SEC women's basketball coaches on racism, hate speech as WNBA grows

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The WNBA exploded this summer, the culmination of steady growth in recent years and a star-studded rookie class.

The league attracted a record of more than 54 million unique viewers across multiple channels during the 2024 regular season. A record 22 regular-season games averaged at least a million viewers. The competition’s total attendance was the highest in 22 years at 2.35 million.

But that spike in popularity comes with racism, homophobia and online abuse directed at players and their families. For South Carolina coach Dawn Staley, it’s a sign that “we’re a sport now,” and the competition gets everything that comes with it.

Connecticut Sun forward Alyssa Thomas called out the racist abuse she and her teammates have suffered and attributes much of it to people within the Indiana Fever fan base. Several players have received death threats. An email Sun guard DiJonai Carrington received contained a racial slur and explicit threats of violence. The wife of New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart received a death threat, with homophobic language directed at the couple. Chicago Sky players were harassed at their hotel during a road trip.

Former LSU star Angel Reese, who was in the conversation for rookie of the year until she suffered a season-ending injury, has been subjected to racist attacks since winning a national championship in 2023. That continued during her first season in the WNBA, and Reese has publicly called it out more than once.

LSU coach Kim Mulkey said part of her job is preparing her players, not just with the X’s and O’s, but with everything that comes with being in the spotlight. She’s not on social media, but she makes sure there are people on her staff who can help players learn how to handle it.

“Society just loves to sit in front of those computers and anonymously write what they write,” Mulkey said. “And when you’re in the spotlight like Angel is, every athlete is or was, everyone just sits down and decides what they want to write. Whether it’s the truth doesn’t matter. The truth doesn’t matter anymore in this world.”

Staley said people’s results can be far off in how they express themselves: the more people bring racism into the competition, the more division they cause.

“We feel like there’s a certain group of new fans who don’t respect our game, don’t respect the players who play in it…,” she said. “They get theirs. Are they entitled to their opinion? They absolutely have.

“For me, I choose to ignore them. I choose to use our platforms to elevate all things positive in our sport. But we need our leaders to come out and use their voices when damage is done to our product. .”

Ole Miss coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin said she is “heartbroken” to hear the stories about the increased harassment the players have faced. The league is in a growth phase, which brings good and bad, she said, but the league doesn’t have to combine the good with the bad.

McPhee-McCuin hopes new fans can learn more about the league and what it has represented throughout its 27-year history. The WNBA has consistently been an activist league and has often been at the forefront of political movements, and McPhee-McCuin said she hopes the WNBA can be different from men’s basketball but still be appreciated for the high-level sport that it is. .

“I think we will get to the other side of the story because it is a beautiful sport,” she said. “We have wonderful people in sports who all come from different backgrounds and represent all facets of our world, right? And so I think once we get over the shock of the negativity that comes with that, and we start to balance it bring, it will continue to flourish.”

First-year Kentucky coach Kenny Brooks, who previously coached at Virginia Tech, said he is a big fan of the WNBA, which he said is “growing as it should.”

Brooks compared the moment the league has arrived, with Reese and Caitlin Clark as big stars, to the moment Larry Bird and Magic Johnson came to the NBA.

“It’s something that if we as women’s basketball people can embrace it and market it the right way, I think the boom can happen like it used to,” Brooks said. “I think we have a responsibility… (as) college coaches, to continue that growth. We can do that because of the entertainment value… You’ve got eyes on the game that haven’t really been there. There’s entertainment value .”

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert also made the Bird-Magic comparison during a television interview in September, saying rivalries like Reese and Clark’s interest are on the rise. Engelbert did not explicitly address the offensive language directed at players, and she later apologized after the WNBPA expressed disappointment in its response. The WNBA released a statement condemning the racism, derogatory comments and threats during the playoffs.

Kentucky point guard Georgia Amoore, projected to be a 2025 first-round draft pick, became an avid fan of the league when she moved to the United States from Australia for college. The league was off limits to watch at home, but when Australian players started joining the WNBA, Amoore started paying even more attention.

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Amoore called the increased racism and online harassment “disgusting.” The fifth-year said she can’t understand why people bring racism into discussions and attack players for doing their job. Amoore said there is no place for it, and something needs to change.

“The more people speak out, and the more players speak out about it, I think the general fan base will realize how bad it is,” she said. “Because on Twitter you can say anything you want. It’s crazy, right? No face. You can hide behind any profile. But when you see the serious consequences it has on people, then it becomes human.”

Cora Hall covers University of Tennessee women’s athletics. Email her at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @corahall. If you enjoy Cora’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that gives you access to everything.

SEC women’s basketball coaches on racism, hate speech as WNBA grows

By Sheisoe

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