Tag Archives: Candace Parker

Pat Summitt (1952-2016): Sports Legend, Feminist Hero

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Debbie says:

pat-summitt

I’m ashamed that I didn’t know more about Pat Summitt before she died earlier this week.  Her name was only vaguely familiar to me; I’ve been reading up since, and I’m in awe.

Body image activists and thinkers are often uncomfortable with athleticism and competition because so many people can be marginalized by successes available to only a few. At the same time, appreciating the body has to include appreciating its highest achievements, without valorizing those achievements at the expense of everyone else. Pat Summitt represents a lifelong commitment to working first with her own body and then with the minds and bodies of competitive college-level women’s basketball players, and getting absolutely the best out of herself and everyone she worked with.

For any of you who are as out of this loop as I was, Summitt coached the University of Tennessee Lady Vols to nearly 1100 wins, making her the coach in all of basketball history with the most victories. In 36 years, she took her team to eight NCAA championships (a record at that time). The only thing better than her record of wins is her record of educational achievement: 100% of the students who completed their athletic eligibility during her tenure also graduated from college.

She died at age 64 of complications from early Alzheimer’s disease.

As Liz Magee said in her obituary at The Frisky, Summitt was “a truly great feminist in a beautifully non-performative way. She just did the damn thing.” In that context, Magee cites Summitt’s response when she was invited to coach the University of Tennessee men’s team: “Why would that be a step up?

When she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, she refused to step down, although she acknowledged that her mind was not working like it had been. With the help of associate coaches, she coached one more year before retiring in 2012.

She had a consuming passion, and she lived it to the utmost. One of her star players, Candace Parker, has become a WNBA star. After last night’s game, she spoke for a few moments about her beloved “Coach.”

Here’s a beautifully embodied quotation from Summitt on her own basketball career before she was a coach:

It’s difficult to explain to someone who has never competed, but a moment arrives in the life of a serious athlete when the game begins to live in you: It so occupies your mind and body that you almost become it. You gain a sense of such command over your own arms and legs that it can almost feel like flying, and you begin to crave that sensation daily. Everything else is just an interruption until you can return to it. That was me. I played, quite literally, in my sleep.

Girl Power: It’s Not Just for Humans Any More

Debbie says:

It’s late, I’m tired, and I was surfing about for something to write about tonight when I found this.

Y’see, Fox News decided to make a list of ten women (females) who can compete with men (males) on male terms in sports. As StuntDouble points out in her blog on the AfterEllen site linked above, this is already an unreasonable idea:

Of course my problem with this list is that [it] exists at all.

When Pat Summitt became the all-time winningest coach in NCAA history, the debate rattled on for weeks about whether or not she could truly be considered great if she never coaches men. When Candace Parker dunks, the criticism is that she can only do it in the open court, making her somehow inferior to men who can dunk in traffic. And when Danica Patrick or Michelle Wie place well against men, the argument is even dumber: Well, it’s not like driving a car/swinging a club is actually a sport!

That being said, again as StuntDouble notes, Fox goes out of its way to criticize or undermine the women it selects for the list.

Katie Hnida, first woman to score in a NCAA football game, made an allegation of rape against a teammate but didn’t press charges. (Imagine a male sports hero being criticized for making an allegation of, let’s say, theft, against a teammate, but not pressing charges.)

Among the golfers, Michelle Wie has only “made the cut” in a mixed-gender group once, and Anika Sorenstam missed the cut altogether. Babe Didrikson Zaharias is still the only woman to make the cut in a PGA tour event, but they have to tell us about the ones she missed.

StuntDouble doesn’t go into some of the even subtler put downs. Billie Jean King may have beaten Bobby Riggs, but only after he beat the top-ranked woman player. Hayley Wickenheiser is better known for playing against women than against men. (Now there’s a surprise!) Shirley Muldowney wasn’t first, and her “opening the door” for women is more important than her actual wins.

Only Candace Parker and Danica Patrick seem to have escaped the sportswriter’s scalpel.

But the best of all is the third choice out of the ten: none other than Rachel Alexandra, first filly to win the Preakness since 1924. Yes, really.

Because you know, when push comes to shove, the only thing interesting about being female in a male world is that ability to bear children foals.

They couldn’t have said it more clearly if they tried: “Girl power is more about being female than it is about being human.”

Thanks, Fox. We knew you felt that way all along; it’s kind of comforting to have it right out there where everyone can see it.