I have not had a chance to see the the Hawkeye women play that many times this season and until the NCAA started, they had lost the games I watched so I was feeling like a bad luck charm and decided it was better not to watch. It is not that easy to follow the team using streaming only. I pay for plenty of streaming services but none that include ESPN. Games broadcast on ABC are easy – otherwise we have watched “unauthorized” posts of the game on YouTube. You can see them on YouTube TV but not officially on YouTube. After 15-20 minutes, the center screen would get grayed out with a warning. Craig was very good at finding another YouTube link that would work for 15-20 minutes. We made it to the end of the game. Interestingly, we had no trouble watching the UConn vs USC game on YouTube so there must have been so much traffic for the Iowa vs LSU game that it drew attention.
We are having so much fun watching these game. My high school was a consolidated school district that did not have a women’s basketball team. At that time the smaller districts had girls team that play 3 on 3 half court which was an entirely different game. I distinctly remember commercials on TV in the 70’s against ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment stating that it would end Iowa women’s basketball. No one thought that women could play full-court basketball. For Iowans, who highly valued their women’s basketball, that was one of the more powerful commercials against ratification and Iowa did not ratify the ERA.
Within a decade high school girls were playing full court 5 on 5 basketball. Over the past 5 decades I have not really paid much attention to women’s basketball. I watched the championship game in Honolulu last year. A tough loss. From one game I was not able to really appreciate what was so great about Caitlin Clark. The Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight games gave me the chance to fully appreciate what a skilled, passionate player she is – unapologetically competitive. Good for her and good for everyone on the Hawkeye team and all women in sports really.
As an aside, Craig and I often have conversations about how terminology has changed with respect to genders. Some women do not want to be called actresses preferring female actors. During one of the recent games, Craig turned down the sound to share with me that he was upset about the cultural misappropriation of women playing “man on man defense”. I burst out laughing.
No question it is confusing as to which words or phrases are commonly understood to be nongendered and those that are traps waiting for men to set off.
Tamara Unleashed 