If you were among the unfortunate folks casting around the secondary market for tickets to Wednesday night’s sold-out Williams Arena appearance by Caitlin Clark and Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball, you probably never met Nicole LaVoi.
She’s the director of the Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sports at the University of Minnesota, as well as a Gopher women’s basketball season ticket holder. A former collegiate tennis standout and coach, LaVoi knows women’s hoops. So when the Gophs put single-game tickets on sale, she didn’t hesitate, grabbing enough to take care of her small Tucker Center staff.
“I bought seven tickets back in September because I knew this was going to happen,” she said. “Now (people) are like, ‘How many tickets do you have? Can I come?’ Nope. All spoken for.”
Smart move. The Gophs declared a sellout of 14,625 in early December, only the second for a Gopher women’s basketball game at Williams. (The other? Lindsay Whalen’s coaching debut in 2018, helped by heavily discounted tickets.) Though well short of the record for a women’s basketball game in Minnesota – 19,423 for Game 5 of the 2016 Lynx-Sparks WNBA finals – it’s significant, and telling.
Clark’s rise coincides with a transcendent moment in women’s sports, a confluence of factors that brought more eyeballs and endorsements her way. (More on that later.) As of mid-afternoon Wednesday, tickets on StubHub were going from $83 in the balcony to $745 courtside, with most ranging from $101 to $266. All to see the biggest star in women’s college basketball – to these eyes, the most charismatic player of either gender to grace the college hardwood since LSU’s Pistol Pete Maravich dazzled fans with scoring (44 points a game) and ball-handling wizardry from 1967-70.
Related: Caitlin Clark or Paige Bueckers in a Minnesota Lynx uniform? Keep dreaming
Women’s college basketball fans were on Clark long before her triple-double in Iowa’s 105-72 rout of Ohio State in last year’s Big Ten Tournament final at the Target Center. The five-day tournament returns to the Target Center next week and it’s already sold out for the first time – more than 109,000 tickets gone, more than double last year’s record 47,923. You know why? Everyone wants to see the show.
At 6 p.m., 30 minutes before the gates opened, the line to get into Williams Arena stretched the length of the building. Both lobbies were packed with fans escaping the wind-swept cold. Later, as people entered the arena, it quickly became apparent from all the black-and-gold shirts that this might not be a totally pro-Gopher crowd. A significant roar greeted the Hawkeyes as they took the court for warmups, a louder one followed when Clark was introduced, and an even louder one shook the joint when Clark banged a three-pointer 13 seconds into the game.
They brought signs, too. “Basketball Besties Here for Clark.” “Today Is My 12th Birthday, But I’m Feeling 22” (Clark’s jersey number). “Carpenter Clark Building HERstory.”
Elvera “Peps” Neuman, Gopher women basketball’s beloved Blanket Lady, wasn’t missing this. Neuman starred for and operated women’s professional barnstorming teams in the 1970s and ‘80s, long before Clark-like notoriety seemed possible for any woman athlete.
“I love how she’s handling all the fame,” Neuman said. “She’s doing a wonderful job – not just her, all the Iowa players are. I wish she was playing for Minnesota, but she’s from Iowa. That’s pretty close.”
Closer than the score, anyway. Clark’s knack for sensing a big moment, then rising to meet it, manifested early. Unstoppable in lime green sneakers, she poured in 12 points in the first three minutes – three three-pointers, plus a conventional three-point play. Iowa was off and running from there. The Hawkeyes pushed it to 39-16 early in the second quarter after Clark shook a defender with a behind-the-back dribble and smoothly fed Gabbie Marshall (16 points) on right wing for a three-pointer.
“It was nice to see a couple of shots go down early,” Clark said. “Obviously the last few games, I haven’t really shot it too great from three. I thought everything just played free, and we had a lot of fun across the board for our team.”
The Gophers, again without injured starters Mara Braun (foot) and Sophie Hart (hip), never recovered. Iowa was up 30 by the third quarter and cruised from there, winning 108-60.
Clark finished with her 17th career triple-double: 33 points, 12 assists and 10 rebounds. Clark seems to break or approach a record every time she steps on the court, and Wednesday featured several.
Her seventh 3-pointer broke the NCAA Division I single-season record. Her eighth and final one gave her 3,650 career points, one more than Lynette Woodard of Kansas, who set the major college mark in 1981. (The NCAA doesn’t recognize Woodard’s total because the AIAW governed women’s sports at the time; don’t get Iowa Coach Lisa Bluder started on that.) With 17 more points, Clark will tie Maravich’s Division I male career record of 3,667, amassed in only three seasons (freshmen were ineligible when he played) and without a three-point line.
“She’s the most dominant player, the best player to ever play in the women’s game, bar none,” said Gophers Coach Dawn Plitzuweit. “To do what she does game after game is almost mind-boggling, honestly. There’s a lot of appreciation for what she’s doing.”
Whether Clark is the greatest women’s player of all time is an argument we won’t entertain here, but there’s no question she’s the biggest draw.
Iowa attracted 55,646 to Kinnick Stadium, the University of Iowa football venue, for an Oct. 15 exhibition game against DePaul, believed to be the largest crowd ever to see a women’s basketball game. It smashed the old record of 29,619 at the Alamodome in 2002 for the NCAA final between UConn and Oklahoma.
Thirty-two of Iowa’s 34 games this season have been sellouts or set attendance records. (The only exceptions: Two games at a nondescript November tournament in Florida.) Wednesday marked the 12th sellout crowd Iowa has drawn on the road, to go with the standard full house of 14,998 for every game at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City. Just in February, Clark and the Hawkeyes attracted 17,950 at Maryland and 17,222 at Indiana.
If Clark uses her COVID eligibility to return for one more season, don’t be surprised if New York’s Madison Square Garden finds a way to book the Hawkeyes and reprise a version of its most famous marquee: George Mikan vs. Knicks.
Now, about that confluence of factors. LaVoi cites three: More people watching and following women’s sports post-pandemic; more companies and organizations realizing the value of women athletes as brand ambassadors, leading to more sponsorships; and the 50th anniversary of Title IX, highlighting women’s sports in a different way.
“And Caitlin Clark is special,” LaVoi said. “She’s kind of the All-American girl. She’s humble and she’s a great player, and people like her.”
Count Neuman among them. At home, she marvels as she watches Clark on television pitching for State Farm and Hy-Vee, the Iowa-based supermarket chain. And Wednesday night, the size of the crowd exceeded any the Gopher men drew all season. To a women’s sports trailblazer like Neuman, it’s stunning.
“I never imagined anything like this,” Neuman said. “I can’t believe they have TV commercials. It just blows my mind.
“When I watch players like Caitlin Clark, I’m reliving my life. So I’m happy it’s going where it’s gone, and it’s only going to get bigger.”
Editor’s note: The story reflects Clark does ad pitches for State Farm, not a previously mentioned insurance company. Also, since publication, Clark announced she is declaring for the WNBA draft.
