ALBANY — Caitlin Clark did it the way the superstars do it, in any sport. She lifted her team, and lifted the entire state of Iowa at the same time, after these last two years of elevating women’s basketball to soaring, unprecedented heights.
When it was over, after she had dribbled out the final seconds of Iowa 94, LSU 87, after she had joined her teammates in a joyous embrace, after she had flung the basketball to her older brother who was standing alongside her father in the stands behind the Iowa bench, after she had posed on the court with her parents and held up a final four fingers, she lay on a bed of confetti, the Most Outstanding Player trophy on her chest, the picture of euphoria, of a dream chased and captured.
Caitlin Clark goes back to the Final Four in Cleveland.
It was 9:56 p.m, when she stood atop a ladder and gazed up at the celebratory Iowa crowd with a big smile, scissors in hand. Snip.
We often talk about male players who rise to the occasion as a man among boys.
Now we should marvel at Caitlin Clark as a woman among girls.
“There were a lot of great players on the floor out there — she was just like a queen among women if you could even say it that way,” ESPN color analyst Rebecca Lobo told The Post.
Betcha little boys watching were inspired, too.
This was compelling theater every step of the way, and with every 3 she rained down from the heavens, with every pinpoint pass she delivered, it sounded as if the entire state of Iowa was inside MVP Arena.
“I’m not worried about what the other team’s doing, I’m not worried about what call the ref is making, I’m worried about what Iowa needs,” Clark said. “I’ve always had basketball skills, it’s just been making my mind better.”
Her legacy would have been intact as a forever legend even had she not scored 41 points to avenge last year’s loss to Angel Reese and LSU in the championship game.
Resting on her laurels was no option for her.
Neither was losing, and neither was never getting to play another game with teammates she loves for a school and a state she loves.
“There could have been nobody in the gym and both teams would have competed the exact same way,” Clark said.
Much has been made of how she and Reese have been the women’s basketball version of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson. Caitlin Clark (9-for-20 from Des Moines, 13-for-29 overall, seven rebounds, 12 assists, five turnovers) showed up as both, and Steph Curry and Michael Jordan in Game 7s.
She was an unstoppable force of nature, a cold-blooded assassin who was not going to be denied.
“Every single time the moment is big, she meets the moment,” Lobo said. “It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.”
She is the face of women’s basketball, and she is a marketer’s delight. Yes, that’s her in the State Farm commercial. She is the all-time leading scorer in major college basketball history, women and men. She is an inspiration to young girls, from Iowa and beyond who wear her No. 22 and aspire to be a Caitlin Clark, and she embraces it all.
Team USA wants her to join. She will be the first pick of the WNBA draft.
It’s good to be Caitlin Clark.
“I thought my shot felt good in warm-ups,” she said.
When she hit a 3 that gave Iowa an 80-69 lead, she pounded her chest and looked up at the Iowa fans and exulted.
“I think I just got hyped for a second,” she said, and laughed. “Sometimes you get a little hyped for yourself and you do things that you don’t even realize you’re doing. But I think that was the only 3 I celebrated.”
Reese (17 points on 7-for-21 shooting, 20 rebounds) had sprained her ankle and left the game for a couple of minutes in the second quarter. She fouled out with 1:45 remaining. A year ago she flipped Clark the ring finger on her way to the national championship. She sat at the end of the bench and looked up at the scoreboard when Clark sank a pair of free throws at the end. It read Clark 39 — as in points.
“We want to win two more and I think we have the power to do that,” Clark said.
LSU coach Kim Mulkey had a message for Caitlin Clark: “I sure am glad you’re leaving.” She would add: “Never seen anything like it.”
Reese, teary-eyed at her press conference, her immediate future uncertain, said this to Caitlin Clark: “Go win it.”
Who would bet against Greatlin Clark?
