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NCAA, College League, USA Basketball: Big East Conference Tournament First Round – Villanova vs Georgetown Mar 8, 2023 New York, NY, USA New York Knicks former player Carmelo Anthony sits courtside during the second half between the Villanova Wildcats and the Georgetown Hoyas at Madison Square Garden. New York Madison Square Garden NY USA, EDITORIAL USE ONLY PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xBradxPennerx 20230308_bjp_ae5_087
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NCAA, College League, USA Basketball: Big East Conference Tournament First Round – Villanova vs Georgetown Mar 8, 2023 New York, NY, USA New York Knicks former player Carmelo Anthony sits courtside during the second half between the Villanova Wildcats and the Georgetown Hoyas at Madison Square Garden. New York Madison Square Garden NY USA, EDITORIAL USE ONLY PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xBradxPennerx 20230308_bjp_ae5_087
Women’s March Madness 2024 witnessed some of their craziest numbers this year. As per an article by Forbes, this year’s women’s NCAA championship game averaged 18.7 million viewers on ABC and ESPN, which was an 89% increase from the previous year. In fact, at a particular instance, the game peaked at 24 million viewers, which made it the most-watched women’s basketball game of all time and the most-watched basketball game at any level since 2019. And it seems Carmelo Anthony has a good enough explanation for this phenomenon.
Appearing on ‘The Right Time’ podcast, the ex-Denver Nuggets star was amid the discussion of how people now prefer watching offensive gameplay. “Which is why they love women’s basketball, like the girls game, because they have offense…” Carmelo Anthony stated on the podcast. He further mentioned that people want to see offense, especially people who came from those eras where you know what it takes to draw up a play and go execute that play.
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This year’s women’s championship game was played between the Iowa Hawkeyes and South Carolina Gamecocks. While the women’s games throughout the season have had their popularity, Hawkeyes’ Caitlin Clark was also a major source of attraction in the championship game. Notably, Clark had an impeccable NCAA season and there were expectations of her claiming the championship this year. However, the winner emerged to be South Carolina.
A closer look into the transformation in women’s basketball
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What Carmelo Anthony sees today in women’s basketball did not happen on a single day of this season. This form of higher offense in the gameplay took its own time. As per an article by Sports Illustrated, the DePaul Blue Demons women’s basketball coach, Doug Bruno had once stated, while referring to Pat Summitt’s famous quote, “Offense sells tickets, defense wins games, and defense and rebounding win championships”.
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And higher viewership this season in women’s basketball is a testament to his statement. He had stated the goal was to obviously win the championship but also to bring more audience to the women’s basketball. “If you’re going to play a slow[ed] down, half-court, robotic style of basketball, that’s hard to watch when it’s the Warriors going against the Lakers,” he stated back then.
And here we stand today where women’s college basketball championship game has had higher viewership than any other basketball game at any level since 2019. Now this may not be concrete evidence to the fact that women’s basketball has better offense than NBA, but it does hint towards this possibility. What is your opinion of Carmelo Anthony’s claim? Do you think women’s basketball is now offering a higher offense-based gameplay than NBA?
