How easy is it to be racist? Maybe it’s easier than you think! This is going back a few months, but my hasty judginess still stings.
The first indication I had that the 2022-2023 NCAA Women’s basketball season had concluded, was a video-clip on Twitter showing LSU player Angel Reese mocking Iowa star player Caitlin Clark with a series of hand gestures at the conclusion of the final game. Clark, one of the most watched and admired up-and-coming players in American basketball had been beaten and, Reese, for one, was going to let her know all about it. Reese wasn’t just giving her opponent a momentary “up yours, sister” finger. She was waving her hands in Clark’s face! When Clark ignored her and started walking away, Reese followed her and continued on with her gesturing. It was a full blooded “fuck right off, mate… and when you have finished fucking off, fuck off some more – oh, and by the way… you and your team are shit!”
No class at all!
The full clip of Reese’s ridiculing of her opponent (see below) might have only lasted for a few seconds but I was horrified. I didn’t even understand the meaning of the gestures but the contempt it intended to convey was obvious. Immediately, for me, Reese was the bad guy. A smart arse. A bad sport. Downright cruel. Imagine winning a championship and then treating your opponent with such disrespect, I thought. That woman has no class at all, was my next conclusion. After reading a number of comments below the video-clip, I discovered that many fellow Twitter users had similar feelings.
It’s easy to come to conclusions about people and events despite having negligible information. Well, it seems that it is for me. Prior to seeing this clip, I had not been following the NCAA tournament throughout the season. At some point in the past, I had heard of how great Clark was, but knew very little about her. I had never heard of Reese. I did not even know that LSU and Iowa had made it through to the tournament final. I had seen no footage of this final game or any of the games leading up to the final and I don’t recall having read anything about the progress of the tournament either. Yet this five to ten second clip was enough for me to write Reese off as a ratbag.
Since I came to my hasty conclusions about Angel Reese I have heard and read quite a bit more about the tournament and the players involved. It seems Caitlin Clark is every bit as good a player as I had heard and that she is so good that many people believe that she may even change the very nature of the game of professional women’s basketball if she chooses to go down the pro path. It seems that Angel Reese is also a terrific player (despite the negative reviews from some basketball followers) and is bound to contribute substantially to the pro game in the future as well. Clark, in college basketball circles, is well known for her trash talking. After defeating South Carolina in the semi-final match where Clark scored 40 points she was taunting her opponents by waving her hand in front of her face with a “you can’t even see me” gesture. Caitlin is not averse to letting her teammates, her opponents, and the crowds who follow college basketball, know that she is the one they need to watch.
Just deserts
As it turns out, the gesture Reese was making to Clark at the conclusion of the final game could be translated to mean “Hey guess what… I guess this means that you can’t see us… and you are not getting a ring.” In Reese’s mind she was giving Clark back some of the trash talk that she had been dishing out to others during the tournament season. A case of “just deserts” being served up by the victor to the vanquished.
The lesson here is for me. Don’t make hasty judgements. Maybe Reese was never the monster I originally imagined to her be. In truth, I still don’t much like what she did. I don’t think it was necessary. But I came to a stupid gut conclusion about the incident on the flimsiest of evidence. The wider context reveals a different picture. As it stands, I would love to see both women play hoops one day, but I can’t say that I would yearn to have either one in my inner circle of mates. After watching interviews of Clark and Reese it’s easy to get the impression that they are both decent people, but they seem to have just a little too much of the Mike Jordan, Larry Bird killer instinct for my personal liking.
A profoundly perverse conclusion
Oops. I failed to mention that Caitlin Clark is white, and Angel Reese is African American. I hope that if the characters in this story’s roles had been reversed, I would have been just as ready to condemn Clark for her post-final bad behavior as I was of Reese… but I don’t know. I jumped onto that condemnation band wagon very quickly. Just a few seconds of video and I was (temporarily) convinced. Did I watch the trash talking… then look at the nails, the makeup, the hair style and come to a profoundly perverse conclusion. Geez, I hope not.
By the way. I have been following the careers of both of these women since their April confrontation and I am I have to confess to being a huge fan of both Reese and Clark. They are extraordinary.
Check out the two videos below. Clark gives it to her semi-final opponents. Reese gives her a taste of her own medicine in the final seconds of the LSU versus Iowa final.
Angel Reese hit Caitlin Clark with the John Cena celebration 💀pic.twitter.com/BO32fmpg8Q
— The Sporting News (@sportingnews) April 2, 2023
Caitlin Clark hit the "You can't see me" after her sixth 3 👀 pic.twitter.com/gIUOoqZiot
— Just Women’s Sports (@justwsports) March 27, 2023
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