Angel Reese on Caitlin Clark: Growth of women's basketball is 'because of me, too'
Caitlin Clark's arrival in the WNBA has brought a new swarm of attention to the league, but one of her fellow rookies believes she's also played a hand in its growing popularity.
On Monday, Angel Reese touted her own role in helping grow women's basketball, as she recalled playing the heel to Clark in the 2023 women's national championship game.
"People are talking about women's basketball, you never would think they'd be talking about women's basketball," Reese said. "People are pulling up to games. We got celebrities coming to games and sold-out arenas just because of one single game. Just looking at that, I'll take that role. I'll take the bad guy role, and I'll continue to take that on and be that for my teammates. I know I'll go down in history. I'll look back in 20 years and be like, the reason why we're watching women's basketball is not just because of one person. It's because of me, too. I want y'all to realize that."
The 2023 national championship game was a watershed moment for the sport, with Reese's LSU squad taking down Clark's Iowa squad in front of one of the largest audiences ever for a women's basketball game. There was also drama from the game, with Reese taunting Clark in the waning moments of LSU's win, using a move the Iowa star had used previously in the tournament.
The storylines from the 2023 games helped create further interest when the two programs met in the Elite Eight in 2024, setting a record viewership number for women's basketball as Iowa won. Iowa's two games in the Final Four wound up breaking that viewership mark.
Another chapter was entered into the Clark-Reese rivalry on Saturday, their first meeting since they entered the WNBA this spring. Late in the third quarter of the Indiana Fever's win over the Chicago Sky, Clark received a shoulder shot from Sky guard Chennedy Carter, knocking her to the floor. As the officials ruled the play an away-from-the-ball foul, Reese was seen on the Sky's bench standing and clapping.
The WNBA upgraded Carter's foul to a flagrant-1 on Sunday, while Reese was also fined $1,000 for failing to make herself available to the media after Saturday's game. Sky head coach Teresa Weatherspoon said Carter's foul was "not appropriate" in a statement on Monday.
Carter's foul has sparked a polarizing discussion, similar to the Reese-Clark incident in the 2023 title game. While Reese has embraced a villain-like role against Clark, Rachel Nichols isn't sure it's fair to either player to paint them as the bad side or the good side. However, Nichols believes that the rivalry between the two draws a similar parallel to one of the most iconic individual rivalries in sports.
"This whole rivalry really does have the potential to grow into the kind of [Larry] Bird-Magic [Johnson] situation that lifted the NBA," Nichols said on Tuesday's "Undisputed." "Bird and Magic ushered in this whole new era for the NBA. It got them off tape delay."
This browser does not support the Video element.
Still, Nichols believes that the Clark-Reese rivalry is being treated unfairly compared to the Bird-Magic rivalry."
"The difference is, with Magic and Bird, no one talked about them being jealous of each other," Nichols said. "No one talked about them being petty or catty. People talked about how they were hard-nosed and competitive. It is frustrating that not to all commentators, but some commentators, and not to all fans, but some fans, that women aren't allowed to be that way. Why can't they be competitive, hard-nosed, aggressive and all the adjectives we give men?
"Instead, they're hit with all these negative adjectives. That stinks."
This browser does not support the Video element.
So far, it's undeniable that there's a new level of interest in the WNBA that can be credited to Clark, Reese and the rest of the 2024 WNBA Draft class. The league's opening week in May brought in record viewership and attendance, with the former growing by 226% from last season and the latter growing by 14% year-over-year, according to the Associated Press.
The Fever have actually already surpassed their home attendance mark from last year this season, according to Front Office Sports. As many of Clark's road games have moved to larger arenas, Reese will have similar treatment on Thursday. The Washington Mystics moved their home game against the Sky on Thursday to the larger Capital One Arena.