NCAA apologizes after giving women insulting facilities for March Madness
San Antonio, Texas - The NCAA caught a lot of heat online after images surfaced on social media, showing the scandalous differences in training facilities provides for the men and women participating in March Madness.
Men's and women's college basketball teams are currently training in separate bubbles in Indianapolis and San Antonio, respectively, for the March Madness tournaments, according to BuzzFeed News.
The tournament demands a lot from its players, so a weight lifting area is indispensable. That these facilities will differ in form and size depending on the location is perfectly understandable.
But the chasm between what male players are provided with compared to the female athletes is jaw-dropping.
That became painfully obvious after Ali Kershner, a coach at Stanford posted photos on Instagram which showed the mind-boggling contrast.
"This is a chance to have a conversation and get better"
The top image in Kershner's post shows the men's gym, a huge area with a plethora of weights to choose from and plenty of space to stay distanced.
The bottom photo reveals what seems like a joke: a women's "facility" which consists of a single rack of light dumbbells.
"@ncaawbb @ncaa @marchmadness this needs to be addressed. These women want and deserve to be given the same opportunities," Kershner wrote in the post, adding: "In a year defined by a fight for equality this is a chance to have a conversation and get better."
In a statement posted on Twitter, NCAA's vice president of women's basketball said in a statement that the discrepancy was partly due to compromised space.
But players were quick to challenge the statement, as Sedona Prince, who plays for Oregon, posted a TikTok showing the vast unused space at the women's facility in contrast to the large men's gym.
After outrage over the blatantly unequal treatment of male and female teams in the tournament went viral, NCAA followed up with a proper apology to the female players, and gave them what they deserved: a large weight room.
"We got a ton more dumbbells; look at that. Look at all these racks for squats and whatever you wanna do," said Sedona Prince in a follow-up TikTok.
Cover photo: instagram/kershner.ali