Hailey Van Lith Getting Meme'd Into Oblivion Is the Best Evidence That Women's Basketball Has Arrived
If you were on Twitter last night and had no idea about anything going on in the world of women's college basketball, it must have been a thoroughly confusing night, because literally the only tweets I saw on the timeline all night were about the Iowa-LSU game. We'll see later today what the ratings ended up being, but it felt like everyone in America that had a television turned on was watching that game.
And there may be no better sign for the growing popularity of women's basketball than the fact that social media was flooded with memes like it was the NBA Finals, no shortage of which were directed at LSU's Hailey Van Lith. She shot 2-10 from the field for nine points, but the bigger problem was that she got cooked by Caitlin Clark for 40 minutes to the tune of 41 points.
She finally just gave up and did a Jim Halpert-esque pan to the camera with a shrug. Sometimes you just get got.
Last year's LSU-Iowa game did monster ratings, but I don't remember the reaction on social media being what it was last night. If the title game ends up being Clark and the Hawkeyes against undefeated South Carolina, I'd have to imagine it tops the 9.9 million viewers for last year's championship game — if last night didn't already.
Thoughts and prayers to Hailey Van Lith, who I imagine will be seeing Caitlin Clark in her nightmares for the next several weeks.