Women's Final Four Coaches, Billie Jean King: Why Aren't You Standing Up For Actual Female Athletes?

The Women's Final Four, Caitlin Clark…it's all the buzz in the world of sports right now.

But will the Women's Final Four be buzzing this weekend about the hottest topic in women's sports? Probably not.

One of the things I used to love about covering the Women’s Final Four (in my previous life as a daily newspaper journalist) was that writing about all of the great games over that final weekend was just the half of it.

All of the press conferences and coach/player media availability, especially on off days, gave reporters the opportunity to check in with some of the top names in the game (and really, some of the top names in all of women’s sports) about the status, and the health and the future of women’s basketball in particular…and of women’s sports in general.

You know, big-picture topics, topics that most coaches love to pontificate on: the growth of women’s basketball/women’s sports, how to get even more television coverage for women’s basketball/women’s sports, how to make women’s basketball/women’s sports profitable, how to get the salaries of women’s coaches closer to those of men’s coaches. The list went on and on.

Knoxville, Tenn. - The late Tennessee head coach Pat Summitt during a game against Baylor at Thompson-Boling Arena on Nov. 27, 2011. (Photo by Simon Bruty /Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)

The late, great Pat Summitt of Tennessee was amazing at this. Her perspective, her vast experience around the game, and her willingness to delve into tough topics provided great insight, and was content gold for the media.

UConn’s Geno Auriemma was, and still is, really good at this as well. One of the best (and most entertaining) in the business.

MINNEAPOLIS - Head coach Geno Auriemma of the UConn Huskies speaks to reporters before a practice session with the team at Target Center on March 31, 2022. (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

Dozens of other media savvy coaches at the Final Four have shared valuable perspectives over the years as well. Even some players, such as Diana Taurasi, and Candace Parker, were known to provide great color and analysis about topics that went well beyond the games of the day.

But about today’s burning issue of transgender athletes in women’s sports…

Don’t expect anything but radio silence to come out of the 2024 Women’s Final Four, which will be held in Cleveland, starting today.

CLEVELAND, OHIO - The Final Four logo for the 2024 NCAA Women's Basketball Tournament Final Four at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse. (Photo by Steph Chambers/Getty Images)

Now, I’m not sure if any reporters will bother to ask the current crop of Women’s Final Four coaches – Auriemma, Lisa Bluder of Iowa, Dawn Staley of South Carolina and Wes Moore of North Carolina State - about biological men competing in women’s sports. But, if that did happen, I’d be curious if the coaches would even answer.

It's an interesting uncertainty, considering that this might be the most consequential issue in women’s sports right now.

For as much advocating and soap-boxing on behalf of women’s basketball and women’s sports that some of the highest-paid and highest-profile people in this micro-community tend to do, I can’t find very much of a history of this topic being addressed by them in a significant way.

The closest I could find via some Internet searching were the brief comments that LSU coach Kim Mulkey made on the topic when asked about transgender athletes competing in women’s sports at last year’s Women’s Final Four.

Hats off to her for answering. But the level of discomfort by Mulkey is palpable. 

"I hope I answer that in a very sensitive way because I think we all know transgenders," Mulkey said. "We all know people who may not be like we are. I had a conversation with (sportscaster) Debbie Antonelli and she has a special-needs child and we found the Special Olympics for them, didn’t we? We found a place for them to compete.

"And I think that with time, maybe you will see a league or something for transgender athletes. I just think that I’m sensitive to those on one side and yet I’m also sensitive to those on the other side. Does that make sense? Is that a good politically correct answer so that I don’t get in trouble." 

Ah, yes. Political correctness.

That, and fear (of cancelation, of termination, of push back, of social media attacks, etc.). 

All of it is driving the lack of honest dialogue on this topic from people who dialogue about everything else women’s sports. 

You would think that in 2024, the idea of biological men taking opportunities in sports from females and possibly even injuring females would be not only a very popular topic of discussion, but also a great concern for these people who have always wanted, and seemingly would still want, the very best for the female athletes they coach and love. 

But it seems that no one in women’s basketball, the most prominent and popular women’s team sport there is, wants to address the issue.

L to R: UConn coach Geno Auriemma (photo: G Flume. Getty Images), South Carolina coach Dawn Staley (photo: Jacob Kupferman, Getty Images) and LSU coach Kim Mulkey (photo: Ethan Miller, Getty Images) are the three highest-paid coaches in women's college basketball and usually have plenty to say about women's sports. But they are mostly quiet on the topic of transgender athletes competing against biological females. 

Not even the seemingly untouchable people in the game, the people with incredible influence and power and, the people with, as they say, "f—k you money," such as Auriemma and Staley, who make $3.1 million per year apiece, and Mulkey, the highest-paid coach in women’s basketball at $3.2 million per year, want to fully put themselves out there.

They don't seem to want to declare unwavering support of the biological women who have enriched their careers and bank accounts.

It’s a bit surprising with Auriemma. Candor and a lack of filter is what he does best, and what I appreciate about him most as a reporter. Where is he with this?

He has put his feelings out there about other controversial topics.

In 2015, he spoke very strongly about Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, signed by Mike Pence, then the governor of the state. The bill prohibited state laws that substantially burdened the ability of people and businesses from following their religious beliefs.

Some argued that this could be used to discriminate against LGBTQ people, which was the argument made in the case of the Colorado bakery that did not want to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.

Former U.S. Vice President and former Indiana Governor Mike Pence speaks during the second Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom in the Loy Henderson Auditorium of the State Department in Washington, DC, on July 18, 2019. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

"How small-minded do you have to be to care this much about how other people live their lives?" Auriemma said in 2015. "Life is hard enough. Why do you care what other people are doing, as long as it doesn’t affect you?

"Hiding behind this religious crap is the most cowardly thing I’ve ever heard. I don’t know all the details…but it’s 2015."

Well, now it’s 2024, and men are saying that they can be women and can compete in women’s sports.

How would Geno like to lose in the national championship game to a team that has a "LeBrona James" on the roster who is actually a 6-foot-7 biological male and averages 50 points a game?

How would Geno like it if one of his players suffered a major injury at the hands of an opposing player who is a bigger, stronger biological male?

Doesn’t Geno want to speak up about that?

I hate it when people make the argument that, "Well, this is barely happening anywhere. What’s the big deal?"

The big deal is that this is even happening at all. 

Men don’t belong in women’s sports. And what happened to OukKick’s Riley Gaines in swimming in 2022 could happen in women’s basketball or in any other women’s sport at any time…and it already has happened quite often at the high school level in sports such as volleyball, track, cross country, tennis, basketball and swimming. The list goes on.

University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas and Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines react after finishing tied for 5th in the 200 Freestyle finals at the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships on March 18th, 2022 at the McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta Georgia.  (Photo by Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Make no mistake, yesterday’s NCAA Swimming National Championship with Gaines and Lia Thomas will be tomorrow’s NCAA Women’s Final Four with…maybe Geno and his team? 

Trust me, it’s only a matter of time.

Again, the power players in women’s sports have no problem speaking up for women’s sports in just about every other way under the sun. Just not about this.

In 2022, Forbes published a story titled, "Why Billie Jean King and Dawn Staley Continue To Advocate For Equality."

Staley was honored at the 2022 Annual Salute to Women in Sports sponsored by the Women’s Sports Foundation, which was founded by King, a legend in women's tennis.

NEW YORK, - Women’s Sports Foundation Founder Billie Jean King presents the Billie Jean King Leadership Award to recipient Dawn Staley on stage during The Women's Sports Foundation's 2022 Annual Salute To Women In Sports Gala at Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers on October 12, 2022. (Photo by John Lamparski/Getty Images for WSF)

Topics in the article included women’s participation numbers in sports, women’s opportunities in sports business, women’s sports coverage and TV rights for women’s sports.

No mention of the men in women’s sports debate. Shocking…but not shocking.

Speaking of Billie Jean King, who has spent more than half of her life championing female athletes, she actually has spoken out on the topic of men in women’s sports, but not in the way you would think as founder of the WOMEN’S Sports Foundation.

According to a press release from the Democratic Press Office in March of 2023, King said:

"There is no place in any sport for discrimination of any kind. I’m proud to support all transgender athletes who simply want the access and opportunity to compete in the sport they love. The global athletic community grows stronger when we welcome and champion all athletes – including LGBTQI+ athletes."

Oh, Billie.

We all know how excited King was to play (and defeat) Bobby Riggs in the "Battle Of The Sexes" in 1973.

HOUSTON-9/19/73-: Tennis pro Billie Jean King (L) laughs on Sept. 19, 1973 as Bobby Riggs tells of how he intends to defeat her in their $100,000 winner-take-all match in the Astrodome 9/20. (Getty Images)

But would King have thought it was exciting – and fair - to play Bobby Riggs and other men in EVERY match of her career? No. Absolutely not.

For her to speak such disingenuous words that we all know darn well that she wouldn’t want to live by herself is rather sickening, particularly considering that she probably considers herself atop the food chain of women’s sports advocates.

Of course, as rational people everywhere understand: no one is suggesting that transgender athletes not be welcomed into the, as King puts it, "global athletic community" to compete in the sports they love.

Likewise, all rational people also understand that the welcoming of transgender athletes into the "global athletic community" shouldn’t be the responsibility of biological females. 

Transgender women are still biological men. And biological men and biological women have had their own, separate sports for pretty much forever. For good reason.

If anyone should be welcoming transgender "women" into the "global athletic community," it should be biological men. Period.

Why is that so hard for Billie Jean King, or Geno Auriemma or Dawn Staley or Kim Mulkey, or anyone with power and influence in women’s sports, to say out loud?

WASHINGTON, DC - Lee University student athlete Macy Petty speaks during an event celebrating the House of Representatives passing The Protection Of Women And Girls In Sports Act outside the U.S. Capitol on April 20, 2023. President Joe Biden promised to veto the legislation, which defines sex as 'based solely on a person’s reproductive biology and genetics at birth' and would ban all transgender women and girls from competing in female school sports. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

If you are truly an advocate for women’s sports, then you must show up for this fight. You must speak up. Now.

Women athletes, real, actual, biological women, need you. Especially when women have outfits such as the National Organization for Women "sticking up" for them (read: sarcasm!!)

In a stunning move on Sunday, NOW pushed out on X (formerly Twitter) a seemingly now-deleted post: "Repeat after us: Weaponizing womenhood against other women is white supremacist patriarchy at work. Making people believe there isn't enough space for trans women in sports is white supremacist patriarchy at work."

WASHINGTON, DC - Demonstrators cheer during the speaking program at the "Our Bodies, Our Sports" rally for the 50th anniversary of Title IX at Freedom Plaza on June 23, 2022 in Washington, DC. The rally, organized by multiple athletic women's groups was held to call on U.S. President Joe Biden to put restrictions on transgender females and "advocate to keep women's sports female."(Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Yikes! Clearly, actual female athletes are under attack, and need strong advocates to stand up and speak out for them now more than ever.  

We’ll see how those Women’s Final Four press conferences go. But I won’t be holding my breath.