Iowa guard Caitlin Clark shoots over Minnesota guard Maggie Czinano during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game on Feb. 28 in Minneapolis.Abbie Parr/The Associated Press
Annick Routhier Labadie is a business consultant based in Montreal. She played basketball for the NCAA Division’s Seton Hall Pirates from 2004 to 2007.
When I was 11 years old, I begged my dad to watch the inaugural WNBA final. Back then, in 1997, without streaming platforms or VPNs, one had to commandeer bulky satellite dishes to watch what cable networks wouldn’t show.
So, Dad and I are out at Brasserie Lionel near Quebec City’s airport, our elbows resting on a countertop that could use some wiping. We are both eating ham sandwiches packed with too much mustard. Video lottery machines are ringing. Fly fishing is playing on television as men slurp on foamy beers. I have absolutely no business being here but for the satellite dish. As tip-off approaches, Dad orders the bartender to switch the channel, his request exuding a kind of authority that is both unfamiliar and exciting. When women appear on the big screen, a chorus of complaints crescendos. Dad muffles the pack with one mustard-covered hand. Game on.
In retrospect, while his silencing was somewhat heroic, timing mattered. It was the WNBA final or fly fishing, so the imposition failed to stir the heartfelt opposition one might have expected on, say, a hockey night. Similar logic propelled the WNBA’s inaugural season to launch in the summer that year: its great hope for survival supposedly hinged on no airtime competition from other professional sports leagues.
Over the following decades, I pined for doses of televised women’s basketball, administered on a single Sunday in April. I scrolled through websites organizing scores under “Basketball” and “Women’s Basketball,” slapped each time with the insult. I heard this same refrain, whether in reference to women’s college games or the WNBA, whether from TV analysts or from guy friends who only cared about television when explaining why women’s sport didn’t belong on it. They all chanted: “No one wants to watch.”
Twenty-seven years later, women’s basketball is having a moment. The Stephen and Sabrina three-point shootout at this year’s NBA All-Star weekend seemingly upstaged the dunk contest. The 2023 NCAA women’s Final Four garnered its highest viewership in history. Regular season games are topping the charts this year, with some games sold out. We’re a long way from my evening at Brasserie Lionel.
Of course, much of this is attributable to Iowa’s all-time scoring record breaker Caitlin Clark, whose “logo” shots and almost paranormal court vision never cease to generate collective awe. Much also seems attributable to a game whose increasingly exciting, zesty play is winning over a fan base. Eleven-year-olds are no longer elbowing their way through bars to envision their future selves – they are watching at home or holding up hilarious signs in sold-out stadiums. They want to see Ms. Clark, Angel Reese, Juju Watkins, Hannah Hidalgo and Paige Bueckers, just to name a few. And their demands don’t invoke a kind of corporate diversity-focused consolation prize reeking of fabricated girl power, but rather a binge-worthy form of entertainment that can proudly stand on its women-sized feet.
Yet, the NCAA has seemed slow to catch on. Having played the “no one wants to watch” song for decades in a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy, the governing body can’t seem to change its tune. Recently, it left so much money on the table that marketers are sweeping in and elevating the women’s game through individual Name, Image and Likeness deals that were initially designed to help male players feel less exploited.
The amount of money devoted to women’s basketball broadcast rights is rising. When a TV contract was up for renegotiation in January, the NCAA settled for a US$115-million deal combining rights for the women’s tournament and 39 other championship sports, a more than 200-per-cent increase on the previous agreement. By comparison, however, the men’s tournament alone garnered US$873-million in broadcast rights this year. Yet the men’s final welcomed 14.7 million viewers in 2023, while the women’s brought in 9.9 million. An eleven-year-old’s math will tell you something’s off. You wouldn’t be wrong: observers have long argued that the women’s broadcast rights are undervalued, with analysts claiming that the NCAA could be leaving millions on the table each year.
This doesn’t sound like good business. For things to change, the people involved in negotiations may need to act more like my father that night at Brasserie Lionel, and less like the men he silenced. Surely many are starting to realize that making the game more visible is a victory not just for women, but also for investors’ pocketbooks.