From Caitlin Clark’s success this season to the women’s basketball team’s participation in the Olympics this week, the history of women’s basketball has been shaped by Title IX.
In her final year at the University of Iowa, basketball sensation Caitlin Clark was far from expecting an elusive national championship, which went to South Carolina in an action-packed showdown worthy of the two best teams in the country.
For the first time ever, this final had more television viewers than the men’s game: 18.9 million people tuned in, nearly double last year’s record of 9.9 million viewers and more than any other basketball game – NCAA women’s or men’s, NBA or WNBA – in five years. At its peak in the fourth quarter, the viewership rose to 24 million. People wanted to see if South Carolina could become the first undefeated team since 2016, and they wanted to see Clark, arguably the best player in women’s college basketball, playing on the opposing team.
During her four years at Iowa, Clark broke records, did commercials for State Farm and drew thousands of fans to stadiums across the country to watch her play. At men’s sporting events, commentators even talked about women’s basketball. She is the 2023-24 National Player of the Year, and when I watch her compete, I see the full fruits of Title IX and the much longer history of women’s basketball that made this moment possible.
The amazing career of Caitlin Clark
Clark was born in West Des Moines, Iowa, in 2002. As a middle school student, he began attracting the attention of college coaches and setting records.
In elementary school, her parents signed her up for boys because there were no girls’ teams for her age group. By the time she reached middle school, the Iowa basketball world already knew her.
Between her sophomore and junior years of high school, Clark failed to make the U.S. national under-17 team (the national team for girls ages 17 and younger), and that disappointment motivated her to improve her game. The next year, she was named the Gatorade Iowa Player of the Year.
In her freshman year at Iowa, Clark led NCAA Division I, the highest level of collegiate sports in the United States, in scoring with a 26.6 scoring average and was selected to the first-team All-American.
As a sophomore, she scored 46 points in a game, which was her career high at the time, and became the first Division I player to lead in both points and assists in the same season. As a junior, she won the National Player of the Year award, the first unanimous choice, was named AP Player of the Year and Naismith Women’s College Player of the Year, and received the John R. Wooden Award.
In her senior year, Clark set a new career high by scoring 49 points in a single game. She broke Kelsey Plum’s NCAA career record for women’s points and then broke the men’s record of 3,667 career points held by Pete Maravich for more than 50 years. She also broke the women’s and men’s single-season records for three-pointers made and won back-to-back AP, Naismith and Wooden awards.
It has been over 50 years since Title IX was passed, and it is amazing how well American female athletes are doing (in the Olympics). Finally, hearts and minds are moving toward the law. People are investing in women’s sports as a business, not as a charity.
Billie Jean King
If not for them
Clark’s success is largely due to her talent, hard work and good coaching. But as Clark herself admits, many other women paved the way for her. Without them – and especially without Title IX, the 1972 law that mandates equal treatment in education – there would be no Clark, no record-breaking attendance and no WNBA.
Shimmy Gray-Miller, a former women’s team coach and color and studio analyst for the Big Ten Network, said MS.“I’ve been watching (Clark) since she was in high school, coaching against her as an opposing assistant. And now, this past year, shadowing her as an analyst, it’s given me a whole new perspective. She’s one of those rare players from the younger generation who I think has an understanding of Title IX and the impact that past players have had on the way we play today.”
The first women’s college basketball games were played at Smith College in 1892, when an enterprising teacher named Senda Berenson adapted the new game to spice up her physical education classes. Soon the sport was being played at other schools, and in 1896 Stanford and UC Berkeley competed in the first intercollegiate game.
The NCAA was founded in 1906 to regulate men’s sports but had no interest in women’s participation. The Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) was founded in 1971 to regulate women’s sports and provide sports championships for women.
“I think it’s really important to know that there was a time, not too long ago, when there was no intercollegiate competition for women and the NCAA had no interest in women’s sports,” said veteran sports reporter Brenda VanLengen, who is producing a documentary series on the genesis of women’s intercollegiate sports from the perspective of basketball. “It took the leadership and courage of the women who founded and promoted the AIAW and the coaches and athletes who played in less than ideal environments to pave the way for the opportunities that girls and women have today.”
When schools began implementing Title IX in the 1970s, the legislation revolutionized girls’ and women’s sports. While fewer than 30,000 women played collegiate sports when Title IX was passed, today there are more than 225,000. Schools were required to provide girls and women with equal coaching, facilities, equipment, training, and scholarships. Although most schools are not yet fully compliant with Title IX, the investment in girls and women has paid off.
In 1978, the Women’s Basketball League (WBL) was founded, the first of its kind. It existed for three years and, at its peak, had teams in 13 states.
The growth of women’s sports eventually caught the attention of the NCAA. In 1982, both the NCAA and AIAW offered a basketball championship. The AIAW could not compete with the NCAA’s money and eventually switched all of its championships to the NCAA.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, the Universities of Tennessee and Connecticut dominated women’s basketball, showing how strong and athletic women could be. As generations of girls born after Title IX went to college, the number of teams capable of competing for a championship increased significantly.
This year, more than a dozen teams had a real shot at the Final Four. We also saw superstars of NCAA women’s basketball become household names for fans: Cheryl Miller, Lisa Leslie, Sheryl Swoopes, Sue Bird, Breanna Stewart, Kelsey Plum, Sabrina Ionescu, A’ja Wilson and now Angel Reese, Hannah Hidalgo, Paige Bueckers, JuJu Watkins and, of course, Clark.
Clark told ESPN’s Holly Rowe, “There have been so many great players before me that have given me such a great foundation to be able to play on this stage in front of this crowd. It didn’t start with me. It didn’t start with this team. It was all the people before me that paved the way for women’s basketball and players like me.”
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