This is somewhat surprising news, but at the same time it’s not entirely unexpected.
It’s officially March Madness season, with the men’s First Four games starting last night and Round One tipping off tomorrow, while the women’s First Four starts tonight with Round One on Friday.
For sports fans and gamblers, it’s one of the best times of the year. An estimated $3 billion dollars will be wagered on both tournaments and no shortage of people will be a bit distracted at work for the rest of this week and beyond. There’s already some rumors floating around on where we may expect an upset, but one bit of actual data that’s come out really puts into perspective how the college basketball landscape has changed thanks in no small part to one player.
Caitlin Clark.
Now the all-time leading scorer in NCAA history, Clark lead the Hawkeyes to a 29-4 record and a number one seed in the tournament, pacing the country in points per game (31.9) and assists per game (8.6). Truly, it’s been a dominant year to finish off one of the most dominant careers any college athlete has ever had.
Many people are expecting the Hawkeyes to make another run to the championship game after losing to LSU and Angel Reese last year, so much so that a ton of people are buying tickets to (probably) watch Caitlin Clark in action. In fact, the no-fee ticketing platform TickPick has said that the women’s Final Four has sold 6 TIMES as many tickets as the men’s so far, which is really staggering when you think about the historical different in fanbase size between the two.
Yes, there are many other great players and story lines in the sport, but do we really think that people hoping to watch the greatest women’s college basketball player of all-time in the biggest games of her career has nothing to do with sales? It would be hard to imagine.
The next time you get tickets for a game or concert, check out TickPick, the original no-fee ticketing platform. The price you see is what you pay, period.
Women’s sports, for a number of reasons, is in the best place it’s ever been, but Caitlin Clark has no doubt been an enormous part of that.
Man, I’m fired up to watch my bracket go up in flames when some no-name school goes on a Cinderella run…
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