Over the past couple of years, a rivalry has emerged between women’s basketball stars Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese after they first met in the 2023 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament title game. That rivalry reached another chapter this week when the two faced off on the court at the WNBA level, and Reese recently opened up a little bit about her role in it.
During a recent interview, Angel Reese understands that she has become sort of a villain compared to Caitlin Clark, but she’s happy to embrace that role for the betterment of women’s basketball as a whole.
“It all started with the national championship game, and I’ve been dealing with this for two years now,” Reese said. “Understanding, yeah negative things have probably been said about me. But honestly, I’ll take that because look where women’s basketball is. People are talking about women’s basketball who you would never think would be talking about women’s basketball.”
"I'll look back in 20 years and be like, the reason why we're watching women's basketball is not just because of one person. It's because of me, too. I want ya'll to realize that." – Angel Reese
(via @GNSportsTV) pic.twitter.com/dfn2LiuMrY
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) June 4, 2024
Reese believes that when she looks back on her career, she will be able to know confidently that she played a role in the growth of the game, not just Caitlin Clark.
“People are pulling up to games, we’ve got celebrities coming to games, sold-out arenas, just because of one single game. And just looking at that, I’ll take that role. I’ll take the bad guy role. And I’ll continue to take that on and be that for my teammates,” Reese said.
“And I know I’ll go down in history. I’ll look back in 20 years and be like ‘Yeah, the reason why we’re watching women’s basketball is not just because of one person. It’s because of me too.’ And I want y’all to realize that.”
