Reaction to LSU women’s basketball player Angel Reese and her taunts toward Iowa’s Caitlin Clark after winning the National Championship has varied. ESPN Radio host Jay Williams believes race is at the center of the reaction, and took issue with the way some pundits characterized the college athlete’s actions.
Reese taunted Clark with a similar hand motion that the Iowa star used against an opponent in the Elite Eight, which garnered strong reaction from many in sports media.
The Keyshawn, JWill, and Max host was angered that the reaction took the focus away from the championship being won by the Tigers and was put on a 20-year-old athlete.
“I’m pissed off because instead of congratulating and celebrating LSU we’re talking about elements of race and double standards,” Williams argued. “So when Caitlin Clark is doing all this, ‘she has swag. She’s a competitor. She’s lost in the juices. This is what we love’. But when Angel Reese does it… was it maybe a tad bit excessive? Could she had been called for a T? Sure. The refs could have wanted to call her for a T at the end of the game for trash talking, because she followed Caitlin Clark around.
“But these are the same things that motivate young people in sports, and we applaud it in other situations. But now we want to apply race towards it or we want to apply ‘Look at her she’s a classless piece of’. That’s what Dave Portnoy said. I’ll put names on it. Keith Olbermann called her a blanking idiot on Twitter.”
The Barstool Sports founder had several thoughts about the situation on Twitter, continually calling her “classless”. However, he later added that he respected Reese because “She is owning it. Every movie needs a villain.”
Olbermann did call Reese a “f—ing idiot”, as well as “mindless” and “classless”, before later apologizing for “being uninformed” about the backstory about Clark using the gesture. He added, “both were wrong”.
“What are we doing? Why are we taking it to that level? If you want to criticize it and say ‘Call a tech’? Fine, I’m okay with that,” Williams concluded. “At least you’re having some kind of informed opinion on it. But now we’re name-calling. Now we’re questioning people’s character in winning a championship? I’m not going to allow that to happen to our show and also nationally.”
