South Carolina Gamecocks coach Dawn Staley once made use of her esteemed platform to address a glaring NCAA issue. Back in March 2021, Staley called out the governing body of the NCAA through a lengthy message posted on her X/Twitter account, which discusses the alleged disrespect of the league towards women’s basketball as opposed to the men’s sport.
In one instance, Staley pointed out that just by the NCAA’s X/Twitter account itself, one may already see and observe the disrespect she says was occurring to the women’s game. This is because the account once had a tagline on its page that featured men’s basketball only and not the women’s game.
“The issue here looms larger. Let’s start with the NCAA @marchmadness official verified Twitter account. The tag line leaves no run for misinterpretation — The Official NCAA March Madness destination for all things Division I/NCAA Men’s Basketball. Those words mean one thing — March Madness is ONLY about men’s basketball,” Staley wrote.
“How can an organization that claims to care about ALL member institutions’ student athlete experiences have a copyrighted term that only ‘represents’ one gender,” she concluded.
#WHATMATTERS pic.twitter.com/QTQzCwbnZT
— dawnstaley (@dawnstaley) March 20, 2021
The alleged disrespect that Staley was calling the league out on was based on the rising issue at that time of when there were inequalities seen of how the women’s basketball bubbles were organized and made as opposed to the men’s. Back in 2021, teams had to live and compete in strict bubbles due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
With this, several players from women’s basketball captured what their living and playing conditions looked like and posted them on their social media accounts, showing the alleged favorable conditions for men’s basketball. With this, a discussion went viral about how there must be more equality for both sports, as spearheaded by the likes of Staley.
Nevertheless, Staley and the Gamecocks still had a relatively successful 2020-21 campaign, finishing with an overall record of 26-5 (14-2, SEC) and made it all the way to the NCAA Final Four, where they were defeated by the Stanford Cardinal by a mere point, 66-65.
Dawn Staley Claimed That The NCAA’s Messaging In 2021 Was In Response To The George Floyd Murder
Also in her statement, Dawn Staley claimed that the NCAA’s season-long messaging of equality and unity was based purely on the murder of 46-year-old African-American George Floyd. In May of 2020, Floyd was killed by a white, 44-year-old police officer, Derek Chauvin, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, over an alleged counterfeit $20 bill, through which the officer knelt on his neck even after Floyd stopped breathing.
“What we know now is the NCAA’s season-long messaging about ‘togetherness’ and ‘equality’ was about convenience and a soundbite for the moment created after the murder of George Floyd,” Staley said.
Staley and the South Carolina Gamecocks now head into the 2025-26 season looking to avenge their 2025 national championship loss to the UConn Huskies, 82-59.
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