On Friday, former UConn women’s basketball star and WNBA player Rebecca Lobo posted a video on social media recounting an alleged incident at her son’s basketball tournament.
Lobo coaches her 15-year-old son’s team and said she received a comment from a referee during a discussion about a missed foul call.
“I said he didn’t slip, he got fouled,” Lobo said in the video. “And this ref, a man, looked at me and he said this is a grown man’s game, this isn’t a women’s game.”
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Her post on X sparked a discussion about sexism in sports, with many people coming to her defense, including Lobo's former UConn teammate and current Connecticut Sun President Jennifer Rizzotti, who quote retweeted Lobo’s post saying, “I’ve always got your back Hall of Famer.”
With lots of attention on women’s sports, Lobo used the opportunity to tell her followers to watch the WNBA.
“It’s an interesting moment in women’s sports,” Professor Susan Cahn, of the University of Buffalo and expert on gender in sports, said. “There seems to be incredible momentum and interest and support, that hasn’t been there. On the other hand, as that video from Rebecca Lobo shows, sexism is alive and well in sport.”
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Darren Gilbert is the director of CT Take Over, an AAU basketball program with over 100 kids.
“I have women coaches, who are coaches of boys teams,” he said. “It should be fair, no matter if you’re male, female. The game should be played the right way, the game should be taught the right way, there should be no boy or girl or any of that.”
Gilbert said the success of players like Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese has changed the culture.
“I think a lot of people are starting to take notice on how good these girls are,” he said. “But, there should be no “this is a grown man’s game” or any of that. It’s definitely inappropriate to say, whether it’s a male or a female.”
He also said that referee pool in travel basketball has gotten worse, which he attributes to on court conflicts with coaches and parents.
“The lower-level tournaments, the local tournament. There’s some people that might not even be certified,” he said.
While there’s been progress in the representation of women in sports, Cahn said comments like this show there’s still work to be done.
“People have been talking about sexism in sports for over 50 years,” Cahn said. “The question is who has been listening and who is willing to do something about it.”
Lobo was not available for an interview to discuss her comments, but her team did confirm the incident happened in Pennsylvania.
