Five Out: The South Carolina coverage gap, Player of the Year races and Caitlin Clark is the needle in the sport

Caitlin Clark’s needle, reassessing a prior Dawn Staley take, ranked Fairfield, the A-10 and Pac-12 Player of the Year. Andrew’s thoughts on the world of women’s hoops…

Well…this weekend was both a celebration of the game and a discourse dumpster fire. I think there’s a separate column to come about women’s basketball media, national media and just how that ecosystem works (for good and bad). In the meantime!

Caitlin Clark is the needle…

Like it or not, the Iowa superstar moves the dial.

What the wanna-be media critic in me appreciates is how the current moment around her leads to macro discussions about how we do what we do. She really is the current embodiment of “does covering a person feed interest in only the player so it’s all the fans gravitate to? Which creates a self-fulfilling prophecy of content choices?”

It’s a worthwhile conversation.

In some ways the answer as it pertains to Clark is yes and in some ways it’s no. I think she is for whatever reason — be it the packageable white American heartland story or the scoring prowess and record shattering nature of her game — the needle in women’s college basketball. Maya Moore, who seemingly doesn’t come out for much in the hoops world these days, was brought in for Clark’s record setting game. Travis Scott inexplicably has a relationship with Clark (and also Lisa Bluder? What must they talk about?) and can rattle off other Hawkeye players to watch. The ratings are through the roof and it’s safe to say she has completely broken containment in a way even Sabrina Ionescu didn’t. Clark is different.

How she got here and why is the the subject of any manner of debate, from topics that are strictly basketball related to greater socioeconomic discussions about our relationship to race, gender and media consumption.

But it’s hard to look at Sunday, from the TV coverage to the atmosphere in Carver-Hawkeye arena and think what happens around her isn’t good for the sport. This entire run has brought in new fans, new money, new energy and life in the same way some superstars (and super coaches, it should be noted) have done before her. Now what comes next is how to take that energy and disperse it to grow the sport in full. There’s a legitimate argument that when men’s basketball started to become player centric, it lost a lot of juice in a one-and-done era. The women’s game doesn’t have that one specific problem to contend with but I do fear a coverage tunnel that we see in the NBA and, to a lesser extent, the NFL (how bout them Cowboys, am I right?).

I credit Lisa Bluder for taking the moment and swiping the NCAA for their lack of support and recognition for AIAW. Lynette Woodard and Pearl Moore’s grace in having their names amplified because of Caitlin is admirable. But the way you make good on those one-off symbolic moments is by continuing to dive into coverage of legends, greats and those that came before. I don’t think we need to gatekeep fans with some “you don’t even know x, y or z player!”. At the same time, it’s incumbent on media to introduce those faces that are well known to the W ecosystem to the general fandom so they don’t fade into the maw in favor of 14 year old NBAMuse Twitter discourse like what we saw on Sunday.

Reassessing a Dawn Staley take…

A couple weeks ago, I had a take on Dawn Staley that essentially said “her legacy is defined by titles from here on out”. As discussion over SC’s second straight undefeated regular season ventured into the area of ‘why aren’t we talking about it?’ territory, I basically brought that take to the timeline.

“They’re killing everyone. That’s not necessarily compelling.”

Bad take.

Here’s the rub with South Carolina: I don’t think coverage of them has been below par this year. They’ve still been the 1B to Caitlin Clark. I’d say if anyone has faded from a coverage perspective it’s LSU. But the beef around SC’s coverage relative to Clark doesn’t seem to be about number of bylines. It feels like it’s about breaking containment.

SC has had Gameday twice, including a matchup against Georgia that had even local Gamecock beat reporters questioning why the traveling road show arrived. Ashlyn Watkins’ breakaway dunk and Milaysia Fulwiley’s circus buckets were all over mainstream media outlets early in the non-conference, especially in that first Paris game against Notre Dame. Eventually the discussion around them felt like it dissipated aside from an extremely hyped matchup against LSU that lived up to the billing.

Part of this is on the SEC’s poor non-conference record. While they had an incredible tournament run last year, the last two January’s have not brought a lot of juice in terms of ranked matchups and hype. I truly have a hard time believing the Gamecocks don’t have more mainstream hype if Ole Miss and Tennessee are Top 10 or 15 teams. And with that in mind, the games haven’t ended up particularly close. South Carolina has trailed in third quarters five times this whole year and trailed in fourth quarters twice (vs. UNC, vs. Georgia). There’s an air of inevitability with them. The same way the Steph&KD Warriors were. UConn was the same in Geno’s glory days. I was also against that too, just so we’re clear. I’m not a fan of single team dominance, personally. I’d rather watch parity. Others will disagree. Yet even in wins there’s plenty of interesting subplots about South Carolina that deserve to be highlighted. Statistically and visually, it’s the best offense Dawn Staley has ever had.

But going back and reassessing the column I realized I was also a part of the problem. By framing Staley’s next legacy act as winning titles and nothing else, I too perpetuated that same ho-humness that has seen most media collectively treat another undefeated regular season with a “yeah well that’s SC. It’s what they do.” While dominance is expected and may not pop when you aren’t playing an opponent of your caliber, highlighting the accomplishment is still essential. While I think the context of how we got here matters, that doesn’t ultimately make the lack of coverage right. That said, I don’t know if you solve that issue via mainstream press because you’re inviting *how* mainstream press works. Even the most established leagues have fanbases complaining about saturation of a few key individuals or teams. Lebron fatigue is a thing! Nick Wright once implied Nikola Jokic could be an MVP candidate but he wouldn’t treat him that way because Jokic didn’t bring TV ratings with him. The Tim Duncan era Spurs were always derided as a boring dynasty. It happens!

My concern is with the unintended consequence of attention: if you want First Take level energy on the Gamecocks, what you’ll likely get is Stephen A with a take along the lines of “when Tennessee fires Kellie Harper they should hire Dawn Staley!” because to him (or any other major media member driven by ratings and brands) it’s all about maximizing outrage or eyeballs. The four letters didn’t exactly earn the benefit of trust in coverage to me when they splashed Aliyah Boston’s crying face over NCAA promos despite repeated calls from in and outside of the program to fix it.

So while “coverage” means more people talking about you, what’s the ultimate cost? Just look at the discourse around WNBA pay and stars like Clark and Angel Reese. All press isn’t necessarily good press. And I’m of the belief, especially looking back on how South Carolina has been covered in the past by major networks, that maybe covering them right is better than covering them big.

Ranked Fairfield!

Ladies and gentlemen, we got em! We told you few weeks ago about the Stags and the amazing work of head coach Carly Thibault-DuDonis. Since then, Fairfield has done everything asked of them and more. Meghan Anderson has been dominant and is MAAC Freshman of the Year and could make a run for Player of the Year.

It’s a fast, fun and efficient style of basketball. What was clear watching them dismantle the Manhattan Jaspers is the clear coaching job Thibault-DuDonis has done. They move with purpose on offense and often get to the right spots defensively. After a spectacular social media run to try and convince pollsters of what they already should’ve done, Fairfield finally found themselves in the AP Top 25. With the only loss of their year being a close drop to Vanderbilt, it’s time to take the Stags seriously in March. Provided nothing happens in the MAAC tournament, whoever they draw in the big dance should be very worried.

The A-10 is the most interesting conference tournament.

I sat in and watched a little bit of George Mason vs. VCU over the weekend and was really surprised. The records were solid through most of this year but this game had the same skill level, physicality and competitiveness as any power five game I’ve watched this season.

Rams guard Sarah Te-Biasu is a baller and, as someone that prides themselves on putting folks on game in this column, I lament that it took me so long to watch her play. George Mason’s Sonia Smith hit big shot after big shot. It took me a second to remember that this game wasn’t for an A-10 regular season title!

Which is why, among all the mid-major and high-major conference tournaments, I think the A-10 may give us one of the most memorable weeks. The conference is about six teams deep this year with four being legitimate tournament contenders.

We’ve highlighted St. Joe’s and Richmond in past columns but Duquesne, Rhode Island and the aforementioned VCU and George Mason are all of bid stealer quality. Mid major ball deserves your love and no conference will embody tourney chaos like the A-10 this coming week. Count on that.

There is no tougher POTY race than in the Pac-12.

Another tournament that will be absolutely loaded is the Pac-12. Given how good the regular season it’s been, it tracks that the Player of the Year race will be one of the toughest we may have ever seen in college basketball. I count six teams that have a star with legit POTY claim. So let’s examine some resumes…

Cameron Brink (Stanford): 17.9 PPG, 12.0 RPG, 3.6 BPG, NCAA Leader in PER and win shares.

Juju Watkins (USC): 27.8 PPG, 7.2 RPG, 2.6 SPG, Pac-12 leader in field goals made, free throws made and points produced per game.

Raegan Beers (Oregon St): 17.4 PPG, 10.5 RPG, 1.8 APG, Pac-12 leader in FG%, EFG%, TS% and OREB%.

Alissa Pili (Utah): 21 PPG, 6.4 RPG, 2.4 APG, Pac-12 leader in offensive win shares.

Lauren Betts (UCLA): 14.9 PPG, 8.7 RPG, 2.2 BPG, 3rd in Pac-12 in offensive rebounds, 5th in box plus/minus.

Jaylyn Sherrod (Colorado): 12.8 PPG, 3.1 RPG, 4.7 APG, led Colorado to best regular season finish 1995.

Feel free to comment with who you think should be the winner but I am just glad I don’t have a vote!