On Thursday. images by Stanford’s sports performance coach Ali Kerschner posted on social media showed a drastic difference between what men’s teams participating in the NCAA Tournament in Indiana use to practice and what the women participating in the NCAA Tournament get in Texas.
The image of the gym for men in Indy shows numerous dumbbells, exercise benches, weight racks and bars and boards in a fairly large exercise space comparable to an average gym. The image of the women’s gym, meanwhile, has six weights in total and some refined yoga mats, the latter of which are branded with the NCAA Women’s Basketball brand. The New York Liberty guard and former Oregon Ducks superstar Sabrina Ionescu helped raise further awareness of this difference via Twitter.
As these images got steam on social media, the NCAA finally issued a statement and said that the significantly smaller women’s gym was the result of ‘limited space’ and that there were plans to make the area larger once the teams were eliminated.
We recognize that some of the convenience teams would normally have access to available in the controlled environment. In part, this is due to the limited space, and the original plan was to expand the training session as soon as there was extra space available later in the tournament. However, we want to respond to the needs of our participating teams, and we are actively working to improve existing resources at the gyms, including extra weight equipment.
But some disputed the NCAA’s statement, especially the section on limited space in the area. One of those who did so was Will Abrams, the director of player development for Rutgers’ women’s basketball, who showed a video of a rather empty large room with one training ground, suggesting that there was actually room for a larger gym. wash. It was also hammered by Kendric Lindsey, a digital content creator for women’s basketball at the University of South Carolina.
But beyond the current inadequate setup, it appears that the NCAA’s promise of a larger gym for teams that penetrate the tournament also does not hold much water. As Chantel Jennings of The Athletic noted, the facilities offered to teams making the Sweet Sixteen do not match the number of players who will be playing in the tournament at that point.
It is not clear what the NCAA is going to take to address this issue, if they intend to address things as they are at present, but if there is anything to take away from this, it is that the organization was willing to show the inequality. exists as normal until attention is drawn to it.