Last Thursday, Iowa women’s basketball star Caitlin Clark went on social media to announce that she will not return to Iowa for her fifth year and instead declared for the 2024 WNBA draft.
Three days later, she broke the all time scoring record passing basketball legend Pete Maravich with a total of 3,865 total points. Along with breaking the record last Sunday, Clark scored 35 points and had 9 assists to take down Ohio State who at the time was the number two team in the country. Clark broke this record at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in front of a sold out crowd of 14,998 people. Crowds like these follow wherever Clark plays. Caitlin Clark and Iowa broke attendance records in every one of her games this season minus two. Every single one of Iowa’s Big Ten regular season games was a sellout regardless of whether the game was home or away.
Viewership of Women’s Basketball is at an all time high with last year’s national Championship totaling 9.9 million views according to Forbes. Sunday’s game vs Number two Ohio State garnered the highest Women’s College Basketballs ratings since UConn vs Tennessee 25 years ago.
Clark is Nike sponsored and had sales for her jersey skyrocket during last year’s March Madness where Clark led Iowa to the National Championship for the first time in program history. Caitlin Clark is one of only four college basketball players to have a true Nike jersey for sale. Clark has become a true ambassador for basketball and women’s sports with the majority of the crowd at any Iowa game rocking number 22 in honor of clark regardless of what team they support.
Clark has truly changed women’s sports and college sports forever. She has boosted women’s sports in a way never seen before. The odds are regardless of whether you tune in to women’s basketball on the daily or have never watched a game you’ve heard of Caitlin Clark. Whether it’s her logo threes or her flashy passes Caitlin Clark has become must see television for people all around the world. The Senior guard from Iowa hasn’t just gained the media attention from nowhere Clark leads the country in points per game (ppg) with 32.3 and Clark is also first in assists per game (apg) with 8.7. To add to her list of awards Clark was unanimously voted Big Ten player of the year for the third consecutive year on March 5th.