value. Last fall, the New York Post reported that the WNBA lost $40 million in 2024, that the league hadn’t had a profitable season since it launched in 1996, and that NBA owners were getting antsy to get their money back.

I’m not going to sugar coat it: That’s obviously not ideal! But context matters.

The WNBA has not lost $40 million a year every year of its existence; previously, NBA commissioner Adam Silver has said that the NBA loses about $10-12 million a year on the WNBA. (Last year’s number was bigger in large part because the WNBA started offering chartered flights to its players, which reportedly cost around $25 million.) In a recent paper, economist David Berri, a professor of economics at Utah University, calculates that including inflation, the NBA has lost around $440 million on the WNBA since its inception.

But starting next season, that will change. Currently, the WNBA has an annual TV deal worth around $60 million. But next year, game-changing new TV deals kicks in. We already know the primary TV deal is worth $200 million per year, which is the WNBA’s portion of the NBA media rights deal, and the WNBA expects to bring in at least $50 million a year extra from separate television deals with companies such as ION and CBS Sports.

Let’s presume that this year the WNBA lost $40 million like it did last year. That means just counting the TV deal alone, a $40 million loss could turn into a $150 million profit.

Of course, one year of profitability does not automatically erase 29 straight years of losses. And it’s understandable that NBA owners want their money back.

But it’s important to clarify that the $440 million loss estimate is split amongst 30 NBA owners over an almost 30-year period. Also, most NBA owners are billionaires, and every NBA team is worth at least $3.2 billion. Nobody is hurting here.

And while I am not sure the exact mechanics involved in getting the NBA owners remunerated, I am positive that pathways should be available over the next few years.

We already established that the new TV deal should put the WNBA in the green next season, and that calculation doesn’t even account for the increased revenue generated by the uptick in attendance, sponsorship, and merchandise sales. Revenue is rapidly rising.

Additionally, WNBA team valuations are absolutely exploding, going from about $2 million five years ago to an average of $269 million today. And with six expansion teams joining the league from 2025-2030, the league is bringing in $925 million in expansion fees. Recently, the owners of the Philadelphia 76ers, Detroit Pistons, and Cleveland Cavaliers all paid $250 million in expansion fees to start WNBA teams. They would not be doing that if the WNBA was the black hole of financial ruin that the anonymous NBA owners complaining to the Post would have you believe.

There is real value there, and it’s more than reasonable for the players generating that value to want to be compensated accordingly.

Which, again, brings us back to revenue sharing.

Myth: There is no revenue-sharing agreement in the current CBA

Reality: Revenue-sharing has been included in the WNBA CBA dating back to 2003. The problem is, it has never been triggered.

The WNBPA got a revenue-sharing clause in their second-ever CBA. But these agreements have always been incremental, meaning things like the salary cap and bonuses are fixed unless certain revenue targets are surpassed. Those targets have always been out of reach.

Prior to 2020, the revenue-sharing targets were tied to ticket sales. But during the last CBA negotiations, the WNBPA decided to change its strategy.

“It was never going to be triggered because we are not seeing at the team level the type of staff and infrastructure and salesforce that is needed,” WNBPA executive director Terri Jackson told me a few years ago.

Instead, Jackson and the WNBPA were fought to get the revenue-sharing targets tied to overall league revenue. This felt like a win at the time, because commissioner Cathy Engelbert was bringing in so many new sponsors.

Jacob Mox has done great work on the revenue-sharing agreement in the current CBA over at Her Hoop Stats and The IX Basketball. Here he describes how the annual targets are calculated:

We can’t know for sure what the exact revenue targets are each season, but the formula is quite straightforward: The annual league revenue for 2019, which is unknown, is compounded by 20% each year for the annual target. As a hypothetical, this means if league revenue in 2019 was $50 million, then the annual target in 2020 would be 20% higher at $60 million. The annual target in 2021 would be another 20% from the previous year, making it $72 million.

Since we know that league revenue doubled over the course of this CBA, this seems like a good deal for the players. But there is a catch: The targets are actually cumulative.

Here’s Mox again:

Going back to 2020, all revenues are added together to find the cumulative revenue, and all revenue targets are added together to find the cumulative revenue target.

In the previous example, the annual target in 2022 would be $86.4 million using the $50 million in 2019 assumption. As a result, the cumulative revenue target for 2022 would be $218.4 million.

Cumulative Revenue for 2022 = 2020 Revenue + 2021 Revenue + 2022 Revenue

Cumulative Revenue Target for 2022 = 2020 Target + 2021 Target + 2022 Target

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic that forced the 2020 season into a fan-less bubble, the revenue in 2020 was so much lower than the pre-established target, which was based on 2019 revenue, that reaching the revenue targets for the rest of the CBA was next to impossible.

So if this CBA continues to utilize incremental revenue sharing rather than basing their salary cap fully on revenue, the WNBPA needs to make sure it establishes reachable revenue-sharing targets.

Then there’s the matter of the revenue-sharing percentage.

As we already mentioned, WNBA players earn about 9% of league revenue, while players in other leagues, like the NFL, NHL, and NBA, earn about 50%. Now, operating costs are significant and its important that the league and teams are still able to invest meaningfully in that area, so I do not expect WNBA players to get close to 50% in this CBA;

But we do know players are looking to share in year-over-year revenue growth, so that they can more directly benefit from the league’s surging popularity. In the NBA, the salary cap each year is tied directly to revenue, meaning it can grow as the league grows. This season, the NBA salary cap will be 10% higher than it was last year. The WNBA salary cap, meanwhile, is fixed at a 3% increase each year.

A big increase in the fixed salary cap will go a long way towards bridging the equity gap. But fair revenue-sharing targets that allow the salary cap to grow in real time could be revolutionary.

Myth: Caitlin Clark is the only reason for the increase in WNBA profitability.

Reality: Caitlin Clark is absurdly important to the WNBA. But she doesn’t exist in a vacuum.

I want to be very clear here: Caitlin Clark’s unprecedented popularity and magnetic talent has supercharged the WNBA.

But people implying that the only reason anyone is watching the WNBA is because of Clark, and that if she can’t play it all falls apart, are wrong.

The WNBA was on the upswing before she arrived. Per Bloomberg, league revenue doubled between 2019 and 2023. Clark wasn’t drafted until 2024.

In fact, The Athletic reported that the new WNBA television deal was actually negotiated before the 2024 WNBA season began, meaning before Caitlin Clark even played a single game in the league. I’m not saying her presence was a non-factor in negotiation; her arrival into the WNBA was highly anticipated. But nobody truly knew what Caitlin Clark’s impact would be on attendance and ratings until the 2024 season began.

And again, her impact has been massive. The 2024 WNBA Draft, which featured Clark and her college rival, Angel Reese, drew over 2.5 million viewers, making it by far the most-watched WNBA Draft of all time. In the first two weeks of the 2024 season, six networks had their most-watched WNBA game in history; five of those records came in Indiana Fever games featuring Clark.

The trend continued all season; the Fever’s first-round playoff games were the highest-rated games of the year, peaking at 2.5 million viewers. By contrast, the finals “only” averaged 1.54 million viewers. I put “only” in quotation marks because 1.54 million is still a strong number — in fact, it’s a 115% viewership increase over the 2023 WNBA Finals.

That’s a pattern that keeps being reinforced — with Clark, ratings and attendance skyrocket. But even without Clark, the numbers paint a picture of a growing, thriving league.

This season, Front Office Sports reports that while Fever games are by far the most-viewed WNBA games on television, non-Fever games are averaging 549,000 viewers, a 37% increase over 2024.

Clark unfortunately has been injured for all but 13 games so far this season, and was notably forced to be sidelined during All-Star weekend. Many headlines seized on the fact that ratings were down 36% from the 2024 game, when Clark played, teaming up with Angel Reese against Team USA ahead of the Olympics. However, the 2025 All-Star game still drew 2.19 million viewers, a 52% increase over any other All-Star game in league history.

Attendance tells a similar story. The WNBA broke its all-time attendance record for a season with two and a half weeks of the regular season remaining. Through 226 games in 2025, WNBA games drew 2,501,609 fans. The previous milestone was set in 2002 over 256 games. In 2002, the WNBA had 16 teams. This year the league has 13.

Across the Timeline calculates that this season, the league averages 10,930 fans per game, which is just edging out the previous record in 1998 of 10,869 fans per game. This is particularly impressive given that six teams play in arenas that are smaller —drastically so, in some cases — than said average attendance: The Atlanta Dream (3,265); Chicago Sky (10,387); Connecticut Sun (8,910); Washington Mystics (4,200); Dallas Wings (6,251); and Las Vegas Aces (10,509).

Yes, the Caitlin Clark effect helps in that regard. The year before Clark, attendance for the Fever averaged 4,066.80. Their lowest-attended home game in the last two years had 15,022 fans. But they’re not the only team drawing big crowds.

The Golden State Valkyries have sold out every home game this season with 18,064 fans per game. The Fever are just behind that, averaging 16,665 fans per game. The New York Liberty are averaging 16,265 fans; with the Los Angeles Sparks at 12,317; Seattle Storm at 11,730; Phoenix Mercury at 11,122; and Aces at 10,871.

Six teams other than the Valkyries are averaging the most fans in franchise history — the Sky (9,179), Sun (8,730), Wings (7,320), Sparks, Storm, and Liberty. Of course it helps that when Clark and the Fever come to town, teams are almost guaranteed to have a sell-out crowd, and many teams move those games to bigger arenas to accommodate the interest. But the Storm, Sky, Sun, and Wings have all set attendance records even if you remove the Fever games from the calculations.

So yes, the Caitlin Clark effect is real. But it is accentuating a strong product, not propping it up.

Myth: If there is no deal by October 31, the players are going on strike.

Reality: It is much more likely that the league and players agree a deadline extension.

As I mentioned up top, it is increasingly unlikely that a deal will be reached by the October 31 deadline. That isn’t surprising. It is difficult to get bargaining done in-season, and the WNBA playoffs will stretch well into October. (October 19 is the last-possible day for the WNBA Finals.)

That doesn’t mean a strike is inevitable, though! WNBA CBA negotiations have never resulted in a lockout or games missed, though in 2003 the draft and preseason were postponed for a few days until a deal was reached. The players and owners can agree on a deadline extension that would allow the talks to continue without a work stoppage. There is recent precedent for this — in 2019, a few days before the October 31 deadline, a 60-day extension was announced, and the new CBA was ratified in January.

But this year there is more urgency to get a deal done in a timely manner because two expansion teams are set to debut in 2026 — the Portland Fire and Toronto Tempo. Expansion and free agency rules are dictated by the CBA, so it would be next to impossible to hold an expansion draft before a new CBA is negotiated. (Last year, the expansion draft for the Golden State Valkyries was held on December 7.)

And, of course, the spotlight and the scrutiny that accompanies it heighten the sense of urgency, too.

There are a lot of issues left to figure out. Yes, players want larger salary caps and a greater share of the revenue. But they also want a soft salary cap, expanded rosters, a less-grueling schedule, standardized practice facility and training conditions across the league, and increased parental and retirement benefits, among other things.

Owners, meanwhile, really want prioritization protections — guarantees that players will not let commitments with other leagues or their national team interfere with their allegiance to their WNBA teams.

The WNBA has proved that it can survive. With this new CBA it needs to set itself up to thrive.

Up next: Later this week, we’ll look back at past WNBA CBA negotiations and examine how we got to this point.

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This edition of Power Plays is sponsored by the Working Families Party, a progressive political party in the United States that bills itself as “the party of the multiracial working class, fighting for our freedoms and to build a nation that cares for all of us.”

WFP has teamed up with Women’s Sports Rally to launch a fan petition urging the WNBA to pay players what they are owed.

“Now, it’s time for the WNBA to meet this moment,” the petition reads. “The league cannot sustain growth without its players. The WNBA’s future and its integrity depends on a contract that honors those who make it what it is: the players.”

Click here to sign the petition and help them reach their goal of 800 signatures by Friday!

UPDATE (9/3): This newsletter has been edited to add a statement by the WNBA and to remove language stating that the WNBA’s new media deal is a “portion” of the NBA’s new media deal.

Hi friends!

If you’re a subscriber to this newsletter, I’m going to assume you have some familiarity with the RE—CAP show, the podcast hosted by USWNT legends and married couple (!!) Christen Press and Tobin Heath.

I tend to be skeptical about athlete podcasts, which often feel cookie-cutter and detached. But the RE—CAP show has become one of my must-listens. The show has been especially on a roll this summer. During Pride month in June, Heath and Press got candid about the pressure and privilege of being “Preath” — which is the nickname fans gave the couple about a decade ago, when online speculation about the nature of their relationship began. Considering how private the couple have been over the years, the episode was a revelation, especially since they both clearly had a different experience with the public nature of their partnership. I also loved their episode on “Gayngel City FC”, which featured three of Press’s gay teammates on Angel City FC talking about their sexuality and what Angel City’s Pride game meant to them, and made me think more critically about what athletes are dealing with behind the scenes.

But perhaps their most impactful episode was the one last month where Heath officially announced her retirement after three years away from the game due to an injury. It was truly the most raw, inspirational, and agonizing account I’ve heard any athlete share about walking away from their sport.

Given all of this, I was absolutely ecstatic last month when had a chance to talk with Press one-on-one. We dove deep about how and why she and Heath built the RE—CAP show, how the podcast has impacted their relationship, grieving in community, the power of "gal culture," their exciting new partnership with Audacy, and much, much more.

Truly, Press was just as thoughtful and sincere as she presents, and I absolutely know you all are going to love reading through our conversation1 *almost* as much as I loved having it. (I AM SO EXCITED TO SHARE THIS!!)

Ready for this exclusive treat??? Okay. Let’s do this.

Power Plays: I'm just the biggest fan of your podcast. I mean that genuinely—it's become one of my go-to listens. My perception of you and Tobin had always been that you're pretty private people. So what went into deciding to launch a media company with you and Tobin at the forefront, on camera and on mic? How did that decision come about?

Christen Press: Well, I think your initial impression was correct. (Laughter) Tobin and I have both had different individual relationships with the media, but both of us got to a place where we really wanted to have a direct and authentic relationship with our community that sometimes cameras, brands, and other businesses and agendas blur.

I used to always say that every single time you get your photo taken, it feels like you've lost a little piece of your soul, and then you have to go out and search and find it. That feeling of disembodiment happens because you start to think about yourself through the eyes of the audience, and that's really what led us to be what appeared to be private—or really was private.

What was really cool about starting a media division and starting the RE—CAP show was that the number one intent was to not have that disembodiment. The intent was, because we own this business, there is no other agenda we have to push. Because this is our show, we get to edit it, and if we don't like how something sounds or something comes out, we actually have control.

What I think it's allowed us to do is be really, really honest and candid in a way that is pretty rare, at least for people who are starting out as niche or small as us. Being able to do that from the get-go allowed us to pull back the curtains and show our community what it's really like to just sit on the couch and talk to us.

We were really inspired by early conversations of us at home and the types of things that Tobin and I just talked about. I really care about social dynamics, power imbalances, culture, and political social movements, and how sports affects those things. She deeply cares about football. A lot of our conversations would be at this intersection point.

We said, "Hey, let's try having these conversations with experts, with really cool people, and let other people into our lives in that way." I think it's been really cool because we did have fear too. It was like, "Okay, let's try this, but maybe it's going to feel awful." And it feels awesome. Everything that kept us away from the camera before has really dissolved in this new framework we've built, and it allows us to feel really, really close to the community that we're building in women's soccer, and have two-way conversations with them.

PP: A few years into the RE—CAP show, what's been the hardest part, and what’s been the most surprising part?

CP: I think the hardest part is the least surprising thing, which is me balancing my schedule and going to practice. While I said we built this amazing, authentic space—which we have—it's still very draining. You still give a lot to it. I give a lot to Tobin, I give a lot to the audience, and I have to figure out how to recover and have boundaries and be able to prioritize my job and my first love and my number one priority, which is football.

I think the most surprising thing about it is how it's pushed Tobin and I’s relationship along. In letting people into our lives, it's really shifted a lot for us and what it means to us to be role models or be in the public eye. It pushed Tobin and me to be vocal about our relationship and share different parts of ourselves with the community. I don't think that would have ever happened or been possible without TRS.

PP: Let’s talk about the "Preath" episode when you guys finally really opened up. I found a lot of the things you talked about made me think so differently about what it is to have your relationship scrutinized. Something Tobin in particular said, or maybe it was you, was this quote I wrote down: "It's hard when everyone wants labels, and you don't necessarily have them yourself." What made you decide to finally open up this Pride Month and share bits and pieces of that with the audience?

CP: The episode was really special. It was definitely the most we've ever talked about us. I thought what was really authentic was how much Tobin really struggled with that — especially early on when we needed space for ourselves, to already have expectations on us was really tough.

The main thing that we like to convey—and I think we'll continue to do so—is we don't like following all the rules. We don't like prescribing to things just because that's how they've always been. When you have expectations on you, and you have these concepts of what it looks like to be in love, what it looks like to be in a healthy relationship—if you're seen out with somebody else, "Oh my gosh, are you cheating?"—it's just a crazy level of patriarchal ideation of what a relationship is supposed to look like. Tobin and I really need space to be able to be creative and re-imaginative in what our love looks like, and that's why I think it grows and blossoms and moves so beautifully, because we leave that space for it to be inquisitive.

The episode—how we got to feel like we could do it—was a lot of the same thing that I said about our show and the way we've been able to claim our own voice. Sometimes the reason you don't want to talk about your relationship is because it's just going to feed those rumors. People aren't going to get the full picture, and they're going to say, "Well, she said this, and I don't understand." But on our podcast, we got to explain, and we also got to disagree in a way that there's not a lot of space for.

What was expressed by Tobin was, "This was really hard for us, and I don't think it's fair that we have these expectations on us." And I said something like, "Well, also representation is important, and I felt like we meant a lot to the queer community." We went back and forth. I feel like that nuance is lost often in other forms of media and other moments that we could have shared about our relationship. It's more like a beautiful photo shoot of a wedding and these epic images and this "happily ever after" story, and that we never want to create, because it's just not true for anyone.

PP: How did you even make it through the Tobin retirement episode? That was so emotional and beautiful. At one point you said, "There's such beauty in trauma," and I could not agree with that more, but I find a lot of people don't see that.

CP: I've always had this brooding artist kind of thing. I really like sad movies. I really like sad songs. I think that's where I relate the most. I think I was kind of an emo adolescent—it really takes me there.

I remember when Tobin first got told she might never play soccer again, and she ended up coming back for the Olympics. She was like, "I don't want to come back halfway. I don't want to try and fail." I remember being like, "But what's more beautiful than giving your all to something and failing?" That level of vulnerability and rawness—we're all so uptight, we're all so embarrassed and afraid to lose, and I feel like we miss out on the full human condition, which is just giving everything that you can. Sometimes you make it and sometimes you don't. I really find that so interesting.

I don't need my life to be all happy all the time, but I want to live the full human condition. Definitely going through this in a public way with Tobin was part of that. People think grief is like, there's an amount of grief, and you just have to process it, and then you're on the other end—like it's a bucket of water. But really, grief is a well. When the grief comes out, often it's filled with more and new grief.

Tobin's been doing a beautiful job in her own life of facing all of her demons and going through what really has been a death and a rebirth. She's done that with me, with her family, with her closest friends, in a way that I think takes so much courage, because her identity in life is so wound up in football in the most beautiful way.

We had this moment where she really accepted it and talked to me about it. We cried about it. We went through the grief. We were processing it—we weren't running from our emotions. Then I saw these big changes in Tobin. I saw her taking opportunities, starting with the World Sevens Football tournament, going to FIFA for a month to sit on the technical committee. A year ago she was rehabbing, still saying, "I'm going to play again," and so she wasn't taking these opportunities. I fell into the "Oh, we're on the other side of it. This is Tobin 2.0."

@re__incTwo graves 🪦🪦 Two very different things inside of them 😷⚽️ In the latest episode of The RE—CAP Show, Tobin shares the full story about the exact moment she decided to retire 🖤 Watch at the link in bio ✨

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What happened when we decided to announce her retirement on the RE—CAP show was the realization of how many layers and how infinite the grief will be and is. This whole other shedding happened when she shared it publicly. If you know Tobin, you know she's like, "I don't want a retirement game. I don't want all that attention. I didn't play soccer for anyone but me." And yet here she is publicly sharing something that she has long come to terms with, with the world, and grieving and grieving—because we live in community. We do not live in isolation.

Other people having the opportunity—her family, her friends, her teammates and her fans—to grieve the end of her career, to celebrate the beauty of her career, it affects you, and it's very emotional. I felt honored that I got to play facilitator and create a moment where Tobin felt safe enough to open up to the world. It almost felt cozy and safe in that room, as if there wasn't the world on the other side of the camera.

The hardest part for me is that she didn't want to watch it. She usually does all the editing and all the notes—we have a full team of editors who are amazing, but she does all the notes for both of us. I watched that episode four times because I was so afraid we could get it wrong and she would be so embarrassed. She was crying so much, she was snorting. We didn't need that on camera. So I had the task of making sure that her heart was protected in what the final product was, and we couldn't have been happier with how the team pulled it all together.

PP: It was incredible. I do a sports podcast with Slate, and I said on there that I think it's the most raw and authentic I've ever heard any athlete be about the retirement journey. Once again—and I'm not one to gas people up, I'm not just saying this—but what you guys have created makes me think about things differently. That's really a gift. That doesn't happen often in this space.

CP: That's really meaningful, because I think that's what we wanted. I mentioned before that we give a lot—and I don't say that like, "Oh, woe is me"—but it takes a lot to sit in a room for two hours and cry with your wife so that she could share this moment with the world. That's the point. The point is for everyone to have the opportunity then to be inquisitive and wonder why, and find the pieces of resonance. I'm really, really proud and happy to hear you say that.

PP: Define "gal culture."

CP: The gals! In sports, we often say, "Come on, girls," and "Let's go girls." You start playing soccer when you are a girl, and it always felt wrong to call us girls when we were grown-ass women. At one point we were like, "F it, we can't say, 'Let's go, women,'" and "ladies" is the worst. So at one point on the U.S. Women's National Team, we were like, "We're the gals. Let's just own it."

It's kind of funny, because "gals" is a really old-timey word, but I think because it was a little antiquated, it gave us space to redefine it. It was really the precipice of Tobin's inspiration for starting a media division.

Both Tobin and I had the privilege of playing on the U.S. Women's National Team for over a decade, and that locker room was the most powerful and magical place that I've ever experienced, because I got to be around 20-plus women that were unapologetic and brave. We fought, and we took up space, and we didn't shy away from the hard things, and we were raw and vulnerable in a way that society really discourages women from being—largely, and definitely publicly.

@re__incThank you for growing up with us 🫶🌈 We hope you're loving the latest episode of The RE—CAP Show. If you haven't see it yet, tune in at LIB ✨

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I had this feeling that I'm a changed woman because I was around such women. When it comes to the culture of the U.S. Women's National Team, that's what it is. In elite women's sports, often the women outnumber the men, and there's not very many jobs where there's gender separation, so you just have so many women around you. The culture of the U.S. Women's National Team was winning and unafraid and unashamed, unapologetic, and a little brass and just like—this feeling of "I'm going to eat my first child to be here." It was a little nasty, like when women shy away from wanting to be the best or wanting to have money, and you're like, "Well, I'm doing it for the next generation," but it was like, "No, we're doing it because we deserve to get paid. Full stop. Because this is our job and we deserve to get paid."

That type of attitude is transformative to see and be around. That is how I define gal culture, and what we try to do in the by bringing in awesome guests and trying to share that locker room feeling with the world is to show different types of gals, different types of people being different types of ways that you don't often get on television.

That's the spirit of gal culture. It is for everyone. It is inclusive. When you think of bro culture, bro culture's for the bros, but gal culture is for everyone. That's the difference. When you are creating things for and by gals, you think about that at the very, very beginning.

PP: It's been such a big month for you all, with the retirement news and some very personal shows. Then there's this big announcement—you get acquired by Audacy. What does that new partnership mean? And what do you feel like that says about where the media is going, and the power in creating your own lane?

CP: We're extremely excited about the Audacy partnership. For us, it really represents TRS 2.0. We put in a ton of work to make sure that the show is exactly where we want it to be, to be able to do this authentic, meaningful storytelling. As we were in negotiation with Audacy, we got an entirely new production team, a new studio that we have full time, so it's a very different feeling when you go into borrowed space—that energetically shifts.

I think Audacy is a big amplifier. We have the opportunity now to reach more people, do more cross-promotion, and really lean into a strong partner that has a lot of historical success to learn and grow with. The Audacy team that we were talking to—the big thing for us is we were immediately like, “These people are gals.” We want to work with the right people. It's not easy to do a show like ours, because it requires a lot of your being to do well, and that's true of our entire team. We knew these were the right people.

With this partnership, we hope that we can just touch more people. Audacy is the number one audio podcast platform, and it's a huge signal, in my opinion, of where women's sports media is going. This is a really, really exciting time for RE-Inc, and for us as business people, and also us as hosts, as talent on the RE—CAP show. It's an exciting time, and I can't wait to see—you said you're with Power Plays, and I think that made me smile, because the Audacy partnership is a power play for us. It's just like pulling up our britches and we're getting real in a really fun way.

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Hi, friends. First off: I am so sorry it has been so long. If you’re a paid subscriber, I’ll be in touch soon about how I’m making it up to you.

I’ve been working on the perfect re-introduction post, and I’ll be honest, this isn’t it. But what’s that they say? Perfect is the enemy of done? Progress not perfection? Perfectionism is a form of self-oppression? Perfection is just fear in disguise? All of the above?

Anyways, today I just want to say that I am in Indianapolis for WNBA All-Star! If you’re going to be around, please let me know, I would love to see you!

I’m doing lots of on-the-ground reporting this weekend, and next week the newsletter will be back in earnest. There are big things on the horizon — a deep dive into WNBA CBA history, an exclusive interview with one of Power Plays’ favorite athletes, and a long-overdue brand refresh (!!), and more.

I’m so excited to start sharing it all with you in a few days.

But since I want to leave you with a little *something* headed into the weekend, here are a few things from the WNBA world that have made me smile recently, because smiling is my favorite and yet sometimes I forget that!!

• You have got to listen to Sue Bird’s interview with Tina Charles on her podcast, “Bird’s Eye View.” It is full of fun nuggets from one of the best — and often most overlooked and mysterious — stars in the game.

• Friends, Rickea Jackson collabed with my favorite food, Cheez-It, for a pre-game fit, and I am obsessed with everything about it. Click through to Instagram for the videos from Rickea and her stylist. It will be worth it, I promise.

• You’re all watching studbudz, right??? RIGHT????!!!

  

  @teamstudbudzCheryl gets down 🕺 you’re missing all the fun on the @studbudz 72 hour @WNBA all-star weekend live now on @Twitch! #natishahiedeman #courtneywilliams #studbudz #wnbaallstar #allstar #cherylreeve #teamstudbudz

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  @teamstudbudzAngel Reese in the building looking fine as hell 🙂‍↔️ tune into @studbudz live on @Twitch for all the behind-the-scenes action at @WNBA All-Star Weekend! #natishahiedeman #courtneywilliams #studbudz #wnbaallstar #allstar #streamer #angelreese

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• I’m also just enthralled with the entire Marina Mabrey/Saniya Rivers show. And apparently, so is the official WNBA account.

  

  @wnbaThe @Connecticut Sun duo Saniya Rivers and Marina Mabrey have graced us with their presence and delivered the fire photos 😍 #wnba #marina #saniya

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• And yes, to continue on a theme, I cannot stop giggling at the hard launch heard around the world. LOOK AT HOW HAPPY PAIGE LOOKS.

  

  @wagtalkAsk and you shall receive- PAIGE BUECKERS EVERYONE 💗 @isomaddy @WNBA #WNBAAllStar2025 #paigbueckers #azzifudd #uconn #WNBA #couplegoals

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I love love. I love this league. And I love you all.

Pumped for what’s to come. Hope to see some of you this weekend! If not, I’ll talk to you next week.

Hi, friends! So, last June iHeartMedia launched something long overdue— a full-on audio network just for women’s sports, the iHeart Women’s Sports Network.

Naturally, I wanted to know everything about this new venture, so earlier this month, I talked to two key people making it all happen: Jessie Katz, the head of iHeart Women’s Sports, and Sarah Spain, the host of Good Game with Sarah Spain, the network’s flagship daily podcast that covers all the news in women’s sports.

We got into the nitty-gritty of how this idea came to life and how the network has grown over the last year — iHeart Women’s Sports now features 15 podcasts, including Levels to This with Sheryl Swoopes and Terrika Foster-Brasby; Throttle Therapy with Katherine Legge; In Case You Missed It with Khristina Williams; and The Rennae Stubbs Tennis Podcast.

And because this is Power Plays, we also talked about the deeper stuff: media equity, audience-building, and the reality of navigating this work in a very politically charged moment. You’re going to love this conversation.

As always, thank you so, so much for your support of Power Plays!

Okay. Let’s do this.

A Q&A with Jessie Katz and Sarah Spain of iHeart Women’s Sports

This interview has been edited and condensed for readability, length, and clarity.

POWER PLAYS: We have a little bit of a nerdier audience here at Power Plays, so we’re always interested in the behind-the-scenes details of how projects like the iHeart Women’s Sports come together. Why did iHeart decide to make this decision to really invest in women's sports and start this network?

JESSIE KATZ: I think it's something that iHeart has done before in different areas —launching the Black Effect network, or My Cultura, they always have their eye out for underrepresented audiences and voices in audio and look to fill those gaps with full fledged audio networks. So a year, year and a half ago, it was becoming more and more apparent that the next big blank space in audio was women's sports coverage. Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment, Laura Correnti [the founder and CEO], approached iHeart with the idea of launching the first ever audio network dedicated exclusively to covering women's sports, and to do that on broadcast and podcast, to tackle this in the most significant way that you can. Considering iHeart's reach, it was kind of the no-brainer platform from her point of view.

Right out of the gate, [Correnti] thought to try to bring Sarah into it to launch a daily show that was going to cover women's sports, because it just quite literally didn't exist. We were able to ask Sarah to not only host a daily podcast covering women's sports, but also to voice those radio reports. Then we were able to bring on a few founding partners. I know you've been covering e.l.f. and what they've been doing in the women's sports space, they're one of our three founding partners that came on board from launch, along with Capital One, and then a little bit later, Novartis. We launched the women’s sports reports in June, and Sarah's show Good Game launched in July, and we've kind of been off to the races from there.

SARAH SPAIN: One thing I think your readers will find interesting is … Laura Correnti’s background is in creating content and meeting advertisers where they live. What she found was that there was no inventory for the people who did want to invest in women's sport. There's very little shoulder programming — yes, there are rights packages, but the same couple of brands that kept buying were either running out of things to buy or it was harder for other brands to get into the space. The lack of investment was in part due to the fact that there just wasn't programming. So she realized, not only do we need to serve the fans, but we need to create enough programming to allow people that wanted to invest to get into the space.

And to clarify, they did not come to me with the daily show concept. I’m an asshole and after 13 straight years of being like, “I wonder what life would be like if you didn't have a show every day,” and then [leaving ESPN radio and] realizing, “Oh, it's lovely,” they were like, “What do you think the network needs?” and I was like, “A daily show!” (Laughter.)

But also just a fun note that Laura [Correnti] and I met in Australia for the first time with Angel City, doing World Cup stuff. And when she reached out about Deep Blue and came with the big pitch to join this network, she made sure Sue Bird was the one who called me. So, very smart move on her part.

PP: Yeah, I literally would not be able to say no to anything Sue Bird asked me to do, that would be very effective! Now, I’m experienced in podcasting but don’t have Sarah’s experience in radio. When you're talking about these sports reports, do these just go on all the iHeart channels? Are these like regular score updates?

SS: Yeah, it's actually weirdly similar to where I started my career with ESPN, at ESPN 1000 in Chicago, where I would get on the air and start out every 15 minutes, and just say, “Welcome to your SportsCenter update tonight, the Cubs take on the Reds at 7pm Eastern. This person's on the mound. This is happening.” It's the way that for years we've gotten traffic, weather, and sports, but sports has always meant men's sports.

These are three updates per day that run across all 500 iHeart Radio stations. And you could be just driving with your kids in the car, and you'll hear me telling you about the PWHL, WNBA, NWSL, the transfer portal and college hoops, all women's sports stuff. So it's funny, because I always used to talk about how men's sports are opt-out, like you have to actively work to not know that LeBron James is doing X or Y, but women's are opt-in, in the sense of not just have to go looking for them, but having to go looking for them in different places for every sport, different streaming services for every game. This is trying to basically force women’s sports on you the way that we've had men's sports forced on us for a century.

PP: Sarah, you've done so much in your career, and obviously we've connected through different parts of it — I think I first probably interviewed you when I was doing an espnW profile for Sports on Earth in like 2013 or 2014 — but you haven't always been focused exclusively on women's sports. So why did this feel like the right career move for you at this time?

SS: I mean, I joined espnW in 2010, so it has been a good 15 years of that being a part of what I do. But yeah, to your point, it was only a part. I've had this conversation with folks over the years about, like, where's the best way to attack this? Do you become just a part of the women's sports space and get the people that are already there? Or do you try to infiltrate, like I did with radio and Around the Horn, where you get to all the people like I mentioned before that are maybe not opting in.

What I'll say is that when my job changed from full time to part time at ESPN in I think beginning of 2023, for the first time in 13 years, I had to figure out what else I wanted to do, or where else to put my energies.

I think part of the reason I told ESPN I wanted out of daily radio was it felt very ephemeral and not that satisfying. It felt like if I'm going to spend all my time talking about sports, particularly with the world the way it is, it should at least feel meaningful. And I realized that the intersection of all the things I care about happens organically in women's sports, and that it was something I had been pushing for the entire time at ESPN, so why not push to do it at other places while still working for espnW? And so when this opportunity came, it was like, oh, yeah, that's the one.

PP: Jessie, from your perspective, how are you able to capitalize on this gaping hole that was a lack of women’s sports coverage on radio? Because on one hand, there's tons of opportunity there. But also the chasm is so big, it's almost like, where do you even start?

JK: We're basically just trying to meet everyone where they're at, wherever they're at. Our programming is very diverse in terms of what the content looks like. We have Sarah's show, which is kind of touching on everything that Sarah thinks that we should know in a given day, and then we have shows that have a more specific focus, whether that's tennis, basketball, soccer, hosted by either broadcasters or players/former players. We're just trying to cast a really wide net right now.

PP: Going back to Sarah's point about providing the inventory for marketers, when I interviewed Ally CMO Andrea Brimmer in Kansas City during the NWSL championship weekend, she said that when they made the 50/50 advertising pledge [in which Ally promised to spend equally on men’s and women’s sports], it actually wasn't as easy to get to 50/50 as one might think, not because they didn't want to, but because the opportunities weren't always there in the right spaces. Have you found it to be difficult to be this connective tissue between sponsors and creators and networks?

JK: No, and I think part of what works in our favor at iHeart is there’s multiple ways that we can attack that. We're growing a podcast network. But also, while we're building an audience there, we have this broadcast reach where we're reaching nine out of 10 Americans every month, right? So out of the gate, sponsors know that because of the broadcast piece, they are immediately going to be finding those listeners. It’s not a long game in that sense. And then a lot of sponsors are wanting to be more creative and show up at major tent poles, like the Final Four, or the NWSL championship. There’s e.l.f., who sponsors the Billie Jean King Cup, which I know you covered, Sarah went out there to Malaga (Spain) along with Renee Stubbs, and they partnered with e.l.f. and they covered the tournament and the Power of Women’s Sports Summitt. I think you wrote about how e.l.f’s first talent that they signed with was Katherine Legge, well we launched a podcast with Katherine Legge, so that was another thing we could bring to the table with e.l.f. — they're not just running spots and dots, but we're working with their talent, we're launching shows with them, we're able to provide this 360 partnership with those brands.

SS: One thing we used to always joke about in women's sports was, like, the best ads are the players playing a two hour game and then their makeup not moving.

PP: I was just saying that!

SS: But I've watched with interest over the years how female athletes have been allowed to get multi dimensional. I was with espnW [over a decade ago] when Laura Gentile gave a quote about how the espnW summit involved panels, conferences, a workout with Navy SEALs, getting our nails done, blah, blah, and [all the headlines] were about the nails and how, “Oh, this isn't sports!” There used to be such an intentional outing of women who had any femininity in the space, but at the same time [critics were] arguing that, if they weren't feminine enough, why would we watch them?

So watching over the years there be feminine, masculine, villainous, funny, kind, sweet, dressed to the nines, dressed down, every kind of woman is allowed in the space now and embraced for their authenticity, I think brands then are able to find their entry point better.

It’s also proven in the Sports Innovation Lab Fan Project that behavioral change in women's sports is much stronger than it is in men's; people are much more likely to align with products that show up there than they are in the men's space. So I think the brands that are being thoughtful and not just parachuting in that want to invest over the long term and understand the space are finding such a big benefit to it.

PP: We're in a fraught time, and women's sports are being co-opted for a lot of different agendas these days. Sarah, I know on your show you make it a point to showcase a wide range of stories, to go beyond fear mongering headlines, and to stand up to rampant transphobia. Why is that important to you? And I'd love to hear from the iHeart perspective, too — this bleeds into politics, and a lot of places are specifically avoiding that right now. So how do those decisions about appropriate topics to tackle get made?

SS: For me, it's important because it's a part of the women's sports conversation, and anything that's going to be talked about, I want it to be talked about correctly. I want there to be research and facts and nuance and thoughtfulness and humanity at the heart of it. What's sort of staggering to me is when I used to search for women's sports, if I wasn't specific enough with my language in my search, I would mostly end up getting “Top 10 hottest women sportscasters” or “Hottest women's sports athletes that have ever played.” Then there was, like, a brief halcyon period of maybe three years, where you actually got athletes and women’s sports in those searches. And now if you search women's sports, all the results that come up are about the trans debate. It just feels like at any point we're being co-opted by things that aren't the thing in pursuit of somebody else's agenda, whether that's the male gaze or it's the patriarchy or it's this bullshit fear mongering for political gain and to be used as a cudgel for individual political wins. So yeah, that's why it matters to me.

JK: From my perspective, I'm not trying to offer a diplomatic or bland answer to that, I really think about this. Because sometimes I want to attack these things more directly, but of course, it's always the dance you have to play with not being too political, not scaring away your advertisers. But our network is like an act of resistance right now, is what it feels like to me. We are platforming voices that people are looking to silence right now. We have incredibly strong feminist voices, like Sarah's. We have a lot of Black women hosting our shows, queer women hosting our shows, and so just being able to amplify that is what gives me peace of mind right now, even if sometimes we can't be as explicitly political as I'd like to be, there are a lot of people who probably wish that our network didn't exist at all. So for me, that's enough right now.

SS: I'll just say I've never gotten a single piece of content management from iHeart. I've literally never gotten any editorial guidance in the sense of like you're not allowed to talk about that, or you can't say that.

PP: So, finally, about a year into this network, how would you both say things going?

JK: The growth has been amazing. Sarah's show is a really nice anchor, having a daily show that we can use to then promote to our other shows when we launch them. Right now it's primarily podcasts. They all do video for social clips, and then some have full video on YouTube channels. We have just started making some radio cuts of our episodes to run on broadcast, we just did one with Sarah's a couple weeks ago that aired on over 160 stations. That's always been the goal, beyond just the reports that Sarah records is also getting our podcasts to cross over into broadcast more. But, I mean, the amount of hours that Sarah's reports do alone is kind of insane. I think she's done, what, more than 35,000 women sports reports, which, because they're airing three times a day, people are hearing them a lot.

SS: I think that even if you're a women's sports fan or dabble in it, you might still not think that the audience is there, or might still question the viability of a network that's just for this. But what I've even learned as someone who's been in this space for 20 years and watches women's sports is the more information you have, the more you care. I think a lot of people like to blame the product, even though they really have never dove into the context around it, and the lack of support that's been given and offered to let people even get a chance to get into it and care.

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Hi, friends. From the ACC tournament to the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament to the Final Four in Tampa last weekend — where I watched the University of Connecticut absolutely destroy South Carolina 82-59 to win the record-setting 12th national championship in the storied program’s history — I’ve watched 22 women’s college basketball from press seats in a little over a one-month span.

It was invigorating. It was inspiring. And it was also incredibly exhausting.

To be candid, I felt a disconnect with the tournament this year, despite my physical proximity. I’m sure part of that was because, let’s face it, this wasn’t the most compelling tournament in recent years. But there were other factors, too. More than five years into Power Plays, I still haven’t quite gotten the hang of what in-person coverage should look like for me; I often get overwhelmed by the self-inflicted pressure to make a trip “worth it.”

Then, there’s, well, everything else going on in the world right now.

In the middle of my personal March Madness tour, I traveled to Ohio to reunite with my Burn It All Down co-hosts and record a live podcast as the keynote for the Social Justice through Sport and Exercise Psychology Symposium at Bowling Green University. That show will be released to the public soon, but to go ahead and spoil it for you, we dove into the cognitive dissonance needed to enjoy this boom in women’s sports while the world is falling apart; the dangerous ways transphobia is weaponized in the name of women’s sports; and the fact that history teaches us that every time there is a surge in popularity in women’s sports, a political backlash soon follows. (It was fun! I promise!)

All of those topics were top of mind headed into the Final Four. Wrestling with such complicated issues can be all-consuming, and make everything else — even one of the biggest and most popular women’s sporting events in the world — feel pointless. So last Saturday, after media availability on the eve of the national championship game, I stopped by Tampa’s Hands Off protest, which was just about a 10-minute walk from Amalie Arena, in search of some way to rectify it all, to find meaning in the madness.

Unfortunately, it made me feel more uneasy than ever.

Don’t get me wrong — there was a great turnout, and it was heartening to see so many citizens take to the streets, especially in such a red state. But I think I was looking for signs that the protest was in community with the Final Four; instead, besides the actual Final Four signs that were hanging on the light poles, there wasn’t a hint that the events existed in the same universe. During the previous Trump administration, I’d often see women’s sports merchandise front and center at protests. Now, everything feels so siloed. It’s unsettling.

Even on Sunday, I couldn’t shake this feeling of discord. Yes, It was incredible to be in a sold-out arena and watch Paige Bueckers get her fairytale ending, to see Geno Auriemma back on top, to see Sarah Strong emerge as a superstar. Yes, it was a gift to sit in a press conference while Dawn Staley processed a big win and a tough loss in real time, Cori Close reflected on women’s basketball history, and Vic Schaefer teared up while talking about his seniors; these are moments that I will never, ever take for granted.

But, when I think back to this month of basketball, my time in Tampa isn’t what resonates the most.

Instead, what stands out is a very sparsely-attended press conference in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, after the First Four game between the Washington Huskies and Columbia Lions, before the first round of the NCAA tournament even began. I stopped by Carmichael Arena to watch the game after a long day of media availability at Duke, and almost left the game at halftime, with the Lions trailing by 13 points. I was glad I stayed, because I got to see the Lions pull off a thrilling comeback to get their first NCAA tournament win in school history, 63-60. But after sitting through a joyous Columbia press conference, I almost left again, because it had been a very long day and was the start of a very long weekend. At the last second, I chose to stick around for Washington’s presser, because I’d aways admired Tina Langley from afar but never had a chance to speak with her.

Langley was joined at the podium by sophomore guard Sayvia Sellers and senior forward Dalayah Daniels. All three were clearly emotional, which isn’t unusual after a season-ending loss. After answering questions about the game itself, a local reporter asked the players about their big-picture takeaways from the season.

“[T]hese are my sisters for life. We talk so much about the journey and not just like focusing on results because, at the end of the day, like a trophy is a materialistic thing, like it's a thing. It's just going to fade. But these relationships are going to last forever,” Daniels said.

“I've learned so many valuable things in my life. Coach Langley is an amazing woman. She doesn't just teach us how to be amazing basketball players, but she wants to teach us how to run our own house one day and how to be a CEO, how to be a boss, and that's everything that she is. I think just being able to follow her these past three years, like she changed my life.”

I watched Langley’s face as Daniels spoke, and it was clear the words made her emotional. (I mean, how could they not?) So when it was time for questions for the coach, I asked her about it. (Emphasis mine.)

Q. Coach, hearing your players talk about you, what you've meant to them, what does that mean to you? And as a coach, so often you are judged on your wins and your losses, but it's obviously about much more than that.

TINA LANGLEY: It's hard to sit here with them because the loss is mine. This game, it's on me, but I'm so proud of them. To sit here and listen to them, to hear how they've grown, how much they love each other, how much they love being here, how much they love caring for one another.

We learn from each other. They don't just learn from me. So I thought they did a beautiful job of saying who we are and who we hope to be, the way that we're committed to one another. So it was beautiful to sit here and listen and learn from them.

I think that's what our culture is, it's becoming. We tell them all the time, they're not the only ones becoming. We're all growing. We're all trying to be better. And they did a tremendous job this year helping this program grow. In the process they grew and we grew.

I love that they talked about our staff. They did a phenomenal job this year. But genuinely I appreciate that question a lot because there's nothing more important than the impact we make on each other and people in life.

I think Dalayah said it well. You could ask me about a lot of my basketball games. I can't tell you a lot about them, but I can tell you about the people. That's what we want to do. We want to be great for people and help each other be better.

I’ve cued up her response in the video below, and I think it’s worth a watch.

It’s easy to get swept up in the grandeur of the women’s Final Four, the rising ratings (8.5 million viewers for the championship game!), and the dynasties at the top of the sport. To celebrate Azzi Fudd, debate Sania Feagin’s draft stock, and immediately turn our attentions over to the tantalizing action in the transfer portal. And all of those things deserve all of the attention in the word. They matter. A lot!

But I think some of my disconnect the past few weeks came from my desire to connect the big-picture stories I focus on in Power Plays with the biggest moments in women’s sports, like the Final Four and championship games. But those are the highlights of the sport, not the heart of it.

I showed up to March Madness reeling from the political reality we’re living in, and searching for the point of it all. But I think showing up is, in itself, the point. Show up to community protests and First Four games; show up to voting booths and high-school girls’ volleyball games; show up to watch parties and championship parades. Show up even when — no, especially when — you feel detached and dispirited. Show up to, as Langley said, be great for people and help each other be better.

It’s certainly not the main takeaway I expected to have after this college basketball postseason. But I guess that’s why they play — and reporters go in-person to cover cover — the games.

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Because I am diabolical, I reached out to Jessica *yesterday,* the day before her dissertation defense, and asked if she had any quick thoughts/reflections/facts about Texas women’s basketball that she’d be willing to share with Power Plays readers, to give us all a bit more context about what this day means and how we got here. Now, I’m not an academic myself, but people have told me that the day before the defense is a pretty stressful day! And yet, instead of immediately blocking me from every app she owns, she said “yes” and sent me over five wonderful archival clips and accompanying insights! Aren’t we lucky?

This was so much fun to read through and compile for you all, and I hope you all take some time to digest it as you get ready for the games tonight.

But first, here is the complete description of Jessica’s dissertation:

My dissertation is about the University of Texas women's basketball team in the 1970s, specifically the impact of two different types of civil rights legal actions -- desexigration (the term used in the 1970s) and desegregation -- on women's athletics, especially on Black coaches and players. At UT, desexigration led to a separate and distinct women's athletics department that forced women to find resources and financing outside of the established men's infrastructure and which led to them dedicating their attention to gender inequality often at the expense of racial inequality, whereas desegregation demanded the assimilation of students and faculty of color into the white status quo, erasing their needs and desires on a campus, in a city, and in a state that had historically discriminated against them, thus ignoring their struggles in an often-hostile environment. Both of these responses have had long tentacles and ripples that women's sports is still grappling with today. As I write at the end of the introduction to my dissertation, the women's basketball team at the University of Texas in the 1970s is a microcosm of the ways that women's sports have succeeded and failed. It is, in short, the story of women's sports.

Doesn’t that sound absolutely INCREDIBLE??

Now, without further adieu, here is the soon-to-be Dr. Luther:

Having recently written over 100,000 words about the UT women's basketball program, I am having a lot of thoughts and feelings about the team making their first Final Four appearance since 2003. I'm mainly just really pumped about this.

Here are some fun nuggets about the history of women's ball at UT:

Women played basketball at UT before men did, starting in 1900!

The very first basketball game ever played at UT was on January 13, 1900, between two women's teams. The final score was 3-2, spectators remained quiet during the match (those were the rules of decorum at the time) and they were only women (men would not be allowed to watch women play basketball at UT for decades), and it would probably have not looked much like the basketball we are used to today (much less vigorous, I'm not sure if they had any dribbling yet, women had to stay in specific parts of the court, depending on what rules they were using at the time). But still, the women were first at UT.

Here’s a fun archival clip about said game from The Ranger on January 15, 1900.

In fact, in 1909, the student newspaper lamented basketball as a ‘girls only’ sport!

The Texas men didn't get around to playing basketball until 1906 and in 1909, the student paper had a column where the author lamented the lack of enthusiasm for men's basketball on campus and wrote, "we know that such a game is considered to be for girls only" (what a telling phrase!) and then dissed the women's game, "but you see or get into a game where the players are really athletes and experienced and your mind will be suddenly changed into the realization it is not child's play." Ouch, 1909 misogynist! Reminds me of how those of us who have long supported women's basketball (and sports) have said, "You just have to watch and you'll be hooked!"! Anyway, in March Madness this year, the game was for Longhorn women only!

Here’s an article from the Daily Texan on January 16, 1909:

Women were pushing Texas for an official team at least as early as 1966!

Women at UT were pushing for varsity athletics (I use that word because that was what they used at the time to differentiate intercollegiate athletics from intramurals) since at least 1966, years before Title IX. In 1973, as administrators at UT were fighting over how they would establish and fund the women's athletics department, which officially started in 1974, Betty Thompson, who was in charge of women's athletics at Texas from 1968-1975, wrote a report that had a short history of women's varsity sports at UT in it.

She wrote, "Two groups of students requested assistance in the formation of teams in basketball and volleyball for the express purpose of competing on an extramural basis. These teams were to be seasonal in nature and team membership was to be based on try-outs (i.e. skill). This took place in 1966–67." That was the beginning of the push for intercollegiate basketball at UT.

The first modern women’s basketball game at Texas was played in 1971, before Title IX

The first intercollegiate women's basketball game in the modern era took place in February 1971, again, before Title IX. They participated in a tournament hosted by Southwest Texas State University (now Texas State). By March 1971, the student paper had a full page about the "feminine cagers" before they set off to compete at state. In the write up at the bottom of the page, it compares men's and women's basketball, and also discusses the femininity the women were forced to participate in.

"Following the Dalton philosophy [referring to the head coach, Jean Dalton], pleated orange skirts and white knit pull-overs were chosen" as the new uniforms that year. I interviewed Jo Ann Holmes, who was a freshman on the team in the 1972–1973 season, and she told me that when she was home over Christmas that year, her high school coach "started cracking up, laughing her head off," when Holmes told her she was going to play on the team. Her coach explained her response: “‘All I can see is the uniforms they used to wear.’ The girls' uniforms were skirts. And she thought that was the funniest thing in the world,” Holmes says. In response, Holmes told her “They're not now.”

Here’s a clip from the Daily Texan on March 17, 1971:

The team was extremely under-resourced in its early days

The final thing I want to share is a 1978 article about the women traveling east to play a handful of top-ranked teams. It was the second time they'd done this. When Jody Conradt started in 1976, she and Donna Lopiano, the school's first women's athletics director, decided the way to get UT on the basketball map was to travel and make news. Lynne Flocke from the local paper embedded with them and wrote a bunch of articles, including this recap article.

I love it because of the picture in which Retha Swindell, the first Black female varsity athlete at UT, is holding a pretzel in front of the Liberty Bell flanked by teammates. And I love all the details, especially about all their groupies and the pushing a van through snow to avoid paying repair fees. To read about what the team used to experience because of the lack of resources and financial support and then to think about where they are now, it's really something.

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Hi, friends. First off: I’m in Tampa for the Final Four! If you’re here too, let’s meet up!

Now, I’ll be honest: March Madness has taken over my life the past few weeks. But while I’ve been bracketing, many other things have happened in the world of women’s sports, including the start of the 2025 NWSL season! Said season is already three weeks old, and while we will have plenty of coverage of the league in the coming months, here’s a quick and woefully inadequate cheat sheet if you, like me, have been consumed with college basketball:

• The Orlando Pride are picking up right where they left off last season; the defending shield winners and champions are 3-0-0 and have outscored their opponents 10-1. Barbra Banda is, it turns out, still good!

• The other two teams at the top of the table are also familiar — the Kansas City Current are 3-0-0 and the Washington Spirit are 2-1-0. No other team in the league has more than one victory, although Angel City (1-0-2) sits at a surprising fourth in the table and has yet to notch a loss this season.

• Four teams are still looking for their first win: the North Carolina Courage (0-1-2), Portland Thorns (0-1-2), Gotham FC (0-1-2), Utah Royals FC (0-2-1), and Chicago Stars FC (0-3-0).

• Ashley Hatch of the Spirit and Temwa Chawinga of the Current both are leading the league with three goals in 2025. Eight other players — including Alyssa Thompson, Barbra Banda, Debinha, Marta, and Emma Sears — have two goals already.

• Over at Defector, friend of the newsletter Lesley Ryder gets you up-to-date on abuse and misconduct scandals in the NWSL, including news reported by another friend of the newsletter, Marisa Ingemi at the San Francisco Chronicle, that players have filed formal complaints against Bay FC head coach Albertin Montoya.

Additionally, there are plenty of business storylines worth noting, if such things intrigue you. (Which, if you’re here, I bet they do!) There are no new teams in the league this season, but expansion is still a huge part of the narrative — four new teams have been added to the league since 2021, and two more will be added in 2026, giving us a sweet 16 of a different sort. Those new teams will be Boston Legacy FC (the rebrand is complete!) and a still-unnamed club in Denver, Colorado, which announced its plans for a temporary stadium last week.

Financially, things continue to trend in the right direction — the Denver owners paid a record $110 million expansion fee, and the league is reportedly shopping a fifth television package to broadcasters that features about 100 games. (The NWSL is currently in the second year of a four-year, $240 million deal with Amazon, CBS, ESPN, and Scripps’ Ion Television; according to the Sports Business Journal, all four of those networks have already sold out their advertising inventory for the 2025 season!)

On top of that, the NWSL has a few exciting new sponsors this season — most notably, in my opinion, e.l.f. cosmetics, which has been named the official makeup and skincare partner of the league.

Among other things, the deal means that e.l.f. will be the presenting partner of the NWSL Challenge Cup and Championship Cup through 2027 and partner with the league on the “Glow for Glory Contest,” which will involve “hosting an open tryout in key NWSL markets to clear the path for young talent to develop, grow and kick the e.l.f.ing conversation about diverse, inclusive and equitable playing fields into high gear.” (Exact details TBD.)

I was very intrigued by this partnership announcement, not only because in 2025 it is somehow the NWSL’s first beauty sponsorship, but also because I’ve noticed e.l.f. popping up as a sponsor and partner across the women’s sports space over the past few years. So I did some digging.

A Q&A with Patrick O’Keefe, e.l.f.'s CIMO

It turns out, e.l.f'.’s first foray into women’s sports came in 2023, when it partnered with female race car driver Katherine Legge at the Indianapolis 500. Later that year, the brand partnered with Billie Jean King to commemorate the 50-year anniversary of the “Battle of the Sexes” and equal prize money at the U.S. Open. Last year, it became the official beauty brand of the PWHL, the presenting sponsor of the Billie Jean King Cup, and partnered with King on its Change the Board Game campaign.

This year, in addition to its NWSL sponsorship, it served as the first beauty sponsor of the largest high school girls wrestling competition, the Wonder Women of Wrestling Varsity Tournament. Pretty cool!

Last month, I spoke with Patrick O’Keefe, e.l.f.'s Chief Integrated Marketing Officer, about e.l.f.’s journey into the space. I think you will enjoy his insights.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

POWER PLAYS: As someone who's been in the women's sports space for over a decade, I've always felt like there was this missing connection between beauty brands and women's sports. I would watch these basketball players and be like, “Oh my gosh, their lashes are still on. How? Give me that brand!” Or, you know, “How are these soccer players who are out in the sun all day protecting their skin?” With your work in women’s sports, do you feel like you've been able to seize an opportunity that's kind-of been right in front of everyone's face all along?

PATRICK O’KEEFE: There have been brands out there that have supported [women’s] sports, and I'm not criticizing it. Any support for women in sports is a plus. It's great. Congrats. Love all of it. We want to go on a deeper level. We want to build a community of people that maybe are the underserved, that are not getting that support. And yeah, we have products that we will provide to them, of course. But for us, it's more around, how do we continue to build the story and the narrative that's really giving these young girls the tools to become really strong, powerful leaders?

We want to see them sitting in boardrooms, because we know that when we put them in the highest seats of power, that they're going to have an impact on business, and we are proof of that. We have a board of directors that’s 78% women and 44% diverse. You can tell by our results, with 24 quarters of consecutive net sales growth, we're living proof of those results.

PP: Katherine Legge was one of the first sports partnerships that you did. How did that come about? Did you know of her?

PO: An email came across my desk [from her PR team, about Legge being the only female driver in the Indy 500]. At e.l.f, we always say we’re a bold disrupter with a kind heart (that aims to) disrupt norms, shape culture, and connect communities. That's the framework that we always lean into. And it's about accessibility, positivity, and inclusivity, and everything we do has to have that lens. So when you look at a sport like motor sports, and there's only one woman driver, you're like, okay, that doesn't feel right. So how do we go in and support her?

We want to always build up communities that are underserved. It's the same thing with wrestling, you know? Wrestling is one of the fastest growing sports in high school. There were 700 of these young girls in Columbia, Missouri, and there were 3,000 people showing up for this wrestling tournament the day after New Year's. And it was just the coolest thing to see these families show up to support their sister, their daughter, whatever it was, in a way that no one else was showing up for them. And I will never forget that one of the girls said to me, she's like, “I can go be a badass on that mat, and then come out and e.l.f. is here helping me look great.” And the other part of that conversation is that there are 14 different weight classes, so it's a sport that really does provide inclusivity.

PP: With your NWSL partnership and the “Glow for Glory Contest,” is your hope to really work on the grassroots and amateur side of things, like you did with the wrestling?

PO: One hundred percent. We want to be where the underserved are not being served, and we want to help them. Like when we launched our album, “Get Ready With Music.” We know that even in the music space, it's so hard for women to advance — even though you’ve got Taylor Swift and Beyonce and all that, but emerging talent, they they have it really hard. So we created this album just to help support them and give them a platform. We partnered with the Elton John AIDS Oscar party, and we had two of our artists that were there, and they got to sing right after Chappell Roan. So they were on the same platform, they were on a stage in front of this influential audience. We're giving them a platform to really show up. So it's the same with soccer. It's going to be the same as with all the sports that we're doing, and it just comes from a place of just wanting to help.

PP: How did the partnership with Billie Jean King come about?

PO: It was really, we love what she stands for. We were just starting our Change the Board Game campaign, and there was nobody that can really support equality better than Billie. And it was just a natural fit. We pitched the idea, and she loved it, and then it just led into a beautiful relationship. Now we’ve done partnerships with the PWHL, which is the hockey league, also owned by Billie Jean; Kendall Coyne Schofield is a big fan, and she's part of the family as well. And then you've got the Billie Jean King Cup, which is another partnership that we did, a three-year deal . What I love about that story is she’s the first woman that has a sports cup named after her, which is huge. That's massive. We're going to continue to do more with her. She's family. She really is family.

PP: I love everything you're saying, and I do I believe you when you're talking about wanting to empower women and get them into the boardrooms. I don't mean to imply any of that is disingenuous at all. But I also know that this is business, right? You're still trying to promote a brand. So, since you're making more of these deals, is it fair to say that you're seeing business reasons to continue partnering in women's sports?

PO: Yeah, we do have to sell product. But marketing isn't buy one, get one free. Marketing is about leaning into your community — listening, learning and leaning in. And when you listen and you learn and you lean in and you build with your community, you will see results, I can promise you that. E.l.f. is proof of that. You have people from every walk of life that are engaged with our brand in some way, and they are playing sports, or their daughters are playing sports, so at the end of the day, we want to be where our community is, and we'll continue to do that and the results will continue to come in.

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CHAPEL HILL, NC. — Late in the third quarter of the second-round NCAA women’s basketball tournament game between No. 3 North Carolina and No. 6 West Virginia, the air in Carmichael Arena was thick with tension. West Virginia had gone on an 8-0 run, and North Carolina trailed 35-33.

Scanning faces in the stands, you could see doubt start to creep into the equation. But it didn’t last for long.

Over the next five minutes, North Carolina went on a 16-3 run fueled by nine points by senior stalwart Alyssa Ustby. In one 31-second stretch, Ustby drew three fouls, made two free throws, got a block, and scored on a fast-break layup to give the Tar Heels their first double-digit lead of the game, 49-38. Seconds later, when West Virginia head coach Mark Kellogg called a timeout, the usually tightly-composed Courtney Banghart raced onto the court, stomped her feet, and screamed with joy as the crowd of 4,271 fans roared and the DJ blasted Icona Pop’s infectious anthem, “I love it.”

The game wasn’t officially over for an other seven minutes and 50 seconds, but Banghart confirmed to me in press that in that moment, she knew her team was advancing.

“Obviously with the time and score and how well we were defending as the lead was extended, I just didn't think they were all of a sudden going to score a ton of points on us,” she said.

“We love these guys, I wanted it so bad for them, and I wanted it so bad for the community that wanted us to host and helped us get there. … I try to keep focused on what needs to happen next, but in that moment, I was just overjoyed for them.”

That victory put an exclamation mark on an absolutely ridiculous, inspiring, and exhausting five days of women’s college basketball in central North Carolina, which featured 17 teams playing 10 NCAA women’s tournament games in a 25-mile radius on the campuses of the University of North Carolina, Duke, and N.C. State in Chapel Hill, Durham, and Raleigh, North Carolina, a region known locally as the Triangle.

For the first time since 2007 and only the third time ever, all three schools in the Triangle advanced to the Sweet 16. At least one team will make it to the Elite Eight, because Duke and North Carolina are scheduled to meet on Friday (this afternoon!) at 2:30pm ET in Birmingham.

I was there in person for most of the weekend’s biggest moments, and I’ll admit: As much as I value professionalism and journalistic ethics and don’t call myself a fan of any one women’s team in particular, I found the entire weekend to be incredibly emotional. I grew up in North Carolina; March Madness, the Duke vs. North Carolina rivalry, Triangle basketball, these were all integral parts of my childhood and adolescence, and massive reasons why I am a sports fan and sports reporter today.

But I only grew up with the men’s game, not the women’s.

I didn’t get to see Charlotte Smith’s championship-winning shot, Chastity Melvin in her prime, or Duke’s historic upset of Tennessee in the 1999 Elite Eight. I didn’t even know these things happened until years, if not decades, later.

And so as I hopped from campus to campus to campus, and watched Ashlon Jackson say night-night to Oregon; Aziaha James bend over, bury her hands in her face, and sob while exiting Reynolds for the last time after an exhilarating 26-point performance in a rout of Michigan State; and Ustsby jump on the scorer’s table and celebrate with her fans after a legacy-defining 21 points, seven rebounds, four steals, and three blocks in her final game in Carmichael Arena, my gratitude and excitement and awe were underscored by a sadness at what I missed out on, almost as if I was mourning the experienced I was deprived of due to the everyday sexism that penetrates every aspect of society.

These mixed emotions made me want to learn more about the history of women’s basketball in my state, so I could better understand the magnitude of the moment. And, of course, I had to take you all on that journey with me.

You can’t tell women’s basketball history without North Carolina

During the ACC tournament, I was lucky enough to host an event at Scuppernog Books in Greensboro, NC with Susan Shackleford, the co-author of “Shattering the Glass: The remarkable history of women’s basketball.”

The book goes back to the very beginning of women’s basketball, when Senda Berenson came across James Naismith’s new game and adapted it for the women she taught at Smith College. This was 1892, and team games were absolutely unheard of for women. But it spread quickly.

“For women, most of whom had never played team sports, basketball was a revelation,” Gundy and Shackleford wrote. “The sport became especially popular among college women, who were already pressing eagerly at the boundaries of conventional womanhood.”

When reading the updated version of the book that was released this year, I was struck by how much of the sport’s history runs directly through central North Carolina, starting from the earliest days. In fact, “Shattering the Glass” has a phenomenal photo of a team of women’s basketball player from 1901 in State Normal College in Greensboro, NC.

State Normal College in Greensboro, NC, would eventually become UNC-Greensboro, drawing a direct line between the five white women in long skirts and long-sleeve sweaters in front of a rickety wooden basket and the team I spent Selection Sunday with.

By the 1930s, historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) were a thriving hum for women’s basketball. Greensboro was home to one of the best women’s college teams in the country: Bennett College. The Bennett College Belles won five national championships that decade.

In the 1950s, factory teams on the AAU circuit were part of an “elite group of amateur and professional teams that lifted American women’s basketball to new heights in the years just after World War II.” One of the most prominent of those teams? The Hanes Hosiery Girls in Winston Salem, North Carolina, who won three straight AAU national championships early in the decade. (Fun fact? Virgil Yow, Kay Yow’s cousin, was the head coach of the Hanes Hosiery Girls.)

No matter the era, no matter the obstacles, North Carolina women found their way to the to top of the women’s basketball world.

In fact, it happened so much that it began to be a problem.

Since the days of Berenson, there had always been a push-and-pull between those who thought that women and girls should only play basketball for fun, and those who saw the benefit of athletic competition in a team-sport format for everyone. In the 1950s, as the Hanes Hosiery Girls were in their heyday, Shackleford and Gundy wrote that “one of the most dramatic battles” of this culture war unfolded in North Carolina.

This is where I really want to dive into the excerpts, because the devil is truly in the details. (Emphasis, of course, is mine.)

In 1950, a group of coaches made a bid to increase the statewide profile of girls’ basketball, founding a well-publicized private tournament that they dubbed the girls’ high school state championship. The Girls’ Invitational opened to great enthusiasm, and by its second year was outdrawing the boys’ state tournament. But the move also aroused opposition. Drawing on decades of carefully cultivated political contacts, the state’s physical educators struck back. In 1952, the state board of education banned state championships for girls.

The decision touched off a statewide debate over girls’ athletics, in which supporters and opponents wrote letters, lobbied state officials and aired their positions in the press. A public hearing held in 1952 set the battle lines. One of the tournament’s founders, Robert E. “Bob” Lee, stressed the virtues of competitive athletics and called for equal treatment. If it were good or bad for the boys, he argued, “then the same thing applied to the girls.” Physical educators, in contrast, contended that women should not engage in high-level competition. In the end, the latter view won out. By 1954, the state tournament was dead.

Is that not absolutely infuriating? The girls’ basketball tournament was so popular that it was outdrawing the boy’s tournament, and suddenly it had to be shut down.

To make things worse, this stifling of girls’ basketball happened at the exact same time that men’s college basketball was being pushed front and center, becoming the local cultural currency that it was by the time I was in elementary school.

The loss could not have come at a worse time. Even as elimination of the high-profile event left North Carolina girls’ basketball reeling, the state’s growing interest in the men’s college game brought new pressures to bear. The state’s major colleges were in the middle of a bid to lift North Carolina men’s college basketball to the highest level of national competition. Their successes turned the game into a state obsession. The growth proved a boon to high school boys’ basketball. It had the opposite effect on girls’ teams.

As enthusiasm for men’s basketball grew, men’s coaches began to cast the women’s game as interfering with their endeavors. In 1951, at the height of the state tournament battle, one top male college coach publicly “blamed girls’ basketball for causing a lack of interest around North Carolina in boys’ play.” By the 1960s, recalled high school coach Bill Bost, men’s coaches at some high schools were working to nudge women’s teams out of their traditional place in the Friday night spotlight in favor of the boys’ junior varsity.

And, my friends, there you have it. The reason why I missed out on so much women’s basketball goodness growing up was a direct result of policy decisions made decades in the past. It was deliberate.

A monumental March

But, on the other hand, it also took policy decisions and a lot of hard work and direct action to figure out a way for women’s basketball — and women’s sports as a whole — to blossom, survive, and even thrive despite the many obstacles they faced.

After Title IX was enacted in 1972, women’s basketball programs slowly started to grow again in the state, starting in Raleigh in 1975, when N.C. State athletic director Willis Casey hired Kay Yow, who had been a successful women’s coach at Elon College. Yow did so quickly; by her third season, the Wolfpack was the No. 3 team in the nation. She led the program until 2009, when she died of cancer.

Seeing Yow’s success, the University of North Carolina soon began putting some (still limited) resources into its women’s team in the 1980s. Sylvia Hatchell was hired in 1986, and in her 33 years at the helm she took the Tar Heels to fifteen Sweet 16s and won the lone national championship for Triangle women’s basketball in 1994. Duke took a little longer to invest in women’s basketball, but by the end of the 1990s, Gail Goestenkors had built that program into a national contender.

There have been some down years, and as women’s basketball has grown across the country, it has felt at times that the boom left this state behind. Which is why last weekend felt so significant. Wes Moore, Kara Lawson, and Courtney Banghart have carved out impressive, devoted fanbases a space where basketball is still, by default, a man’s game. Just because not everyone sees it, doesn’t mean it’s not happening, and doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter.

North Carolina’s victory on Monday night didn’t just cap off an exciting weekend. It capped off what I believe has been one of the most special months of women’s basketball in the state’s history.

It started with the ACC women’s basketball tournament, which was hosted in my hometown of Greensboro, North Carolina for the 25th time in the last 26 years. Duke, N.C. State, and North Carolina all made it to the semifinals, and then Duke defeated N.C. State 76-62 in the first all-North Carolina ACC championship game since 2013. That same week, UNC-Greensboro won the Southern Conference tournament in Asheville, North Carolina, earning its second trip to the NCAA tournament, and first since 1998; and High Point University, which is just 15 miles from UNCG, won the Big South Conference tournament.

On Selection Sunday, Duke, North Carolina, and N.C. State were all named top-four seeds in the NCAA tournament, meaning they each got a chance to host games in the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament.

But here’s the thing: While the past few weeks have been extra special, women’s basketball in North Carolina has always been the heart of March Madness, even in the 40 years where the NCAA sponsored the women’s tournament but didn’t allow women to use the official term, even when people like me were unaware of its existence.

The first official NCAA women’s basketball tournament was in 1982. Since then, there have been 43 editions of the tournament. Here are some stats I pulled together that I think are notable:

• There has never been a women’s NCAA basketball tournament without a team from North Carolina. There are only two years when Duke, UNC, and N.C. State all failed to make the tournament field: 1988 and 2016. It turns out, 1988 was one of only two years that Wake Forest qualified for the women’s tournament. In 2016, two smaller schools in the state — UNC Asheville and North Carolina A&T — both made the field.

• In 33 of the 43 tournaments, at least two out of the three Triangle schools made the tournament. All three qualified in 15 years.

• There has been at least one Triangle team in the Sweet 16 in 34 NCAA women’s tournaments; at least two Triangle teams in the Sweet 16 in 16 tournaments; and, as I mentioned at the top, all three teams advanced to the Sweet 16 three times, including this year.

• In 17 seasons at least one Triangle team made the Elite Eight; in three seasons at least two Triangle teams were in the Elite Eight; and in 1998 all three teams made the Elite Eight.

• In 2006 both UNC and Duke made it to the Final Four.

• Duke has made 19 Sweet 16s, 11 Elite Eights, four Final Fours, and two championship games.

• North Carolina has made 19 Sweet 16s, seven Elite Eights, three Final Fours, and won one national championship in 1994.

• N.C. State has made it to 17 Sweet 16s, three Elite Eights, and two Final Fours.

But I think the most impressive statistic is that there has been a game hosted in the state of North Carolina in 39 out of 42 NCAA women’s basketball tournaments. (Excluding the 2021 tournament which was held in a single site in San Antonio due to covid; N.C. State was a No. 1 seed and would have hosted if not for the pandemic.)

“I think in my lifetime, Tobacco Road has always been the kind of epicenter of college basketball. I've grown up kind of knowing that this is what it's like down here,” Oregon head coach Kelly Graves said last week in Durham.

“I think really neat. I mean really neat. And it just goes to show you how strong women's basketball is in this area. To have three elite teams hosting like this. I can just imagine how those rivalries play out each and every year. Incredible.”

It certainly was incredible last weekend, when I drove about 600 miles back and forth between Greensboro and the Triangle to see each team reach the Sweet 16 in person. It will be incredible this afternoon when the Duke vs. North Carolina rivalry makes its women’s NCAA tournament debut, and one of the teams will make its first Elite Eight in over a decade. And it will be incredible tonight when N.C. State faces LSU for the chance to make its third Elite Eight in the last four years.

I’m still mad about all the epic women’s basketball I missed out on growing up. I’m still frustrated that local media isn’t talking even more about women’s basketball, and that every game last weekend wasn’t a sell-out. There’s so much more work to do. But mostly, I’m just so excited to be paying attention now.

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I will also be paying close attention to what seeds Duke, N.C. State, and UNC get; it’s likely they will all be top four seeds, meaning they will all be hosting games in the first and second rounds, and I plan to be at those schools in person for those games and media availabilities as frequently as the NCAA’s scheduling will allow!

Over the past month I’ve learned a lot about the history of women’s basketball and how it connects with my great state of North Carolina, and I look forward to bringing you all lots of coverage over this tournament that does what I think Power Plays does best — tie the history together with what is happening on the court and in society today. It’s going to be a special journey, and I’m so blessed that you all have made it possible for me to take it!

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Plus, I’m going to finish up the NCAA tournament covering the Final Four in Tampa for Power Plays!!

But first, I realize that as I have been preparing for all the potential coverage and travel scenarios that might pop up this week, I never actually wrapped a bow on the ACC tournament — which is, unfortunately, extremely on-brand and ADHD of me. So, without further adieu, let’s rewind the clock one week as I empty my ACC tournament notebook.

GREENSBORO, NC — After Duke upset Notre Dame 61-56 in the ACC tournament semifinals last Saturday afternoon, head coach Kara Lawson sat on the podium beside her star players Ashlon Jackson and Oluchi Okananwa and tried to find the words to describe the energy of her team.

“There's so many adjectives that flood into my mind, and they change daily. They are just, like, off the wall sometimes. They're very loud. They're very sweet and nice. Sometimes they're annoying. They just have it all. We have so many different characters. They all have great senses of humor,” Lawson said.

“I think what I love — I love a lot of things about this team, but they all have a good sense of humor. Like, we can make fun of one another, which I think is like a critical thing. Everyone can take a joke. They make fun of me a lot, too, and I think that's good when you have that in your relationship with your players and they have it with it each other, is if somebody does something we're going to make fun of them the next day. I had a good one this morning, right? We laugh, and nobody is above getting made fun of. I think that's important.”

Friends, I’ll be honest: I did not see that answer coming!

I haven’t spent an extensive period of time with the Duke program in the five years since Lawson took the job, but all interactions I have had with Lawson have reinforced my perception of her as a caring and passionate yet exceedingly serious and intense person. Of course, most great coaches have those characteristics. But some — such as Wes Moore and Dawn Staley — use humor as an integral part of their public personas. Lawson does not show that side of herself to the media often.

But, when I talked to Duke players in the locker room, they assured me that there was much more to Lawson than what meets the eye.

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Hi, friends. First off, I want to say THANK YOU for supporting Power Plays. We are in the midst of what is one of my biggest renewal cycles, and it absolutely is warming my heart how many of you are sticking around, even if it is only as a free subscriber, it is helping keep this dream alive!

As many of you know, I’m very lucky that my hometown and place of current residence, Greensboro, North Carolina, is the host of the ACC women’s basketball tournament. My plan for coverage this year was to do a running diary throughout that I published at the final buzzer on Sunday after a champion was crowned.

But then I wrote almost 4,000 words about the first two days, and decided to go ahead and publish the early-round reflections today! Honestly, I love the first couple of days, they are in many ways more high stakes than the latter rounds, because seasons — and, at times, careers — are literally on the line.

But first, a reminder that tomorrow night (Saturday, March 8) at 6:00pm ET I’ll be hosting a conversation with Susan Shackelford at Scuppernog Books in Greensboro, NC, to talk about the groundbreaking book she co-authored with Pamela Grundy, “Shattering the Glass: The Remarkable History of Women’s Basketball.”

This book was originally published in 2005, but last month, Shackelford and Grundy released a revised edition that includes the last 20 years of history-making moments in the sport!! It is a foundational text for all women’s basketball fans, and it’s such an honor to get to host this talk.

I realize I’m biased, but truly this is a must-attend event for anyone who happens to be in town for the ACC women’s basketball tournament. The semifinals are on Saturday at noon and 2:30pm ET, so there will be plenty of time to get from the Coliseum to the book store!

Okay, onto my diary from the first two days.

DAY ONE

Boston College knows what month it is!

The kick-off game of the ACC tournament on Wednesday, March 5, was between No. 12 Boston College and No. 13 Syracuse. And I’ll be honest: Halfway through it did not look like a good one! Syracuse led Boston College by 19 late in the second quarter, and 17 at the half, and Felicia Legette-Jack’s team looked to be cruising to the second round. I was planning to spend most of the second half catching up on my correspondence.

But then, Dontavia Waggoner and Teya Sidberry happened. Both players scored 10 points each in the third quarter, combining for 20 of Boston College’s 28 points; Syracuse as a team only scored 15. Still, the Orange led 72-66 with 3:29 remaining in the game, but only scored one more point the rest of the way. The Eagles ended the game on a 10-1 run, taking the lead for the first time in the game with a JaKayla Thompson jumper with 1:27 left.

Waggoner scored a career-high 32 points, with Sidberry adding 24 points of her own and a career-high 17 rebounds. Waggoner also had the CHASEDOWN BLOCK OF THE YEAR.

Seriously, WATCH THIS.

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Hi, friends. I hope you are all doing well! It’s March, and the Power Plays calendar is busier than it has ever been! This week we’ve got the ACC women’s basketball tournament in my hometown of Greensboro, NC and the PWHL takeover game in Raleigh, NC, between the Ottawa Charge and Minnesota Frost, plus a fancy season kickoff party with the NC Courage. If you have any coverage requests for those games or teams or events, let me know!

But I think the thing I’m *most* excited about this week is happening at Scuppernog Books in Greensboro, NC, on Saturday, March 8 at 6:00pm ET.

I’ll be hosting a conversation with Susan Shackelford to talk about the groundbreaking book she co-authored with Pamela Grundy, “Shattering the Glass: The Remarkable History of Women’s Basketball.” This book was originally published in 2005, but last month, Shackelford and Grundy released a revised edition that includes the last 20 years of history-making moments in the sport!! It is a foundational text for all women’s basketball fans, and it’s such an honor to get to host this talk.

I realize I’m biased, but truly this is a must-attend event for anyone who happens to be in town for the ACC women’s basketball tournament. The semifinals are on Saturday at noon and 2:30pm ET, so there will be plenty of time to get from the Coliseum to the book store!

Okay, now I need to dump out some of my Diana Taurasi feelings.

1. Diana Taurasi is retiring, and I am super emotional about it.

Last week, Diana Taurasi officially announced her retirement from basketball. This is not a surprise; she was noncommittal about her future all last season, prompting the Phoenix Mercury to run a campaign, “If this is it,” a way to celebrate her legacy and leave the door open for a return in 2025, if she so chose. But, alas, she chose differently. And that makes perfect sense. Taurasi is 42 years old and has played 20 full seasons in the WNBA. That’s a lot.

“Mentally and physically, I’m just full,” Taurasi told Sean Gregory of Time Magazine. “That’s probably the best way I can describe it. I’m full and I’m happy.”

So Taurasi, it seems, is content with her decision and her life. Which I love! That is the goal for us all.

But friends? I’m really, really sad about this, much sadder than I expected to be. Taurasi is an icon, an institution, a force of nature. She is women’s basketball. I haven’t known women’s basketball fandom without her, and millions upon millions of other people can say the same. I’m sad that we’re not going to see any more of her nonononono-YES three pointers, her bully-ball drives to the basket, her laughably audacious crossovers. I’m sad that we’re done with her irreverent post-match press conferences, her mischievous smiles at opposing fans, and her infamous tech-drawing antics.

I think that, more than anything, I’m sad that the new fans who are streaming into the game won’t know what it’s like to have Taurasi as both a heel and heroine in the WNBA universe. Her unapologetic audacity carried women’s basketball through the best and worst times the sport has ever seen.

Over the past two decades, different marketers and commissioners and sponsors have come in and out of the WNBA’s orbit trying to make it more mainstream by playing into heteronormative gender stereotypes, glamming things up, trying to appeal to the male gaze. There are phenomenal players who leaned into that, and I don’t blame them in the slightest — you can be hyper feminine and straight and love modeling and be a great women’s basketball player! If that’s genuinely who you are, go for it!

But we’ve been lucky to have Taurasi during these times, someone who didn’t give a damn about any of that stuff. Even the most corporate, conservative camps couldn’t conceive of forcing her to conform to a mold; it would have been an exercise in futility. With Taurasi, it’s never been about social media or magazine spreads or talk show appearances or even accolades; it’s about a pure, almost child-like love of the game. Through all of the turbulence of leadership changes, franchises folding, media backlash, and sponsor de-investment, Taurasi helped anchor women’s basketball in the basketball, and was able to transcend the sport despite her avoidance of the “other” because she was simply too competitive, too electric, and too talented to be denied, and the league, the sport, and the world at large, are so much better for it.

Fuck. I miss her already.

2. Putting Taurasi’s greatness into context.

Regular readers of this newsletter will know that I firmly believe that sports are about more than just statistics. But sometimes the statistics tell quite a story. Here’s a look at Taurasi’s career, by the numbers:

• She is the leading scorer in WNBA history, with 10,646 points. (Tina Thompson is No. 2 on the list with 7,696 points.)

• She has the most three pointers in WNBA history, with 1,446. (Sue Bird is No. 2 with 1,001.)

• She’s second all-time in minutes played, behind Sue Bird; second in field goals made; and fourth in assists.

• She is a three-time WNBA champion; three-time NCAA champion; six-time Euroleague champion; six-time Olympic champion; and three-time World Cup champion.

• She made 14 all-WNBA teams (10 first teams, four second teams), and 11 All-Star teams. (Note that the WNBA used to not hold All-Star games or even name All Stars during Olympic years.)

• She was the WNBA MVP in 2009; a two-time WNBA finals MVP; three-time Euroleague MVP; three-time Russian player of the year; and four-time USA Basketball female athlete of the year.

I could keep going!!! Her accomplishments, they are many.

3. I love this Unrivaled compilation of Taurasi moments.

Down in Miami at Unrivaled, the social media team asked players for their Diana Taurasi story, and the results did not disappoint.

Dying at “Is that your sister?” and “Are those Pumas going to make it to the second half?”

@unrivaledDiana Taurasi is UNRIVALED 🥹 #goat #dianataurasi

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According to the most recent rookie class, Taurasi went soft in her old age. I love that so damn much.

4. Taurasi used to be much, much tougher on rookies.

In one of my previous lives, when I was a Washington Mystics beat reporter in my previous life, Shatori Walker-Kimbrough told me about her on-court introduction to Diana Taurasi. It’s still one of my favorite Taurasi stories.

I have tried to find video of this, but have failed; I will pay real money to someone if they can actually find footage of Taurasi sitting on Walker-Kimbrough’s shoe in 2017.

5. I’m obsessed with this anecdote about Taurasi scorching Draymond Green.

Thank you, Time and Sean Gregory, for bringing us this story:

During the 2016 Rio Olympics, the women’s and men’s U.S. basketball teams again stayed on a cruise ship. Players from both teams, a group of NBA and WNBA stars, were sitting around one night, having a few laughs, a few drinks, and talking some serious smack, as is the habit of super competitive and successful athletes. Draymond Green, a noted NBA rabble-rouser known more for his defensive instincts, physicality, passing skills, and penchant for drawing technical fouls and suspensions than his shooting and scoring ability, was going on about something. Taurasi said, “Hey, Draymond, how does it feel to be the only person in this room who’s never been double-teamed?”

Iconic.

6. Also, LMAO at this story about Taurasi going after Geno during a World Cup game.

This is also from the Time profile, which I hope you have read in full by now.

Taurasi also won three World Cups, in 2010, 2014 and 2018. In the 2010 World Cup final in the Czech Republic, the U.S. faced the home team in the gold-medal game, and the Americans couldn’t quite shake off the Czechs. At one point Auriemma, the national coach for that tournament, ordered the team to switch from man-to-man into a 2-3 zone. A Czech player hit a shot from the corner. “We inbound the ball, we go down there, Diana stops like 32 feet from the basket and drains a three,” says Auriemma. “She turns around, runs all the way across the court to go past our bench, to look me in the face, in front of the entire Olympic team, and go, ‘Get the f-ck out of this zone.’”

Auriemma started screaming “man, man.” The U.S. won by 20. “And the rest of the guys on the team, the look on their faces,” says Auriemma. “I had to go, ‘Yo, guys, don't get any ideas.’”

7. I’d like to check in on how fabulous Taurasi and her wife, Penny Taylor, looked on their wedding day.

THEY ARE SIMPLY RADIANT.

8. Let’s watch some highlights, shall we?

There are so many compilations, but this is a great place to start.

9. She had the weight of the league on her shoulders from the start.

This Los Angeles Times article from May 21, 2004 gives a glimpse of the hype that surrounded her when she entered the W.

10. There will simply never be another.

I don’t think we talk about the clip below enough, so I’ll leave you here.

Love you all. Talk soon. You’ll be sick of me this week, I hope.

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Hi, friends! I’m coming to you live from Miami, where I am about to head over to watch Unrivaled in person! I’m so excited — please let me know if you’re here, too.

With basketball on the brain, I wanted to continue our Black History Month series where I take the paywall away and republish old Power Plays newsletters that focus on Black trailblazers in women’s sport, so we can all do a better job learning about women’s sports history.

Earlier this week we revisited Wyomia Tyus’s story. Today’s newsletter is repurposed from one I initially sent out last year when Caitlin Clark broke Kelsey Plum’s NCAA scoring record.

It’s about Lynette Woodard (3,649) and Pearl Moore (4,061), who both played in the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) era of women’s sports.

Remember, while I have lifted the paywall on this one, the full Power Plays archive is only available to paid subscribers, and most of my archival deep dives are only available to paid subscribers from the jump. Paid subscriptions make Power Plays possible, so please support if you can!

LYNETTE WOODARD

Lynette Woodard is a legend from the University of Kansas who scored 3,649 points over 139 games from 1977-1981. (Rachel Bachman of the Wall Street Journal wrote a must-read piece on Woodard.) At the time I published this newsletter last year, Woodard still had more points overall than Caitlin Clark, though Clark passed her by the end of the season.

Woodard had a storied career after college, too, helping lead Team USA to the gold medal in the 1984 Olympics and becoming the first woman to every play with the Harlem Globetrotters in 1985. She played pro basketball overseas, and then played two years in the WNBA — in 1997, the league’s inaugural season, she played for the Cleveland Rockers; in ‘98 she was with the Detroit Shock. She was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2004 and the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2005.

Her record isn’t recognized as “official” by the NCAA because the NCAA didn’t take over women’s sports fully until 1982. Therefore, the NCAA just ignores anything that happened before that. It’s complete bullshit.

27 News in Kansas released a statement from Woodward’s publicist about Clark’s accomplishment, and it’s a must-read:

Statement from Lynette Woodard:

I want to congratulate Caitlin Clark on her sensational career and becoming the new Division I NCAA scoring leader.

In 1982, when the NCAA began offering women’s championships, I was the first female athlete to earn the NCAA’s top V award. At that time, the NCAA recognized my career scoring record of 3,649 points, all achieved in my four seasons at the University of Kansas.

I am proud of my record that has stood for 43 years. I played from 1977 until 1981, when women’s basketball was governed by the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women. Back then, collegiate women’s players used a larger basketball, and we did not have a 3-point line. In honoring Caitlin’s accomplishments, I hope that we can also shine a light on the pioneers who paved the way before her. Women’s basketball has a glorious history that predates the NCAA’s involvement. I applaud Caitlin for everything she has done and look forward to watching her score many more points for years to come.

—Lynette Woodard, February 15, 2024

Here are a few articles I came across that will help you get to know her story a bit better.

The Shreveport Journal; March 14, 1980

This is a great article about the versatility of Woodard, who could play all five positions.

Olathe News (Olathe, Kansas); January 11, 1981

Here’s an article after Woodard broke the scoring record about the difficulty getting it recognized.

That might be a bit hard to read due to the small font, so here’s an excerpt that I found particularly interesting as it pertains to women’s sports history and stat-keeping:

The first basket she made, a 15-foot jumper, made her the record-holder for career points in Division I women's basketball. That's according to NCAA Division I standards. But the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women is the governing body for women's athletics, not the NCAA.

The AIAW doesn’t deem individual records important and according to KU's sports information department has refused to accredit Woodard's 3228 career points as a record. AIAW records are kept only for national championships. 

The record itself was a confusing one to begin with. At the beginning of the basketball season, Carol Blazejowski was the record holder. The former Montclair State (NJ) star had 3,199 career points. At the end of her junior year Woodard had 2,888 points, already a KU record. Woodard has outscored all KU players male and female.

But while the Jayhawks were playing in the Hanover Classic Tournament in Madison Square Garden last month, Mel Greenberg, who writes for the Philadelphia Enquirer and publishes a weekly Top 20 poll, announced that Cindy Brogdon, a Tennessee graduate, had scored five more points than Blazejowski.

And that record, according to a women's sports record book written by Van Nightengale of the Virginia Pilot newspaper, was correct. 

All of that is past history now, however. Woodard has outscored both Blazejowski and Brogdon and, as far as KU is concerned, holds the record.

The Wichita Eagle; September 23 1981

Here’s a great article about Woodard’s life after setting the record and the tragedy of the lack of options for women athletes professionally back in 1981. A reminder both how far we have come and how far we still have to go.

PEARL MOORE

Believe it or not, there’s someone who has scored even more points that Woodard and Clark in college — and no, I’m not talking about Pistol Pete.

Pearl Moore was a 5’5” guard who scored a whopping 4,061 points in 135 games from 1975-1979, a point total that is still the overall record in college basketball. Pete Iacobelli wrote about Moore in the Associated Press, and her story is a phenomenal one.

She grew up in Florence, South Carolina as one of 11 children. Her collegiate career started at Anderson Junior College where she played eight games and scored 177 points before transferring to Francis Marion College in her hometown. (FUN ASIDE: Francis Marion was in the news while Clark was making waves because Francis Marion center Lauryn Taylor set the all-time women’s NCAA single-game rebounding record with a 34 point, 44 rebound performance in a Division II win against North Greenville! )

Despite playing at such a small school — when Moore played, the AIAW classified Francis Marion as a “small school”— Moore was a transcendent talent who set records on the regular, even scoring 60 points in a game in the AIAW tournament in 1978.

She was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011 and the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2021.

As far as I can tell, the reason why some recognize Woodard’s record but not Moore’s is because Francis Marion is a DII school. (Those that do recognize Woodard’s record sometimes specify that it’s the record for “major colleges.”) But still, she scored 4,061 points!!!! That deserves a lot of love. As one South Carolina sports reporter wrote in 1979, “Moore has brought girl’s basketball from the days of one paragraph to headlines.”

Florence Morning News; March 23, 1978

Here’s an article written after Moore set a single-game record with 60 points. It really shows how focused and hard-working she was.

Florence Morning News; March 11, 1979

Here’s an article from after Moore set the national record in her final collegiate game, just surpassing the men’s DII record set by Travis Grant of Kentucky State in 1972.

Florence Morning News; March 27, 1979

This article is really mostly about the pictures and her accolades, but it is great to see her being celebrated in-real-time for her achievements in 1979.

Hope you all enjoyed this trip down memory lane. Thank you for your support!

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Hi, friends! Happy Black History Month.

Usually, after eight months, every Power Plays newsletter, even those that are initially free to all, go behind a paywall and become available only to paid subscribers. But over the next week, I’m going to re-publish a few of those old newsletters that share the stories of some of the Black women that made women’s sports the juggernaut they are today. Then, we’ll cap off the month with a brand new #FromtheArchives dive on a Black trailblazer.

Today, I’m sharing an adapted version of a newsletter I published four years ago about Wyomia Tyus, one of the greatest sprinters in U.S. history. Tyus won the gold medal in the 100m in the 1964 and 1968 Olympics, becoming the first man or woman to win back-to-back Olympic titles in the race. (She also two Olympic medals in the 4x100m relay — a silver in ‘64 and a gold in ‘68.) But because she was a Black woman in the 1960s, she didn’t get nearly the notoriety or fame or financial support she deserved, especially since any attention given to Black athletes after the 1968 Olympics went to John Carlos and Tommie Smith, who gave the Black Power salute on the 200m podium during the national anthem.

This newsletter features a pretty depressing 1970 article on Tyus’s overlooked legacy, as well as excerpts from her incredible autobiography, “Tigerbelle: The Wyomia Tyus Story.”

#FromtheArchives: ‘Wyomia: Forgotten queen of the Olympics’

This article from the San Francisco Examiner on June 2, 1970, just two years after her Mexico City triumph, paints a bleak picture of what life was like for Tyus after she made history.

She wasn’t bathing in endorsement deals or celebrity; instead, she was an unemployed housewife, and not by choice.

“People think if you win a gold medal you can get a job,” Tyus says. “Not if you’re Black.”

A few things to note:

• WHAT IS THIS LEDE??? “Wyomia Tyus is a tall, slender, dark woman with soft, sensitive eyes. She speaks in a low and tense voice, as if trying to contain a scream, Wyomia is very much a woman. And she can be disarmingly honest.” I … cannot.

• In her book, Tyus makes it known that she is *not* crying in that photo from the medal stand; it was merely raining.

• Claiming she is “bitter” because she didn’t demonstrate at the Olympics in ‘68 is ridiculous, because, first of all, she did demonstrate — she wore black shorts instead of white shorts to show solidarity with John Carlos and Tommie Smith after their podium protest, and dedicated her relay medal to them. Plus, as she details in her book (and as we will touch on below), she wasn’t frustrated that she “didn’t” raise a fist on the podium; she was frustrated because women were left out of the movement altogether.

Excerpts from ‘Tigerbelle: The Wyomia Tyus Story’

I really do love everything about Tigerbelle, but my favorite section is when Tyus is reflecting on what happened before, during, and after the Mexico City. Olympics. It’s a perspective that is missing from almost every remembrance of the momentous competition.

Her college track coach, the famous Ed Temple, was among the many who thought that Smith and Carlos doing the Black Power Salute on the podium after the 200m race was the reason why her 100m title defense didn’t get much attention. But Tyus astutely notes that her 100m race happened before Smith and Carlos raised their fists; the primary reason why she was not given the proper attention and respect was because she is a Black woman.

Since the very beginning here at Power Plays, we’ve discussed sports as a beacon of power and oppression for white, cisgender men, and how women’s sports — and everything that comes with it — is often treated as less of an opportunity, and more of a threat.

Tyus, of course, says that better than I ever could. But I do think that sport is at its best when the powerless use it as a means to seize power; we’re seeing marginalized communities do that more and more as the years go on, and it’s why it’s crucial to continue to fight for a sports world that is inclusive, so that power can be accessible to all.

Tyus also uses the book to take us behind the scenes before Mexico City, and notes that as they were planning their protest against racism in the United States and human rights abuses across the globe, Smith and Carlos and their cohort never reached out to female athletes to join them. There was no communication, even though it would have been very easy for them to reach out — Tyus’s boyfriend at the time was involved with the movement.

“We should have been included in the organizing, should have bene consulted. It would have made a difference,” Tyus says.

I love that in telling her story, she manages both to acknowledge the power and impact that Carlos and Smith’s protest had, but is also very frank about how it felt to be less than an afterthought. Both are valid. Both are the story. Both matter.

She also uses this experience to provide great guidance to anyone who is trying to build movements going forward: Inclusivity is the way forward: “[W]hen you are trying to build a movement, if there are a lot of people who get left behind or are not spoken to, that’s a weakness.”

Given what’s going on in the women’s sports world right now, her words resonated with me on multiple fronts.

If you’re fighting your own community’s marginalization by further marginalizing others, you’re wasting energy instead of gaining steam. No matter how small your platform is at the start, you can build it up much higher if you build it out on the ground first.

Thanks for reading Power Plays. Happy Friday. Happy Black History Month. Have a good weekend.

And, sincerely, thank you.

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Hi, friends. Earlier this month, I wrote that President Donald Trump’s anti-transgender agenda actually has nothing to do with women’s sports — his first three anti-transgender executive orders make that inexplicably clear. I still believe that. But that doesn’t mean he was going to let trans women in sports off the hook. There’s nothing this man loves more than a political stunt.

Last Wednesday, on National Women and Girls in Sports Day, President Donald Trump, flanked by young girls and women, signed an executive order banning transgender athletes from competing in women and girls’ sports entitled, “Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports.”

In his order, Trump states that “it is the policy of the United States to rescind all funds from educational programs that deprive women and girls of fair athletic opportunities, which results in the endangerment, humiliation, and silencing of women and girls and deprives them of privacy. It shall also be the policy of the United States to oppose male competitive participation in women’s sports more broadly, as a matter of safety, fairness, dignity, and truth.” Within 24 hours, the NCAA followed suit.

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I’ve been covering the advancement of anti-trans legislation for a decade. Here at Power Plays, we’ve closely followed the movement to “protect” women and girls in sports via transphobia since it gained significant momentum and organizing power at the start of the Biden administration. Watching things unfold last week, I was heartbroken for my trans friends, whose mere existence was being used as a punching bag. I felt like a failure, and found it difficult to focus through my fury. I still do.

Like fellow Substacker Frankie de la Cretaz, I’ve been dismayed by the silence of women’s leagues and women athletes since the ban. Like Katelyn Burns, I’ve been outraged by organizations like the New York Times failing to publicly grapple with their role in pushing anti-trans propaganda into the mainstream. Like Rodger Sherman and Nancy Armour, I’ve been sickened by the NCAA’s spinelessness and complicity.

But, as the days have ticked by, and the anger has stewed, I’ve come to realize that I actually do agree with Trump about one thing: We should keep men out of women’s sports.

We should keep men like Donald Trump out of women’s sports. Men who only care about women’s sports when they can use them as a political prop. Men who take away abortion rights, who publicly mock women’s appearances, who use their bully pulpit to attack the star of the U.S. women’s national team in the middle of the 2019 Women’s World Cup, creating a distraction so large that it probably should have cost the U.S. a World Cup victory, and who publicly reveled in the same team’s quarterfinal loss at the 2023 World Cup, posting, “WOKE EQUALS FAILURE. Nice shot [Megan Rapinoe], the USA is going to Hell!!!” Men who are accused of rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment by dozens of women. Men who say things like “when you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. ... Grab 'em by the pussy.”

We should keep men out of women’s sports who weaponize Title IX to invoke trans witch hunts instead of utilizing the law to encourage schools provide equal resources and opportunities for girls and women in sports. We should keep men out of women’s sports who are trying to get rid of the entire Department of Education, which will surely mark the end of Title IX as we know it.

We should keep men like Charlie Baker out of women’s sports, absolute cowards who oversee organizations that have had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, every single step of the way over the last 50 years to advance women’s collegiate sports, but want full credit for all of their current successes. Men who accept television deals that criminally undervalue women’s basketball, and women’s sports in general. Men who know that out of 510,000 NCAA athletes, less than 10 are transgender.

We should keep men like Luis Rubiales out of women’s sports. Rubiales, the former president of the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF), infamously kissed Spanish soccer star Jenni Hermoso on the lips while she was receiving the medal for winning the World Cup on August 20, 2023. We should keep men like Rubiales’s colleagues — former Spanish women’s coach Jorge Vilda, former RFEF sporting director Albert Luque, and former RFEF marketing director Ruben River — out of women’s sports, men who proceeded to (allegedly) incessantly pressure Hermoso into publicly defending Rubiales and saying that the kiss was consensual. Men who are currently on trial in Spain for their actions; Rubiales for sexual assault, and all four for coercion.

“He didn’t ask me if he could kiss me or not,” Hermoso said in court last week, according to the Athletic, who is providing phenomenal coverage of the trial. “If he had asked me the question, I would not have agreed.

“I felt disrespected, it was a moment that tainted one of the happiest days of my life.”

We should keep the men out of women’s sports who gave Rubiales a standing ovation five days after this kiss, when he gave a defiant speech in front of a RFEF assembly, declaring five times that he would not resign. (He resigned about two weeks later.) We should keep the men out of women’s sports who encouraged Rubiales’s behavior for decades, despite informal and formal protests by players.

We should keep men out of women’s sports who perpetuate abuse and protect abusers, men like former NWSL head coach Paul Riley. In a 2021 investigation by Meg Linehan of the Athletic, NWSL players Sinead Farrelly and Mana Shim reported that Riley sexually harassed, coerced, and abused them when they played for him. Subsequent reporting revealed a culture of sexual and emotional abuse throughout the league that was ignored and enabled for years in order to protect the reputation of the NWSL and to perpetuate the notion that pro women athletes should be grateful for anything they get; that safety was too much to ask for.

Riley was banned from the NWSL, but true justice and accountability has been slow. Last week, on the same day that Trump issued the transgender ban, attorneys general from D.C., New York, and Illinois concluded their three-year long investigation into the NWSL’s abuse, and announced a settlement with the league. As part of the settlement, the NWSL established a $5 million Players’ Restitution Fund, and agreed that the attorneys general would oversee and enforce player safety policies in the league for the next three years.

“This $5 million restitution fund is not a gift, nor is it justice,” Tori Huster, former NWSL player and current deputy executive director of the NWSLPA, said in a press conference. “This fund is an acknowledgment of the league’s failures and the harm suffered by players. It’s a testament to players’ courage and a necessary step toward accountability. If the NWSL is safer today, it is because players fought to make it that way. But true accountability means ensuring this never happens again.”

We should keep men out of women sports who perpetuate inequality, such as the president of the Internationals Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS), Johan Eliasch. FIS is the federation that oversees ski jumping, where women earn less than 30 percent of the prize money as their male counterparts. As reported by Power Plays, last week in Lake Placid, women had to hold a GoFundMe in order to pay the winner of the women’s qualifying competitions.

We should keep men out of women’s sports who only see it as a stepping stone on the way to their true dream of working in men’s sports; men who only view their support of or involvement in women’s sports as an act of charity; men who perpetuate bigotry rather than fight against it.

In his speech last Wednesday, Trump said he wanted to get the “woke lunacy” out of women’s sports. We should keep men out of women’s sports who believe that is a possibility.

In 1971, a young girl in Connecticut, Susan Hollander, wanted to run varsity cross-country and indoor track for Hamden High School. But this was the pre-Title IX era, and there was no girl’s team, so she wanted to join the boys’ team. When that was prohibited by state law, she brought a lawsuit against the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference.

Here’s more information from a 1973 Sports Illustrated feature on women’s sports:

The case was heard on March 29, 1971 in the Superior Court of New Haven and Judge John Clark FitzGerald ruled against Hollander. In giving his decision Judge FitzGerald stated, “The present generation of our younger male population has not become so decadent that boys will experience a thrill in defeating girls in running contests, whether the girls be members of their own team or of an adversary team. It could well be that many boys would feel compelled to forgo entering track events if they were required to compete with girls on their own teams or on adversary teams. With boys vying with girls … the challenge to win, and the glory of achievement, at least for many boys, would lose incentive and become nullified. Athletic competition builds character in our boys. We do not need that kind of character in our girls.”

The biggest irony in all of this is that girls’ and women’s sports were not created as a category to protect girls from boys; they were created to protect boys from having to compete against, and potentially lose to, girls.

And those same men who worried that competing against a girl would nullify “the glory of achievement” for boys actively discouraged girls from competing in sports of any kind; they feared that girls would gain positive life skills from such an experience, and “we do not need that kind of character in our girls.”

Women’s sports do not exist to make people comfortable, to reinforce gender stereotypes, or to give political points to the patriarchy. They exist to disrupt the status quo. And that’s why, beyond their dehumanization of trans people, which is reason enough to oppose them, trans bans in women’s sports are so upsetting; because they rely on the notion that femininity, above all else, is fragile. And, as someone who actually actually watches women’s sports on a daily basis and sees what these athletes are capable of, I vehemently disagree.

All trans youth should be able to compete in sports without restriction, and there should be a reasonable and achievable pathway to participation for trans women to compete in women’s sports at all elite levels. Because trans women are not a threat to women’s sports.

In fact, right now, women’s sports are absolutely thriving. Plenty of men, inside and outside of women’s sports, are threatened by that success. Those are the men we need to keep out.

This Thursday in Lake Placid, New York, just one day after National Women and Girls in Sports day, history will be made: For the first time, women ski jumpers will compete in an International Ski and Snowboard Federations (FIS) Ski Jumping World Cup event on North American snow.

Unfortunately, the event won’t quite be the celebration of equality that it should be. That’s because ski jumping is one of the only sports1 governed by FIS not to offer equal prize money for men and women.

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And the gap isn’t marginal. It is, ahem, quite a leap. Right now, the female World Cup winner earns 4,300 Swiss francs2, about $4,747, compared to the CHF 13,000 earned by their male counterparts. And that’s not all. Men earn CHF 3,000 for a qualification win, while women earn absolutely nothing.

Well, that’s not quite true. A few weeks ago at a World Cup event in Germany, the women’s qualification winner was presented with a package of shampoo, lotion and four towels.

It turns out, the toiletry bag for champions caused quite a stir in German media, and elevated the outrage over inequality in the sport. So, ahead of a monumental occasion for U.S. women in ski jumping, a few trailblazers decided to take action. Together, they have started a GoFundMe to close the prize money gap in Lake Placid.

Yes, you read that right. Because the federation still won’t step up, women have taken matters into their own hands.

The idea came from retired ski jumper and current commentator Nina Lussi, a four-time national champion and Lake Placid native. She asked her former U.S. national team members Lindsey Van, Jessica Jerome, and Tara Geraghty-Moats, to help join the “flight.”

When Jerome heard about the idea, she jumped (sorry) at the opportunity.

“I was like, yes, absolutely, of course,” Jerome told Power Plays, recalling that she once got a 12-pack pallet of coca-cola for winning a competition.3 “I went through this 20 years ago, or even longer than that. It's a no brainer for me. I'm here for my girls.”

Initially, the group aimed to earn enough to present CHF 3,000 to the winner of the first women’s qualification event this weekend. Quickly, they reached that goal and surpassed it. As of publication, the GoFundMe has reached $7,727, enough to cover the qualification check for the winner of both events. The support has exceeded their expectations.

“I think the sense of community is really heartwarming,” Jerome said. “I think that women get shit done. I hope that people realize that this is something worth caring about, and we should try to make it right. Just standing by and not doing anything isn't going to cut it anymore.”

Of course, now that the qualifying champs will get more than soaps and hand towels, the women have set their sights on closing the prize money chasm. The men’s prize money pool at Lake Placid is CHF 172,000 (86,100 per event), while the women’s prize money pool is only CHF 60,458 (30,229 per event), meaning men get almost three times as much money as the women, and that doesn’t even include the qualification payment.

“This is about more than just money; it's about respect, recognition, and inspiring the next generation of ski jumpers,” Lussi said on the GoFundMe.

It has been a long, uphill climb for women in ski jumping over the decades. Women weren’t allowed to compete in the ski jumping World Cup until 2012, and weren’t allowed in the Olympics until 2014. Even then, the women only had one ski jumping event, compared to three for the men.

Many men in power are simply aghast at the thought of women competing in this sport. In 2005, then-FIS president Gian Franco Kasper told NPR that ski jumping “seems to not be appropriate for ladies from a medical point of view.” In 2014, a Russian ski jumping coach said that ski jumping wasn’t appropriate for women because “women have another purpose—to have children, to do housework, to create hearth and home.”

But despite the rampant sexism, women have kept pushing forward. Next year at the Winter Olympics, they will finally be allowed to compete on the large hill, not just the normal hill. FIS has begun holding more combined World Cup events between the men and women, which helps growth. The total women’s prize money available on the World Cup circuit has increased from CHF 690,238 in 2022 to CHF 857,096 this season. (Though that’s an increase of 166,858, while the men’s prize money pool increased by 185,300 in that time.) FIS used to only pay prize money to the top 20 finishers in women’s events; now the top 25 get checks. (For men, FIS pays out the top 30.)

This season, the top woman, Nika Prevc of Slovenia, has earned CHF 54,319, a mere 17.8 percent of the CHF 306,650 the top man, Daniel Tschofenig from Austria, has won. (And again, that doesn’t account for any money he would have earned from winning a qualification event.)

Nussi, Jerome, Van, and Geraghty-Moats know that one GoFundMe can’t fix all the systemic inequities in the sport. But they hope it helps alleviate the financial burden so many of the competitors face, raises awareness of the issue, and makes a significant statement to the governing body of the sport that there is soaring (last one, I promise) public support for these athletes, and that the time for change is now.

“Lake Placid is where I took my first jumps. It was here that I fell in love with the sport of ski jumping. It was here that I first had the dream of competing at the Olympics. It was here that the sport shaped me,” Nussi says.

“Join us. Let's make history in Lake Placid and send a powerful message to the world: it's time for equal pay in women's ski jumping.”

Well, friends. We are almost two weeks into Donald Trump’s second term in office, and each day has brought new horrors.

Trump and his team have made so many sweeping changes in such a short period of time that it’s impossible to even begin to process them all. But today I think it’s really important to focus in on his attacks on the transgender community.

These attacks are, of course, not surprising in the least. That doesn’t make them any less horrifying or damaging. The Republican party passed an onslaught of anti-transgender laws across the country during President Joe Biden’s term in office, and found success in the court of public opinion by framing all transgender rights issues around the false pretense of “protecting women’s sports.” Trump carried that message and momentum right into the White House.

But Trump’s first days in office prove what the transgender community and its allies have known all along: This was never about women’s sports.

It was about reinforcing traditional gender roles, asserting control over women’s bodies, and, most terrifyingly, eradicating transgender people from public life completely.

This doesn’t mean Trump won’t keep attacking transgender athletes, both rhetorically and regulations. But women’s sports were merely the trojan horse.

I’ve spent this week combing through all of Trump’s executive orders pertaining to the transgender community. Even though these executive orders will face legal challenges and it is unclear how (or if) they will be enforced, it’s worth looking at them and grasping just how far Trump’s war against transgender people is prepared to go.

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First, Trump tries to redact transgender people from existence

In his inauguration speech, just moments after taking the oath of office, Trump stated, “From now on, it is the official position of the United States that there are only two genders: male and female.”

Then he put that in writing. One of his first executive orders was pithily entitled, “Defending women from gender ideology extremism and restoring biological truth to the federal government.”

That executive order is 1,925 words. One word not missing from the order? “Sports.” (Although it does include the word “passports,” so if you control F it, you will get a hit.)

I have a hard time putting into words how all-encompassing this order attempts to be, so I’ll cite Casey Parks of the Washington Post: “The order … narrowly defines sex in a way that aims to erase the very concept of trans and nonbinary people.”

Read that again: “[I]t narrowly defines sex in a way that aims to erase the very concept of trans and nonbinary people.”

Absolutely terrifying.

Of course, you can’t just erase an entire category of people, unless you commit a genocide. So Trump is physically attempting to erase transgender people from all government documents and policies, emphasis mine:

(d) The Secretaries of State and Homeland Security, and the Director of the Office of Personnel Management, shall implement changes to require that government-issued identification documents, including passports, visas, and Global Entry cards, accurately reflect the holder’s sex, as defined under section 2 of this order; and the Director of the Office of Personnel Management shall ensure that applicable personnel records accurately report Federal employees’ sex, as defined by section 2 of this order.

(e) Agencies shall remove all statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications, or other internal and external messages that promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology, and shall cease issuing such statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications or other messages. Agency forms that require an individual’s sex shall list male or female, and shall not request gender identity. Agencies shall take all necessary steps, as permitted by law, to end the Federal funding of gender ideology.

There are a lot of questions remaining about how this will be implemented. Intersex and nonbinary people have been able to have the gender marker of “X” on their passports since 2021. Marco Rubio has already put a stop to that. But there is no clarity about what this means for people who currently hold passports with “X” marked as a gender.

But, as always, the destabilizing chaos is by design.

There are a couple of other things in this first anti-trans executive order I want to highlight.

Trump explicitly defines transgender women as predators

While this first order impacts all transgender people, it hones in on transgender women and paints them as a threat to all cisgender women. This is in-line with the “protect women’s sports” slogan, but the terminology is incredibly sinister, dehumanizing, and incorrect:

Section 1. Purpose. Across the country, ideologues who deny the biological reality of sex have increasingly used legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers. This is wrong. Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being. The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system. Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself.

The order goes on to say that transgender people who are imprisoned must be detained in prisons or detention centers congruent with their sex assigned at birth, barring trans women from women’s domestic violence shelters and women’s prisons.1

On a completely unrelated note, via Wikipedia, “Donald Trump has been accused of rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment, including non-consensual kissing or groping, by at least 25 women since the 1970s.”

Trump was caught on a hot mic in 2005 talking to Access Hollywood about women, saying “when you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. ... Grab 'em by the pussy.”

He has also been accused of entering women’s dressing rooms during Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants while contestants were undressing. In 2005 he bragged to Howard Stern on live radio that he could “get away with things like that” because he owned Miss Universe.

In 2023, a jury found Donald Trump liable for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll in 1996 in a civil suit, and awarded her $5 million in damages.

Amidst the transphobia, Trump also gave a terrifying nod to anti-abortion advocates

Yes, we are still on his first executive order about gender identity on the first day. But I want to also note that in this order — which again, did not mention the word “sports” once — he states that sex begins at conception.

In the part of the order that offers Trump’s definitions of terms, he includes this:

(d) “Female” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell.

(e) “Male” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell.

While the word “abortion” or “life” is not written, his message was clear: At the 2025 March for Life last week, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La) got a huge round of applause from the crowd when he said, “I don’t know if you saw [Trump’s] executive order on gender, but he defines life as beginning at conception rather than birth.”

Don’t you feel safer, women athletes??

Next, Trump tries to abolish all gender-affirming healthcare for minors

This week, things somehow got even worse, with multiple executive orders targeting the transgender community.

First let’s talk about the one that goes after transgender health care for minors, “Protecting children from chemical and surgical mutilation.” It is devastating in its cruelty, falsely painting medical transitions for minors as widespread and common and misrepresenting it as mutilation forced upon minors.

Section 1. Policy and Purpose. Across the country today, medical professionals are maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex through a series of irreversible medical interventions. This dangerous trend will be a stain on our Nation’s history, and it must end.

Countless children soon regret that they have been mutilated and begin to grasp the horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding. Moreover, these vulnerable youths’ medical bills may rise throughout their lifetimes, as they are often trapped with lifelong medical complications, a losing war with their own bodies, and, tragically, sterilization.

This is just spreading lies. Last year, researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health “found little to no utilization of gender-affirming surgeries by transgender and gender-diverse (TGD) minors in the U.S. The study also found that cisgender minors and adults had substantially higher utilization of analogous gender-affirming surgeries than their TGD counterparts.”

These surgeries on minors are extremely rare. But when Trump says refers to “mutilation” he is not only talking about top surgery or bottom surgery; he is referring to all methods of gender-affirming health care:

(c) The phrase “chemical and surgical mutilation” means the use of puberty blockers, including GnRH agonists and other interventions, to delay the onset or progression of normally timed puberty in an individual who does not identify as his or her sex; the use of sex hormones, such as androgen blockers, estrogen, progesterone, or testosterone, to align an individual’s physical appearance with an identity that differs from his or her sex; and surgical procedures that attempt to transform an individual’s physical appearance to align with an identity that differs from his or her sex or that attempt to alter or remove an individual’s sexual organs to minimize or destroy their natural biological functions. This phrase sometimes is referred to as “gender affirming care.”

Not only will this order prevent both transgender and cisgender youth alike from getting the health care they need, it is also only the beginning. Multiple states have also outlawed gender affirming care for adults, and that is the logical next step for Trump.

He is coming after social transitions, too

In another executive order issued on Thursday, “Ending radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling,” Trump paints schools, and teachers in particular, as the enemy. He takes steps to ban all diversity, equity, and inclusion programs from public schools, and the order is extremely and deplorably racist. But I’m going to focus in on the parts that relate to gender identity.

“In many cases … young men and women are made to question whether they were born in the wrong body and whether to view their parents and their reality as enemies to be blamed,” he says. “These practices not only erode critical thinking but also sow division, confusion.”

Trump adds that schools are “steering students toward surgical and chemical mutilation without parental consent or involvement” and “allowing males access to private spaces designated for females,” two statements that have been widely debunked.

He then directs his cabinet to provide a plan within 90 days that will focus on:

(iii) Each agency’s process to prevent or rescind Federal funds, to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law, from being used by an ESA, SEA, LEA, elementary school, or secondary school to directly or indirectly support or subsidize the social transition of a minor student, including through school staff or teachers or through deliberately concealing the minor’s social transition from the minor’s parents.

So not only is Trump trying to stop transgender children from getting health care, he is attempting to outlaw all social transitions as well.

What is a social transition? Well, the executive order defines social transition as such:

(e) “Social transition” means the process of adopting a “gender identity” or “gender marker” that differs from a person’s sex. This process can include psychological or psychiatric counseling or treatment by a school counselor or other provider; modifying a person’s name (e.g., “Jane” to “James”) or pronouns (e.g., “him” to “her”); calling a child “nonbinary”; use of intimate facilities and accommodations such as bathrooms or locker rooms specifically designated for persons of the opposite sex; and participating in school athletic competitions or other extracurricular activities specifically designated for persons of the opposite sex. “Social transition” does not include chemical or surgical mutilation.

So yes, this order would impact girls’ sports. But that is practically just an add-on. Trump didn’t write this executive order to ensure fairness in a track meet. He wrote it to alienate transgender children from every aspect of life, and to scare educators and therapists and teachers from providing any support at all to a child dealing with gender dysphoria, even in the form of a pronoun.

As Power Plays has previously reported, school is already fraught for transgender youth. A study from 2017 and 2019 found that almost 44 percent of transgender youth reported considering suicide in the previous year, versus 16 percent of cisgender youth.

These policies will make things far, far worse.

Perhaps most devastatingly, Trump deems transgender people ‘mentally unfit’ and ineligible for the military

In the first week of his second administration, Trump repealed a Biden-era provision allowing transgender people to serve in the military.

This week he got far more specific in the executive order, “Prioritizing military excellence and readiness.”

This is, truly, one of the most deplorable things I have ever read. He flat out says that being transgender makes you unable to be in the military because it is inherently dishonorable:

Consistent with the military mission and longstanding DoD policy, expressing a false “gender identity” divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service. Beyond the hormonal and surgical medical interventions involved, adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life. A man’s assertion that he is a woman, and his requirement that others honor this falsehood, is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.

Read that again: “A man’s assertion that he is a woman, and his requirement that others honor this falsehood, is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.”

If there are words capable of emphasizing just how insulting and false that statement is, I haven’t found them.

And, in case you think Trump is just concerned about the impact of a medical transition on the physical capabilities of a transgender person in the military, he makes it clear that he is not:

Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States Government to establish high standards for troop readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity. This policy is inconsistent with the medical, surgical, and mental health constraints on individuals with gender dysphoria. This policy is also inconsistent with shifting pronoun usage or use of pronouns that inaccurately reflect an individual’s sex.

Pure. Evil.

I wish I had a pithy way to wrap this up, but I don’t.

I’m going to keep covering this, and also keep covering the real issues that are actually impacting women’s sports, and hopefully find ways this community can help and also find ways we can experience joy.

I love you all. And if you’re trans, I love you even more.

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There have been so many huge news stories in women’s sports over the past few days, and I promise I will get to them all. But the past few days, my head and heart haven’t been able to stop replaying the scenes from Saturday morning in the United States — which, because the world is round and time is a construct, happened to be late Saturday night in Melbourne, Australia — when 29-year-old American Madison Keys hit a stunning inside out forehand winner to defeat two-time defending champion and world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 to win the Australian Open and capture the maiden Grand Slam title of her career.

It was, my friends, a MOMENT.

I don’t think it’s accurate to call Keys a late bloomer; she has been considered the future of women’s tennis since her pre-teens. She turned pro on her 14th birthday, and won her first WTA match just 45 days later. She won her first U.S. Open match when she was 16 years old, entered the top 100 when she was 17, and had her first top-10 win at 18, defeating No. 6 Li Na at the Madrid Open. She made her first major semifinal at the Australian Open when she was only 19 years old by upsetting No. 4 Petra Kvitova in the third round and No. 18 Venus Williams in the quarterfinals. After she fell to No. 1 Serena Williams in the semifinals, Serena said, “It was an honor for me to play someone who will be No. 1 in the future.” Two years later, she reached her first major final at the 2017 U.S. Open.

When I think of a late bloomer, I think much more of someone like Jasmine Paolini, who hit her way from obscurity to relevancy in her late 20s, surprising everyone in the tennis establishment, even herself.

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There was, until Saturday, a much more demeaning moniker attached to Keys: Under achiever. From the outside, it appeared she had all the resources, the power, the talent, and the hype needed to be one of the greats. But there she lingered, a steady presence in the top 20 for a decade — an admirable achievement that many former tennis prodigies never sniff, but hardly a bastion of fulfilled promise. In normie terms, she was the kid who grew up in academically gifted programs, earned a yearbook superlative or two, went to a good college, and yet found themselves a decade or two after graduation surviving, but nowhere close to thriving. (Not that I would know anything about this.)

Now look. I am about as far from a professional athlete as one can be; I’m three weeks into a beginner’s running program that hasn’t required slowly jogging for more than one minute at a time yet, and it has been a *challenge* to make it this far. But I am someone who is really trying to make more of her life, who feels that weight of untapped “potential,” who believes in therapy and working hard on your mental health as a means of improving your lot in life. I am someone who has, as a result of both my own shortcomings and outside circumstances, felt like I’ve been treading water, something that (famously!) takes a lot of energy, for a decade now. I am someone who wants to change my narrative.

And I feel like Madison Keys both showed and told me exactly how to do it.

Keys’ press conferences after her semifinal win over Iga Swiatek and her championship victory over Sabalenka were masterclasses in self reflection. She wasn’t hiding behind a wall of platitudes, the way so may athletes do; she was simply sharing her truth. And it bowled me over.

Here was a woman at the peak of her career talking, in detail, about how working on her mental health allowed her to reach for her best tennis when it mattered the most. Here was a champion advocating, strongly and directly and specifically, for talk therapy. Not sports psychology — though that definitely has its place. But real, true, therapy.

“I think in the past I had done it before, but it had always been I think too sports-specific,” Keys said. “I kind of always went in with the thought of, Will this help me perform better? I finally got to the point where I was personally low enough that I was like, I don't really care if this helps me perform, I just want to feel better. I think doing that, it was just kind of that moment where it was like, I don't really care what I have to do, I just want to feel better.”

She just wanted to feel better. How relatable is that? How many of us have been there, or maybe even are there right now?

“I think that everyone should be in therapy, no matter what,” Keys continued. “I think it helps. I think no matter what, no matter what's going on in your life, you're going to have moments where things are tough and you need someone to talk to. I think it's very important. It's something I will continue to do for the rest of my life. I think if more people do it and more people talk about it, then it just kind of becomes the norm.”

As I mentioned above, I’ve been in therapy. In fact, I’ve been in and out of therapy for 25 years, with many long breaks primarily due to insurance and financial woes. I’ve been with my current therapist for 13 months, and I’m making progress dealing with my severe depression, anxiety, ADHD, and trauma, but it’s an intense, sometimes excruciatingly slow process.

Because of that, none of the concepts that Keys talked about in her press conferences were new to me. But the way she explained how they impacted her life deeply moved me, as did her authenticity and vulnerability.

I am not one to buy into toxic positivity; I do not believe that everyone can do anything they set their mind to, that we’re all just one self-help book or podcast away from success. Systemic inequities exist. Luck always plays a factor in success. There is so much that isn’t in our control. But Keys reminded me that change is possible, and I think it’s worth diving deeper into how she turned untapped potential into a trophy presentation.1

If you want to change the outcome, change the process

They say that the definition of insanity is to try the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. (If you are playing a twisted drinking game and taking a shot every time I write a cliche in this newsletter, my apologies for the liver damage.) But I think that’s a bit dramatic. These repetitive patterns, which often lead to ruts, are extremely hard to recognize when you’re in them, and even harder to pull yourself out of. Change is difficult!

Keys had a successful career; she was getting close to a breakthrough, over and over again, for decades. So she kept training the same way, kept using the same equipment, kept staying the course. Until last year, when she reached a low point after getting injured and being forced to retire at 5-5 in the third set in an absolutely epic fourth-round match against Paolini at Wimbledon.

She re-evaluated things. And, with the help of her husband and coach, former ATP player Bjorn Fratangelo, she decided that it was time to do things differently. Over the next six months, she changed her racket, her strings, her service motion, and even her offseason travel schedule.

After beating Swiatek in the semifinals, she discussed what led to those changes, emphasis mine:

Q. You spoke earlier about trusting your work and trusting that will pay off. At what point in your career did you come to that conclusion? Was there ever a point when you did focus too much on doubts and you were in your head too much?

MADISON KEYS: I think there's been moments in my career when things kind of just felt like they were kind of happening and things were easy, and you just kind of run with that momentum.

I think that's kind of the reality of the sport. It's really hard to just be on a high every single week. I think it's the times when things aren't going your way that it's pretty easy for doubt to kind of creep in.

I think that the big focus for me this off-season was really just kind of buying into I'll try anything, I'll do anything, I'll be open. I'm open to any and all changes. Let's just really go for it.

Obviously I'm at the later point of my career. It just kind of felt like, why not, however many more years I have, be willing to adapt and be a little bit more open to change?

I think doing that is a little bit freeing because I think for a really long time I felt like I was so close doing it a certain way. I kind of just kept falling short. But in my head it was, If I just keep doing it that way, maybe it will happen.

I started putting a lot of pressure on myself within that, and I probably just got a little too rigid not wanting to change because things were good enough for close and all that.

I think just really buying into let's just go for it and be open to change. Doing that, I think I kind of pushed myself to figure out kind of what I actually wanted. I think for a long time I just picked up a racquet and said, This is great, and moved on.

I think there was kind of trying things and actually saying, Do I like them? Do I not like them? It just gave me a better insight on what I actually like and what I wanted to do. I think that kind of built a little bit more self-trust.

Sometimes we do things a certain way just because that’s how we’ve always done it. Mixing things up might make things worse; but it might also be the only way to make them better.

Feel the fear and do it anyway

Keys is known for her power. It’s what sets her apart from her peers, why she was able to achieve so much at a relatively young age, why she has remained in the top 20 for all these years. But it’s also been, at times, what’s held her back. Because unleashing that power can be risky; there’s nothing safe about Keys’ game when its at its best.

One of the matches that Keys was most known for prior to this season was her semifinal loss to Sabalenka at the 2023 U.S. Open. Keys led that match 6-0, 5-3, 0-15. She served for it at 6-0, 5-4, and then she again led 4-2 in the third set. But every single time she got within a few points of victory, she tightened up, and her power became her kryptonite. She lost the match in heartbreaking fashion, 0-6, 7-6 (1), 7-6 (10-5).

After the Swiatek victory, she talked about how her instinct, both in that 2023 match and afterwards, was to play it safe in the big moments. But she learned that the bigger the moment, the braver she had to be.

Q. Do you feel as though you're playing with house money a little bit just because, like last week you were saying, Oh, I'm 30, I'm ripping up my game, I'm doing all these things differently, I'm willing to take the risks to go all in. Today in the match, even in the tight moments, you were laughing, at times smiling. We didn't normally see that body language for you before in tight moments in the past. Is the mindset more like that, like let's just see how we go as opposed to matches are life and death?

MADISON KEYS: I think that I've been doing a lot of personal work with all of that. I think one of the big things, after I lost to Aryna at the US Open, I felt like I tried to play safe, and I wasn't playing how I wanted to in the big moments. That felt so bad.

I just felt like if I can go out and do what I want to do and really just, again, be uncomfortable at times and just actually go for it and continue to play the way I play my best tennis, and I lose, then I can walk away and say, Okay, I did my best, she beat me, that's fine.

I didn't want to be in the same situation where I kind of looked back at it and thought, Man, I should have gone for it. I didn't want to have any regrets for not really laying it all out there.

So that was kind of just my whole goal today was that no matter what, win or lose, I walked away and said that I did what I wanted to do, I followed the game plan, I went for things when I should have gone for things.

I think that it was a little bit more freeing and I was able to kind of just take in the moment a little bit better and stay a little bit more present instead of getting too wrapped into the emotional turmoil of I should have done this, I should have done that, and just having a lot of regret.

Our impulse can be to shrink under the spotlight, to try and just not mess things up. But when times are the toughest, when the stakes are the highest, that’s when we need to be our boldest.

Seriously, get comfortable being uncomfortable

This is a concept Keys kept coming back to time and time again, and it’s so important that I decided to highlight it twice, albeit under slightly differently-sloganed subhed!

Other than that Sabalenka loss in New York, many associated Keys with another loss on Arthur Ashe stadium: Her no-show in the 2017 U.S. Open final against Sloane Stephens, which she lost 6-3, 6-0. When asked about that match ahead of this Australian Open final, Keys opened up about how she’d learned to work with the nerves, not against them.

Q. Back eight years ago against Sloane in New York, how much have you either watched that match, thought about it? Are there ways in which that experience can be a benefit and help you take on Saturday?

MADISON KEYS: Yeah, I mean, I've obviously thought of that match endlessly for the past eight years (smiling).

I think during that match, I was so consumed with being nervous and the moment and the opportunity and all of that, that I never really gave myself a chance to actually play.

I think that I've done a lot of work trying to not get rid of nerves because I think in the past in my head it was kind of always the people who play amazing in the tight moments, they either don't have nerves or they figure out how to get rid of them, instead of being able to play tennis with them.

I think the big thing for me has just been knowing that there are going to be a lot of moments where I'm uncomfortable in the match. It's going to be stressful. You have thousands of people watching you. You might not be playing your best tennis.

But instead of trying to shy away from that and search for settling or comfort or anything, just being okay that that's the situation, and you can also play tennis through that, I think is something that I've been working really hard on.

I think that's probably one of the biggest lessons that I can take from that US Open final and just be okay with knowing that I'm probably going to be uncomfortable 99% of the time that I'm on the court, and that's okay, and I can still also play tennis through that.

Everything in my life is much, much more low stakes than a Grand Slam tennis final. But I’ve only recently realized how much of my life is spent avoiding discomfort. I’ve often wondered myself whether other writers and reporters just have magical genes that make them confident and secure in everything they write and publish, at ease while asking tough questions and sending out blind inquiries, and completely self-assured and at home promoting themselves and their own work. And I bet some of them do! But it’s much more likely that others in this industry are just better at pushing through those feelings than I am. Rather than putting energy towards hiding from discomfort, I’m going to keep working on sitting with discomfort, and doing what needs to be done anyways.

And last but not least …

Separate your self worth from your accomplishments

As much as I love everything Keys said in press, the most crucial revelation she provided was that she had decided in the past year that if she never won a major title, she would be okay.

Q. I know you have nothing to compare it to, but where you sit now, given this journey that you've been on in order to get here, can you reflect at all about how it feels having gone through all that and to get to the top of the mountain this way rather than maybe if it had happened eight years ago? I'm curious, the classic idea of does it make it all worthwhile?

MADISON KEYS: I think everything kind of happens for a reason. I think for me specifically, I kind of had to go through some tough things. I think it just kind of forced me to look at myself in the mirror a little bit and try to work on, like, kind of just internal pressure that I was putting on myself. I felt like from a pretty young age, I felt like if I never won a Grand Slam, then I wouldn't have lived up to what people thought I should have been. That was a pretty heavy burden to kind of carry around.

So I finally got to the point where I was proud of myself and proud of my career, with or without a Grand Slam. I finally got to the point where I was okay if it didn't happen. I didn't need it to feel like I had a good career or that I deserved to be talked about as a great tennis player.

I feel like finally letting go of that kind of internal talk that I had just gave me the ability to actually go out and play some really good tennis to actually win a Grand Slam.

Accepting ourselves and loving ourselves regardless of whether we reach our goals is not giving up!! This is a concept that I always have a hard time grasping, and I needed this reminder desperately.

Thank you, Madi. And if you need a ghost writer for the self-help book you should absolutely write, my email address is available in too many places to name. Let’s talk.

(I promise to bring snark to the newsletter later this week to help make up for all the sincerity. Love you all!!)

Hi, friends. One of the things I’m looking to do in 2025 is figure out how to get more Power Plays in your inbox more often by experimenting with different formats. While the heart and soul of Power Plays will always be in-depth explorations on the biggest issues in women’s sports, the women’s sports world moves lightning fast, and I want to talk about more of it!

So, this is the Power Plays version of the gamer, which is traditionally the basic post-game story that sports reporters file as soon after the game finishes as possible.

My rules for this? I need to press publish within two hours of the “buzzer,” whether that be a literal buzzer to mark the end of a game, or a metaphorical buzzer to mark the end of a momentous press conference, event, or announcement. (Confession: I forgot to time today, I think I am late, off to a perfect start.) I get about 1,000 words to jot down my thoughts, and those thoughts will come in bullet-point form. Nobody has time for paragraphs.

Right now I’m naming this series “Buzzer beats,” but I’m not in love with the name and so reserve the right to change it, and also am open to suggestions if you have them, naming things is really hard!!!!

In this first edition, I’m going to give my initial reactions to the first weekend of “Unrivaled” basketball. Ready? Let’s go.

My unbridled takes on Unrivaled

• First, let’s review what Unrivaled is: Unrivaled is a new women’s basketball league founded by Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier. It was announced in 2023 and debuted on Friday night. It’s three-on-three basketball played in one location in Miami between six teams over eight weeks, culminating in a single-elimination playoff tournament involving the top four teams on March 16 and 18.

• The money is good. Very good. Individual salaries are not disclosed, but the average Unrivaled salary is reportedly close to that of a max WNBA salary, upwards of $220,000. That’s worth celebrating.

• It’s chock full of WNBA stars, including basically every marquee name in the game except for A’ja Wilson, Caitlin Clark, and Jonquel Jones. (Which are notable exceptions, it must be said.) Seeing different combination of WNBA stars play together is an absolute blast; I simply did not know how badly I needed to see Angel Reese, Brittney Sykes, and Kahleah Copper on the court together.

• I was skeptical about Unrivaled from the start. While I am bullish on the future of women’s sports, I am usually pretty cautious when it comes to the launch of new leagues, simply because I have seen so many try and fail over the years. It is incredibly difficult to gain true, lasting traction in a crowded sports market, and most investors simply don’t have the patience to make it happen.

• But so far, color me impressed. I thought the strategy of announcing players throughout the length of the 2024 WNBA season was great. I think the team branding and league design schemes are fantastic. The talent is out-of-this world — here is a link to the teams and rosters. There is true investment via powerful brands like Ally and State Farm and Sephora, and a great television deal with TNT, TruTV, and Max, reportedly worth $100 million over six years, with an out after three years. Players have equity in the league and are raving about the facilities and accommodations. But most importantly …

• The format is fucking fantastic. Like, I am OBSESSED. To me, new formats typically come across as gimmicky and try-hard. But this one struck all the right notes. While FIBA 3x3 basketball is played on the half court, Unrivaled utilizes a full court, albeit a slightly smaller one than the standard basketball court. The first three quarters last seven minutes each and air without commercial breaks. The pace is lightning quick and there is so much action, every player has to be on point in every single possession or they will be completely exposed. You only get one chance at the free-throw line to convert your foul points. This means trips to the line do not interrupt the flow of play. I love it. And best of all …

• The fourth quarter is not played until the clock winds down; it’s played until a certain score is reached. The winning score is 11 points higher than the leading score after the third quarter. This means there’s no running the clock out and every game includes a game winner. I didn’t think this would make a huge difference, but it really does.

• The games are longer than expected, though. Turner Sports allotted 60 minutes for each game’s broadcast window, but every game took approximately 90 minutes this weekend. I will be very curious who has to make adjustments — Unrivaled or Turner.

• The best moment from the first weekend? Skylar Diggins-Smith hitting the game winner in the first game in Unrivaled history to cap the Lunar Owls’ comeback victory over the Mist, 84-80. Diggins-Smith is an icon and a competitive beast and deserved that moment to shine. I love the vets snatching the spotlight. So much.

• The worst moment from the first weekend? The absolute egg Phantom laid in its debut game on Saturday, a 86-48 loss to the Owls. It wasn’t surprising that Saturday’s first game couldn’t recapture the electricity of opening night; let-downs happen, as do uncompetitive games. That’s sports. But for a team with Brittney Griner, Sabrina Ionescu, Natasha Cloud, Satou Sabally, and Katie Lou Samuelson to only score 48 points? Absolutely inexcusable.

• I’m a bit disappointed in the production and storytelling so far. In the lead-up to Unrivaled’s tipoff, I kept hearing how compared to regular basketball, Unrivaled stands out because it is a made-for-TV product. (There are less than 900 seats in the arena, and the court and studio were custom-built from scratch.) But while I liked the announcers and the pre-game and post-game show on opening night, and the arena looked great on camera, I wasn’t blown away by the production itself. I expected more get-to-know you features on the players and teams. I expected some innovative camera angles, stats integrations, and audio components. But beyond some in-game player interviews, which I did enjoy, the broadcasts felt disappointingly standard for such an innovative product, and I didn’t think it did a good job showcasing the personalities of the players. I had a friend sitting court-side for both games, and she texted me that on Saturday afternoon, Alyssa Thomas was talking a lot of shit to Marina Mabrey and Griner on the bench, and that despite Phantom not playing well, “BG is having more fun than any player I’ve seen yet. It’s great.” Absolutely none of that came across on the broadcast. In a non-competitive game, you think there would be time to highlight some of the back-and-forth and joy and competitiveness of the players, but whether it be time constraints, equipment constraints (maybe they had no way to capture that audio or to get the bench/sideline footage needed to tell those stories), or a directorial decision not to show any side plots and just to focus on the game itself, those moments were missed.

• I also want more stats, both on the broadcast and online. GIVE ME MORE OF EVERYTHING. (I know I’m being picky, but well, that’s kind-of the point of this column.)

• Overall, there is so much to love about the league and where it’s going, and I can’t wait to watch it grow. I’ll be tuned in on Tuesday night.

• Let me know what you think in the comments!! Do you agree? Disagree? Love it? Hate it? Were you there in person? I want to hear it all.

• HOOTIE HOOO!!!!!!!!!!!
  

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