Hip-hop mogul Ice Cube announced Wednesday that his BIG3 basketball organization offered superstar college player Caitlin Clark $5 million to suit up for the league.
Calling it a “historic offer” to a “generational athlete,” Ice Cube said he’s still waiting for the University of Iowa guard to respond to the opportunity.
The rapper and actor is a co-founder of BIG3, the 3-on-3 league that attracts former NBA players and international players, and confirmed the offer while responding to a TMZ story on X.
“We intended the offer to remain private while Caitlin Clark plays for the championship. But I won’t deny what’s now already out there: BIG3 made a historic offer to Caitlin Clark. Why wouldn’t we?,” Ice Cube wrote. “Caitlin is a generational athlete who can achieve tremendous success in the BIG3.”
Get top local stories in Connecticut delivered to you every morning. Sign up for NBC Connecticut's News Headlines newsletter.
Ice Cube, 54, whose name is O’Shea Jackson, said on X the BIG3 has already broken barriers by offering women head coaching jobs.
“The skeptics laughed when we made Nancy Lieberman the first female coach of a men’s pro team, and she won the championship in her first year. Then Lisa Leslie won it all in year two. With our offer, Caitlin Clark can make history and break down even more barriers for women athletes.”
Representatives for Ice Cube and Clark were not immediately reached by NBC News on Wednesday afternoon.
Ice Cube said on the “Pat McAfee Show” on Wednesday the BIG3 has not yet heard back from Clark.
"We just need an answer, as soon as they are ready to give it to us," he said.
He added: "It's always 50-50 till we get a no. At the end of the day, it's a generous offer."
He also said on the show he would not be doing his job if the BIG3 didn't explore the possibility of adding Clark, saying she could take the league into a "different stratosphere."
In February, Clark became the NCAA women’s career scoring leader against the University of Michigan.
Two weeks after she broke that record, she became the NCAA Division I basketball’s overall scoring leader, breaking “Pistol Pete” Maravich’s record of 3,667 career points, which stood for more than 50 years.
Clark’s record-setting performance drew huge television ratings, attracting more than 4 million television viewers at its peak and was the most-watched women’s regular-season basketball game since 1999, Fox Sports said.
In late February, Clark announced she will enter the WNBA draft this spring.
Ice Cube said on X that female professional basketball players on U.S. soil should have more options than the WNBA and should have a choice of avoiding playing overseas in some countries. Playing in Europe during the offseason gives WNBA players a chance to earn four or five times their American salaries.
“America’s women athletes should not be forced to spend their off seasons playing in often dismal and dubious foreign countries just to make ends meet,” Ice Cube said. “And they should have more than just one professional option in the US at a time when American pro sports leagues are being infiltrated by autocratic, anti-women regimes such as Qatar. Our pathbreaking offer to Caitlin Clark demonstrates that BIG3 now offers another choice for athletes.”
Clark scored 32 points during her team's win on Monday in the second round of the NCAA Tournament against the West Virginia Mountaineers.
This story first appeared on NBCNews.com. More from NBC News:
