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The sports industry is stereotypically dominated by males. However, in today’s day and age, we are seeing more women becoming involved. But they still fight an uphill battle and women in the industry and are becoming more vocal about their frustrations. Enter Notre Dame women’s basketball head coach Muffet McGraw, who is not afraid to speak her mind.
According to the Chicago Tribune, McGraw thinks its time for more women to receive coaching opportunities. McGraw said Thursday at the Final Four, “We don’t have enough female role models. We don’t have enough visible women leaders. We don’t have enough women in power.”
It’s also worth noting that McGraw employees a staff of all females and she hopes to maintain that. With this catching the media attention it’s interesting to see their perception of the men’s teams. The media failed to mention that every team in the men’s tournament did not have a female coach. So, why question McGraw decision to employ a female staff when none of the men’s teams are attempting to diversify as well?
With the women’s basketball industry becoming more lucrative, men took up head coaching positions. But we still haven’t seen women break into the men’s league. This difference in gender equality is becoming more and more frustrating for women in the industry and rightfully so.
McGraw continued by saying, “When you look at men’s basketball, 99 percent of the jobs go to men. Why shouldn’t 100 or 99 percent of the jobs in women’s basketball go to women? Maybe it’s because we only have 10 percent women athletic directors in Division I. People hire people who look like them. That’s the problem.”
All valid points from the historic coach. During the 1976-77 women basketball season, 79.4 percent of the teams had female head coaches. However, this number has dropped since. During the 2017-2018 season, only 59.3 percent of the head coaches were female, while the men’s league was still dominated by men on the bench.
With public criticism, it will be interesting to see how the NCAA responds to the obvious gender divide in college basketball.