UConn's Lady Huskies Break Record -- Why Aren't More Paying Attention?
Women's basketball team breaks UCLA men's 37-year-old record.
Dec. 21, 2010— -- For the University of Connecticut women's basketball team, tonight's game has been history two years in the making.
The Lady Huskies beat Florida State, 93-62, for their 89th straight victory, breaking the 37-year-old college record for most consecutive basketball wins, stealing the title from the UCLA men's team. It is a feat that some have called "monumental."
So why haven't the women's pictures and stories been splashed on the covers of magazines or getting mentions in newscasts?
"If this was a men's basketball team, we would have had saturation coverage," USA Today sports columnist and ABC News analyst Christine Brennan told ABC News. "It would have been all over the news."
"Grandmothers in Topeka and Tupelo would have known about this if it was a men's team," she said.
When the UCLA men set their record back in the 1970s, the college basketball community roared with excitement. Now, Brennan says, not so much.
Things still aren't exactly equal in college basketball even four decades after Title IX mandated equality in women's athletics. Some say it's an apples-to-oranges comparison between the sexes. The balls are different and some have gone so far as to say even the athleticism is different.
"Let's not kid ourselves, the lack of coverage for the UConn women is very similar to what would be going on, on a playground," she said, "with a fourth grade boy pointing at a girl and saying 'you can't play, you're just a girl.'"
But the Lady Huskies haven't just beaten the competition to get this far -- they've flat-out trounced them, winning by an average of 30 points since their streak began more than two years ago with a win against Georgia Tech on Nov. 16, 2008. Their streak has earned them two national championships along the way.
The last time they lost a game was in April of 2008.
