Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain.
Where we thought we belonged to the trash talk Hall of Fame until we watch today's guest in action.
There are levels to this. It's Friday, May thirtieth, Happy Friday Slices.
On today we're going to be bringing you my conversation with Connecticut Sun guard Marina Maybray, recorded on Wednesday. We talked about the Sun's tough start to the season, finding her focus and purpose in Connecticut after being denied a trade out, trash talking, self regulating, and more.
This is a good one, y'all.
Plus a look ahead at another weekend chock full of WNBA hoops, soccer, friendlies, golf, and a lacrosse What the fact that'll put toenails in your creamed corn? It's all coming up right after this. Welcome back, y'all.
Here's what you need to know today in hoops.
Big weekend for the WNBA, starting with five matchups tonight, two contests at seven thirty pm Eastern. First, the Caitlin Clarkless Indiana Fever hosts the Connecticut Sun, and then the Washington Mystics play host to the New York Liberty defending Champs.
New York are on a roll to start this season.
They've got five players averaging double figures, Brianna Stewart, Johnqwell Jones, Natasha cloud Sabrinia Escu and Kennedy Burke. Then at ten pm Eastern, three more games the La Sparks at the Las Vegas Aces, the Seattle Storm at home against the Atlanta Dream, and the five and zero Minnesota Links visiting the Phoenix Mercury Links. Undefeated NAFISA Colliers come out of the gates with a point to prove Kaylea McBride's getting back to full strength, and the entire team is looking
to avenge last year's finals loss. They have been fun so far. You can catch all of tonight's games on League Pass or on Ion. The lone game on Saturday is at eight pm when the Chicago Sky heads south to play the Dallas Wings. That'll be the second meeting between those two teams in three days. Then on Sunday, Commissioner's Cup play starts quick refresher for so a select number of games count toward this Commissioner's Cup in season tournament.
This year, it's the thirty six games running from June first to June seventeenth, Every team will play one game against each of the other teams in its conference, and the team from each conference with the best record in those games will face off for the Commissioner's Cup Championship on July First. Four games Sunday to kickoff Cup play this year sun at Liberty, Mercury at Sparks, Aces at Storm, and Links at Valkyrie's. We'll link to the full WNBA schedule in our show notes.
More hoops news.
The Chicago Sky have announced that they'll hang Candae Parker's number three jersey in the wind Trust Arena rafters on August twenty fifth, when they host the Las Vegas Aces. Parker only spent two seasons with the Sky, but the beloved Illinois native helped the team to its first and only WNBA title in twenty twenty one. The honor from the Sky will come about a month after the Los
Angeles Sparks retire her jersey. The team Parker spent thirteen seasons with and helped to a championship in twenty sixteen, will honor her in their game against the Sky on June twenty ninth. Golf Don't Forget The US Open continues today and this weekend as one hundred and fifty six players compete for a.
Share of the twelve million dollar perse.
You can watch today's action twelve to six Eastern on USA Network and six to eight Eastern on Peacock. On Saturday, it'll be one to six Eastern on Peacock and three to six Eastern on NBC, and Sunday's final round can be watched from two to seven pm Eastern live on NBC and Peacock. Also in tennis, the French Open rolls on at Roland Garros, with live coverage on TNT Sports. Everyone there vying to make it to the June seventh championship match and earn the roughly two point nine million
dollar winners. Cut to softball, Remember Jessica Mendoza teasing some big athletes unlimited softball news on yesterday's show. Well, it's officially out and it's big big. Major League Baseball has
announced a strategic investment in the AUSL. Per an official release, the partnership includes quote engagement with the AUSL across many areas of MLB's business operation, including collaborative sales and marketing efforts, while AUSL athletes and storylines will be featured across MLB's digital platforms and incorporated into select MLB events, including the All Star Game and throughout the MLB postseason end quote.
This is huge news and for the first time a professional softball league having an affiliation with Major League Baseball including resources and investment and time and energy and marketing and all of that is fantastic. In footy news, no NWSL soccer this weekend. The league is on an international break so players can compete during the FIFA International Match Window ending on June third. NWSL play starts back up
on June sixth. Speaking of the FIFA window, the US women's national team is using it to play matches against China on Saturday in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and Jamaica on Tuesday in Saint Louis. And remember we told you last week that the second match will also have a pregame retirement celebration for US women's national team legend Becky Souerbrunn, friend of the show, who had a legendary career and recently announced that she's pregnant. So get your tissues ready.
That's going to be a lovely moment for one of our best. You can catch both those national team games on TBS Universo Max Peacock and Westwood One Sports.
More footy.
Our show side, Minnesota Aurora FC plays this weekend as well. They're two to zero to start the season, continuing their unbeaten streak. Our girls have been undefeated in the regular season for three consecutive seasons in the USLW League, and the streak rolls on. Squad's got a road game against river Light FC tonight at six pm Eastern and another road game Sunday at five pm against the Chicago City Dutch Lions. All right, y'all, we got to take a
quick break when we come back. We aren't cooking with Marina Maybriy, but things might still get spicy stick around joining us now. She's a guard for the Connecticut side
of the WNBA. Drafted by the LA Sparks and the second round of the twenty nineteen WNBA draft, she spent two seasons in LA before being traded to the Dallas Wings, a couple seasons there before being sent to the Chicago Sky and just a season and a half here in Chicago, where we all loved her, before being traded to the Sun in the middle of last season, she left Notre Dame of the program's all time leader in made three pointers. She's famously the only one of the Maybury sisters to
win a title with the Irish. You could check TikTok to see if her sisters are salty about that. And she was a member of Phantom BC and unrivaled this season, but a calf injury limited her play, so she focused mostly on learning how to use spices. It's Marina Maybury him Marina.
Hi, thank you. That's a great intro.
Well, I want to hear about the most important thing first, cooking with Maybury. So have you mastered any new recipes that the Sun teammates have given the seal of approval?
No, not yet, but I was thinking that since today with our off day, I was going to make something with the kitchen aid, maybe like some chocolate chip cookie so nice. I'm kind of nervous. This is going to be the first time. I don't know how they're going to feel about it, but.
I have faith.
Just read all the ingredients before you start, and all the instructions. I have problems sometimes where I don't do that, and then it's like immediately put in that and I'm like, no, I didn't measure that yet, or then it's like make sure you don't and I've already done that because I didn't read down further. So yeah, yeah, especially with baking, it's it gets really difficult, especially like the temperatures and stuff,
like I didn't realize how important that was. Extremely That's why I prefer cooking to baking, because cooking you're like, oops, I screwed that up, Like I had some more of this and put a little of this, and at baking it's like that's it, one and done. Speaking of your son teammates, one of them is one of the all time greats in Tina Charles, and I'm wondering if she has practice habits or tendencies that like feel like keys
to her years of success. Because when I see someone in any professional sport that was born in the nineteen eighties, first of all, I feel validated, and also I wonder, like, what are they doing to stick around this long and be successful?
Yeah?
I mean, Teena just knows her spots, Like she gets out there and she's going to go to her she's going to go to her jump shot, and she reads her defender pretty well when she's in one on one situations and stuff, so it's just like hard to stop. And she's powerful and she's been doing it for years, so like she's not going to get sped up or like into anything you're trying to stop her from doing. She's just going to keep doing what she does no
matter what. So that's definitely probably brought her her success throughout the years in the w just being able to get to your spots no matter what the scheme is.
A whole lot of new teammates for you this year, How has it been trying to like just get started and get going with such a short offseason. Once the draft happens and everybody's in one place.
I just think it happens a lot faster than everybody thinks. It's like, oh, we have time, we have time, we have time, and all of a sudden, we're playing the Mystics on our first game, and you know, you're trying to work through things, shoot in practice and shoot around in training camp, and everybody's young and inexperienced, and you have to have grace and leadership at the same time, accountability, but also some type of sympathy in a way, like I know that this is really hard, this is tough.
You just got from college, and now all of a sudden, people are screaming, let's go move faster, sense of urgency this and that, you know. So I try to like put myself in their shoes and remember what I felt like as a rookie and like I wanted some comfort. I wanted somebody to tell me, like, you are doing good, even though maybe I probably wasn't doing that good. But so I've been trying to take that and give that to the rookies and the younger players that we have.
Let's talk about that, you're one of the more experienced players on this team. What are you telling the rookies and the youngsters about, like getting off to a tough start or just being patient through the first couple of games.
I've been trying not to address like little situations rather than kind of helping them figure out what gives them the most energy to be able to come out here for forty four games, Like where can you go to fill your cup up? Like what do you need to do? Because those things you have to do to be consistent in this league to them out and keep playing whether
things are going great or they're not going great. And then also just like preaching about boundaries, like no matter how old you are, no matter how long you've been in this league, you have to have boundaries. You have to set an intention of not allowing other people's energy
to affect yours. And when you're in a work environment, there are always there's always going to be somebody that maybe isn't great energy, or the person the people that you're playing against next to you, there's not maybe they're out to make you mad, or they're whatever they're doing,
or the rest are not calling, which you want. Like you have to have boundaries set in the sense of I'm not giving my energy to this, I'm not giving my energy to this, but I am giving my energy to this, or you know, just like that as an athlete, even like brand deals and stuff like you're in the middle of the season, like you have to be able to say no, sometimes no, I can't do that, I'm too tired. I need to do this and to do that,
Like those all go in that boundary category. And then just confidence, like I think that most things come from confidence, and so you to go out there and perform in forty four games in a WNBA season, against the best players in the world. If you're lacking any type of confidence, it's going to be really hard. So those, like the three things that I've been talking to them a lot about.
Those are all really smart, And you know, the first one you talked about sort of like where do you give your energy and how do you react to your teammates and your opponents and everything else. It seems like that's something you're sort of working on this year. Fans are loving watching clips of you in games, sort of
reacting to hard fouls or calls you don't like. Someone said Marina Mabria's first team all reactions, which I loved, But they also love watching you sort of practice self regulation. This year, you got caught doing the deep breathing, the send hands sort of talking to yourself. Is that something that you've been working on with coaches or just in the off season being more intentional.
About Yeah, I mean, I think I'll honestly give credit to like last year's team, like AT and dB and them, they were big on me about like keeping my complete, with keeping my control because they're saying, like you're getting out of you, no one can stop you when you're in the zone and no one, and you're not upset
and you're not like losing your focus. So been trying to have my moment and then get back to it and go on a run or do something that's going to help the team win, because you know, when I get too far one way and I'm too mad, I'm crashing out, like I can't come back. I'm not good when I am all the way down, when I go all the way down there. So I feel like the first week of the season, I actually did go down that way a little bit, and I was like, I
got to catch myself. So I feel like this week I was a lot better with like keeping my controlsure and keeping my head. And then the numbers said, so.
Yeah, the crash out seems to be the term of choice specifically to you. Is that something that you came up with or it is something that like the folks on TikTok and social unsigned to you and you're like, all right, that's right, that is what it feels like.
Well, my TikTok friends gave me that one. I learned
it from them. Yeah, they're always like hung crash on stuff. Honestly, sometimes I get mad at those videos though, because it's like sometimes they create a narrative that's like, yeah, that's like, oh, I'm crazy and stuff, and it's like I hear you, but like if I need to know that if you got tackled from behind in the back court right and no one's saying anything in their talking about our marine or flopping, like and you know you didn't flop, it's
like okay, like at some point you really might crash out too.
Yeah, No, I want you to know that.
I would be absolutely mortified to play basketball on television. I have a terrible temper. I'm a horrible loser. I would get so.
Angry during games. I would throw my hands in the air, my.
Face would get beat red, like I just was like I wanted it so bad, but I couldn't really control it sometimes when I was indeed crashing out or when I didn't think like.
The call went the right way.
So I think people watching, especially people who never played, just don't get it, Like they just don't understand and they think you're somehow supposed to like have the best energy in the world toward the thing that you want to accomplish, and then be able to have no energy in the moments.
When you're angry or frustrated or whatever.
So I feel, yeah, and I enjoy it, and I also get that sometimes the.
Narrative is that what you were hoping for?
Right?
Like, sometimes I'm just like whatever, Yeah, you mentioned Alyssa Thomas and do Wanna Bonnard. Those are two of your previous teammates that sort of helped talk you through it. But you're you've been able to figure out how to better control yourself. But you're also like you're willing to
let opposing players know what's on your mind. You're willing to talk, You're willing to like try to get in their heads and do exactly what you're warning those rooks against, Like how do you not let the energy of the opposing players get you? And if you could take advantage of doing that to someone else, it can really help your game. Do you remember, Like ever, it's just like the wildest thing you ever said to someone.
I mean, I've said some wild shit.
I don't know.
I mean I've like told someone their dog is ugly before. No, No, I've never seen their dogs too far it's too far, right, that's wild. And someoney told me that Charlie was ugly. You might have to scrap right, but.
Uh, that was kind of wild to me.
I'm not gonna lie.
Have you run into like an even strength trash talk or is there anyone who can match your energy?
Nay's pretty good. I think Nay's not bad. Djn A Carrington, Okay, AT's not bad either, Melyssa Thomas. Yeah, yeah, I mean there's other people that will like talk and stuff like, but honestly, I don't really say that much unless you say something wild. Like usually I hear them say something first, and I'm like what, Like, like even last night, I was like, oh, so you wanted me to hear that, like you know, so like if you wanted me to hear it, then I'm definitely gonna right right, and then
I'm gonna have something great to say back. And also I get that from like my I grew up in a family that was like I mean, it's an aggressive family. Like whenever we like could have argument or something like we're arguing to win. We're not effing around with these arguments. So like our siblings, we used to like unhinged things to each other like crazy. So sometimes like I get in that mode and I'm like, oh yeah, all right,
well say something back. Yeah, so it's really like that that I get it from.
Yeah.
I mean you talk about how like when you're at home, you're playing one on one with all your sisters who played college ball at Notre Dame, and like you guys get after it.
Like when I would lose, like to them, they would like tell me I'm adopted.
And stuff, like the oldest trick in the book, the oldest trick.
You're gonna get kicked off the family because you.
I Meanwhile, you guys look exactly the same. No one's mind.
Yeah, you mentioned talking trash about a dog.
It's actually funny. So you are a certified dog.
We have had conversations on the show trying to talk and like figure out exactly what constitutes a dog.
What makes a dog? Who's a dog?
Can you be a dog and a glue gal at the same time. We've had all of those and one of the things everyone agreed upon was that you are, in fact a dog. How do you characterize a dog?
I feel like someone that has like toughness on the court, like not like a punk, gonna get back up and try again, like play with physicality, like have that mentality of like we're down but like I'm still gonna come back.
We're still gonna come back. Like we're gonna make a play, We're gonna get a stop, get a block, do make do something, make something shake Like I always think about like Candace Parker when I was on LA I was only on there for a year, but it was almost like she never thought she was gonna lose, like and like as a rookie sometimes I'm like, oh gosh, we're
playing bad. I think we're gonna lose, you know, like you don't know any better when you're not playing, like and she's always saying like, okay, just do something for somebody else. Then just do this. Oh, then just do this. And it's like she always found a way to to and we didn't always win every game, but we won a lot of games. And Candace is always saying, do this, we can just do this. Oh, I'm to take it
upon myself. I'm going to take the ball up the court injurbble all the way up and score, like just stuff like that, or time out, we need to reverse the ball this way. You don't see how she's guarding you, Just stuff where she's making everyone else around her better and tougher and like challenging their ceiling. Yeah, and that's kind of like how I see it.
Yeah, so dogs like what you do, but also how you make other people do things. I'm putting you on the spot here, but I'm gonna need your top five dogs currently playing in the WNBA.
Oh damn, I only have top five. Yeah, this doesn't mean best player? What does dog mean? Well?
You just now yeah, see you just defined it though, Like I'll give you a couple of mine. I'm not gonna like be held to this because it's off the top of my head.
But Skyler Diggins.
Kelsey Plum uh, Courtney Williams.
A shout out, Courtney Colia Copper ha yeah huh yeah, Like.
I think at Alissa Thomas is one. I mean, Angel Reese is a dog in certain ways for sure.
All Right, so you wouldn't categorize like, so what do you guys think about like Satu everyque and then like what is that categorize as I.
Think Satu's a baby dog, She's a pup.
Satu's a puppy an angry pop, but pop I'm not sure about ari K.
I think like ari Arik is a bucket more than a dog to me.
I mean I feel like she's like dog. You out, like you really out there on the island with her, right, Like, Yeah, that's not fine.
I feel like Chelsea Gray is a dog. Okay, you don't agree.
No, I mean she's a four time champion dog. Like. That's why it's complicated, is the way this conversation is horrid.
That's what I got in a fight at the Final four about whether Page Beckers is a dog. I say dog, but she just looks like a little kid, Like she's so cute that people mistake that she's a dog.
Okay, who am I missing?
I'm with Ka for sure.
I'm with Ka at Courtney Williams.
Yeah, I definitely got Courtney in there. Asia like Asia.
It's just it's just a dog.
It's just hard because she's also like the best, So it's like you don't first think dog, you think MVP and then later dogs.
Yeah facts, I hear that, But yeah, I mean, yeah, we got a lot of there's there's a lot.
Tell me about coach Mezzanine does see how does he handle your temperament?
How does he get the best at you?
I think right now he's still trying to figure out what to say to me, which rightfully so I understand I wouldn't know what to say to me either. Sometimes I sometimes you just be looking at me like I
need you to calm down together, Are you okay? But sometimes you just like grab my hand on the way out the game and be like, you know, like come right here, right here, you know, little little little, just little subtle things like not to try to embarrass me or anything, you know, like just to reel me back in. But like Ron really like Ron and Chavante have been
like hands on about it. Like Ron like the other day we were playing Atlanta and she just got up and we were like they were shooting a free throw and she just gave me a hugs.
Oh that's good.
Let me calm down, yeaheah.
They're like they're figuring out how to regulate you different tactics, like yeah.
Z sometimes will be like so are you going to bitch or are you going to play? Are you going to bitch? Or are you going to have thirty points? Because you can't wait who says this? And I'm just like, okay, Chavante is amazing.
I love that.
And like even sometimes like the rookies like they've been like like I know she just flipped you over, but like what are we running? And you know, like what are we doing? I need you to like or just like it's okay, like they called the foul. They called it, you know, so like they see it, like they see like why they don't they see, like why I get paid sometimes like this is crazy. She just hate me.
Like yesterday I was driving up the court and she literally like someone that literally is like this in the back of my head and straight in the back of the head. And I'm literally just like I don't know, I didn't see right, but like I'm standing right in front of you and I have the ball, so like I don't know what else you're watching.
To be honest, if I were a therapist, I would tell you to control what you can control and understand that they're always going to miss things and that it takes you out of your game when you get mad.
But like, how do you miss that right?
Like right the head the head knock in the back of the head, you missed right?
Tell yourself a story in your head.
Oh my god, I can't believe a fly flew directly into the ref's eye right when that happened and they were incapable of literally couldn't see it.
Ah, I will not be lying to myself.
Sometimes those stories help us get through those moments, even if they're blatant lies. You know, you had to adjust to this new coach and they had to adjust to you. And this isn't the first time that's happened in your career. You've been in a bunch of different spots. So I wonder, like, when you find out you're being traded, do you remember the moment of each of those teams, like actually hearing the news and what your immediate reaction was.
I mean, my rookie year, I got traded because they were trying to win a championship right away. They traded me for like Simone Augustus and Christy Tolliver decent like that. So they were trying to they were trying to win right away, and Dallas was the sign was like I was restricted for agent, so I could leave anyway. It wasn't really like, oh we're getting rid of you or anything that's part of the deal. I think the first real trade honestly was Chicago. I mean it was what
it was. I knew it was coming like, you know, things weren't working out. It wasn't I came to play for James Wade. When he left, it just wasn't the same for me. I wasn't playing the same POSI I signed in Chicago for three years to be a point guard and that just wasn't it. And then we weren't winning either, and it just wasn't really going that well.
So it was better off to go and try to win a championship with Connecticut, and obviously, although we fell short, Like I'm really grateful for my time in both places, honestly, because like Connecticut showed me how to win, even though it's not happening right now, Like it showed me what you have to do to win, and how at had that team winning for so long at a consistent, really high level, Like there were so many things that stood out to me that I was like, oh, Okay, you
have to have that to win. You have to have that. You can't have this. And then also in Chicago when we weren't winning, it was like, Okay, I'm the leader of his team and I'm not doing a good job and I don't know, w what is it that I'm not doing? So once I got to see what I wasn't doing in Connecticut. Now I feel like I've become a such a better leader.
Yeah, that's really interesting.
It does make such a difference too, like the expectations, Like the same thing with the Sun though, Like you signed a two year deal after being traded there, but then they basically traded away all the players and the coach left. So now you're in a completely different position on a team that's starting more fresh than the one that you got there, which was like on the verge
of a championship multiple years in a row. When you asked them out and you said you wanted out, Like what was the conversation?
Like how did that go?
You know, I built relationships in Chicago where, you know, they understood that I wasn't in a good place there, Like my mind wasn't good. Things were really tough there for a little while. We weren't winning. You couldn't figure it out, And they knew I came to play for James Wade. So when they figured out that they could get a couple pieces back, that they'd be able to get a couple of their picks back, we came to an understanding of you know, we want her to be happy.
We've built a really good relationship with her. We don't want to keep someone here that maybe doesn't belong here right now, doesn't fit on this team anymore. Where Whereas when we had me Courtney and Ka I did fit. I fit perfectly, Like I had my best year in numbers. So it was really mutual and like I still talk with them like all the people there all the time. So I'm grateful that they did let me go because it was just a mutual agreement of like, you know,
we get it. Obviously, we love you and we want you to be here, but we do get it. So I appreciate them a lot for that, for understanding that when there's a player that doesn't want to be somewhere, really isn't happy anymore, you know, you want them to go and be be themselves somewhere else.
Yeah, So if that doesn't happen and you end up somewhere that maybe the situation is different than what you'd hope.
What's your approach?
How do you get your self back focused on the job at hand, getting the most out of your year or making it work well.
Obviously you know this wasn't exactly in our plans, Like you know, I would have thought in twenty six, if Connecticut didn't win the finals that maybe then at the new CBA reset, maybe it would you know, the pieces would change. I didn't know that it was going to happen in twenty five right before it. I think I just had to come to a realization that Like I feel like, I know it's cliche, but I feel like for some reason, I keep getting put in the same position.
And is it because God has a plan for me to grow into something way bigger than I even thought I could be. Can I carry a team somewhere that nobody thinks can go anywhere? Like I feel like the answer is yes, because why else I keep getting put in this position? Like what's the odds that everybody's gone?
That's insane, Like no one would have guessed that. So now I'm just trying to figure out a way to be that leader that I obviously can be, or else I wouldn't keep put in this position, and I just have to work through it instead of trying to trying to go somewhere where I think where I think it's going to be perfect, where I think I can do what I want to do, and maybe I need to just make it work, and that's where and that's where everything that I think I can become comes. Yeah, because
I'm not sure anymore. Like it's obviously everybody has a different journey, but my journey has been insane, So i wouldn't trade it for the world because I'm grateful to be here. I was the nineteenth pick and now I'm considered one of the best players in the world, so I never saw that coming. But I still think I have so much more to offer. And if I can kind of be where my feet are and not always think that maybe there's something better, I will get everything that I think that I can be.
That's such a good perspective.
It really is like, if I keep getting the same result when I ask out, maybe I have to go through exactly and figure out what it means to go through this thing that I don't know that I want or I don't know if it's the right fit, and then make it work well enough to know that anywhere you go you can make it work. And I love the perspective of putting that weight on your shoulders because you are this incredible story of a second round pick that's made it great and becomes the centerpiece of a team,
and you have a real opportunity. It's been a tough start, but you get to help this next generation of players, and you already are bringing them such good perspective. And there's so many I mean, next year's the league's in a blow up, the Sun might get sold to a different owner. I mean, there is just so much that we don't know and can't control that. All you have is like, what can I do for this team right now in this moment, which is awesome.
I love to hear that.
Well, hopefully we'll have you back down later in the season. We'll ask you how that's going. It sounds like you've got a great perspective on it.
It's going to be going better.
Yeah, it's got to be right. I mean, listen, sky fans. So I'm like, okay, progress. We had a sixteen point lead. We blew it and we lost, but at one point we were leading a game by a significant number of points.
Maybe next time they'll keep it.
Yeah, we were beating Minnesota the other day.
Yeah, yeah, that was baby steps, baby steps.
Well, thanks so much for hopping on with us. Get some cooking with Maybury going. We want to see those cookies and some more. We need more proof that you've figured out the spices, if not just for us, but for DJA. I know that's important to her. So thanks so much for the time.
Thank you.
We got to take another quick break when we come back a lacrosse What the fact that'll make you want to get called for slashing welcome back slices. It's time for another What the fact? You might remember earlier in the week we told you about UNC winning Sun d's Division One College Lacrosse National championship, completing their undefeated season in front of a record fourteen thousand, four hundred twenty three fans, and we mentioned that that tally knocked off
the previous record from twenty seventeen. Well, when you dig into the history of NCUBLEA lacrosse championships, breaking a twenty seventeen record makes sense. First, let's go back to twenty twenty one. You may recall that the NCAA commissioned a big investigation into gender equity following outrage over the disparities
between the men's and women's basketball tournaments. While the law firm that conducted the investigation, Kaplan, Hecker and Fink, dug into the NCAA's treatment of lots of other championships too,
including lacrosse, and the findings were very curious. So historically, men's lacrosse has hosted its D one, D two, and D three championships at the same venue, usually using NFL facilities that can see tens of thousands of fans at the same time, the D one, D two, and D three women's events have been held separately in smaller venues
fewer resources. For example, the KHF report outlines how in twenty nineteen, quote men's lacrosse sold twenty eighty, one hundred and sixty tickets to the Division one men's final in a stadium with a capacity for sixty seven thousand and five ninety four, while women's lacrosse sold nine and seventeen tickets to the Division one women's final in a stadium with a capacity for eighty five hundred end Quote. Yeah,
you heard that right. They sold over nine thousand tickets for a stadium with a capacity of eighty five hundred. You got to assume that standing room only. Either way, Clearly the venue not big enough. So where was that twenty seventeen championship that had the previous record Gillette Stadium. Yeah, so it's not like people suddenly became more interested in women's across this year than last year or the year before. It's just that more of them were able to fit
in the venue again. Now, it's worth noting that the women's D one Championship was held at Gillette this year, along with the men's D one, two, and three championships, but the D two when D three women's Championships were all still held elsewhere. Tous lacrosse coach courtney' shoot actually called the NCAA out after this year's D three championship game, which the Jumbos lost ten to nine to Middlebury.
Take a listen.
You know, Salem does a great job with this championship, So I hope anything I'm going to say doesn't come across offensive. But this is a hard place to get to and the NCAA needs to do something about accessibility of the championship. We had an incredible crowd, but our men are playing for a national championship in front of all there alarms tonight and that's an issue. And I was hoping to say this when we won. I have notes prepared because I think it's a real thing we
got to talk about. I promise these girls that if we want a national championship, I was going to fight for equity. I'm going to do it either way. It deserves some attention and against Salem Rono College do a fantastic job once we're here, but this is a hard place to get to. We had four A launs here today. I had one hundreds reach out that would have been there in a major city. Our men get to do that.
And there's an accessibility issue for the Division III Lacrosse Championships that is inequitable.
And get this so per the KHF report, multiple sources said when planning ahead for the twenty twenty five championships, Jillette Stadium was willing to host all three women's competitions, but the D one Men's Lacrosse Committee was concerned about hosting too many championships and teams at one venue.
Here's a snippet of the report quote.
The D one Men's Committee expressed concern about the significant scale of hosting six championships with at least sixteen teams over one weekend for an outdoor sport. There were also concerns with, among other things, the scheduling of the championships, including because the Division two and three women and their season a week before the men, and the ability to provide sufficient practice times for the teams competing in all six championships.
End quote yeah totally so just.
You know, giving the women's D two and D three champs their time to shine right, must be about logistics nonsense. Kudos to Gillette Stadium's operation folks for caring more about women's lacrosse than the NCAA Division one men's lacrosse committee does. I guess this what the fact brought to you by ELF Beauty. And here's another fact. Companies with diverse leadership
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Two books you technical fouls for harmless shit. Talking Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iheartwomen's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You could find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wondermedia Network, our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz, Jenny Kaplan and Emily Rudder. Our editors are
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