Women who work in sports

She and I have something in common I will tell her about in a second.

There is a great podcast called She Got Game, inspiring women inspired by sports on Audible and she joins us right now on the Adam Gold show. Here's what we have in common, Bonnie, before we start talking about the series. I'm ready, play it on me. You and I are both graduates of the University of Maryland. You're a Terp?

I'm a Terp. I'm not going to ask you what year because then you're going to ask me what year and people don't need to know. You are younger than I. I am 1988. So we're pretty close. No way.

I don't believe that for a second. No, we are. Here's what we have in common. I was just speaking on another station about how we were there during the dark days. While you were 88, you were there to see the tail end of Lenny Bias.

Yes. I was there two years after Len Bias unfortunately passed away and then the entire athletic department was thrown into tumult because Bob Wade, our basketball coach, got nailed for all the NCAA recruiting violations which just had a ripple effect not just on the basketball team but on the entire athletic department. So when I speak fondly about how the 2002 championship where Maryland won it all was probably my favorite memory as a broadcaster, you understand that like I experienced the dark days of Maryland basketball just to see them reach the pinnacle is just awesome. You know it's interesting, Bonnie Bernstein is joining us and I don't want to go down this too far because we have other things to talk about is that it impacted campus life because I living in Ellicott Hall, by the way Scott Van Pelt lived two floors above me on Ellicott Hall.

Did he? Yeah, Scott and I knew each other. Did you know him? Yeah, Scott and I were you know we didn't hang in the same group but we knew each other pretty well in College Park.

Well he hung at Bentley's and I hung at the what we were like Santa Fe Cafe. If you could get into Santa Fe with a fake ID, god bless. That was the place where you legit had to be either 21 or had like a killer ID to get by and I work there. So in order for me to get a hostessing job at Santa Fe gave us a book of fake IDs we had to memorize and we got tested on it or else we wouldn't get hired.

Wow, that's that's very good. By the way the Friday free wings thing, what a scam. Well you had to wait like an hour and 15 minutes for like eight scrawny wings. But it's worth it. Look, you're a hungry starving college kid.

Free wings, take them. No question about that. But campus life changed so much in the wake of Bias' death. So for I lived on campus for one more year. I lived on campus for three years. That my junior year because he passed away after my sophomore year. My junior year it was like in many ways being like in prison. They were so protective of everything. Security changed in all the dorms.

Cragged, there were constant patrols. I mean it really, I should probably stop this this whole thing right there because I don't want to give away too much of my college life. Let's get to She Got Game because I want to and I know I've looked at the guest list whether it's Layla Ali or Chelsea Clinton or Shawn Johnson, Amy Trask who I'm a big I follow on Twitter and she is a dynamite follow for NFL stuff. And also you know the I guess the I would just call it a civil rights issue of women working in sports. Yeah, these are all fascinating people but before we get to that can I ask you about Kaitlyn Clark and to me she is she's Steph Curry and she's this version of Steph Curry. She's got love from Steph Curry too so you know you're doing something right if you're getting social media love from Steph. So what what are your thoughts on I mean she might be the she's the story of the NCAA tournament.

She's the story at the perfect time. I wouldn't say she's the only story because what Don Staley's done at South Carolina I think they've won 42 straight dating back to last year and 36 this year and have two bigs at six seven and six five who you just cannot penetrate on the low block. So I mean there's that and and the Iowa South Carolina semi-final coming up may break the ratings record for all of female sports but Kaitlyn's timing could not be better because I think Adam when you look at things on a broader scale there is a sustainable women's movement in sports that is continuing to become more and more visible. If you look at attendance it's up across the board. If you look at ratings for women's sports it's up across the board. If you look at the amount of investment that distribution platforms are making to acquire the rights to showcase women's sports that's up. If you look at the number of brands that are getting behind women's sports in a meaningful way and at the league level the team level and at the individual athlete level when we started talking about NIL nobody was thinking oh yeah Kaitlyn Clark the Cavender Twins they're going to be inking these huge NIL deals but what's the why there and the why there is when you look at the research women engage more powerfully more impactfully on social media than men do so when you look at hey I'm going to go out and get an athlete and do an NIL deal and we're going to Olivia Dunn the LSU gymnast we're going to leverage her social media platform if you have an understanding of their audience and that is the audience you want to reach there's no better way to reach that audience than through a female athlete and so to get back to your original question about Kaitlyn yes she is transformative in every single way it is a wonder to watch her if you're not a women's basketball fan just do it because if you are a basketball purist and you watch the way she plays she is as fundamentally found as any player you will find but Kaitlyn's ability in combination with what's going on on a broader scale in women's sports right now is really palpable. Bonnie Bernstein a legend joining us here on the Adam Gold show she got game inspiring women inspired by sports on audible it's a 10-part series um you mentioned you know how I guess commercially attractive the women's sports has become the ACC now has basically a title sponsor for their major women's sports Ally is the ACC's title sponsor um and the women's European soccer championships I mean I'm a soccer fan I call it football but uh so the women's euros did massive numbers not only in terms of television uh in Europe and even in the United States but also in terms of attendance they they sold way more tickets to that than they even believed that they would I think that that's the next frontier for televised sports a hundred percent and women's soccer has really been football soccer if you're a football purist you call it football and we call football American football and yes all of that but women's soccer is really leading the way when you look at the the gender equity suit that they won and so now the women's national team is getting the same amount of money and resources that the men's team is but the reason why they won that suit was because there was an undeniable there were undeniable data points that spoke to attendance ticket sales merchandise sales and the overall success of the women's national team here in the states versus the men's when it comes to winning world cups winning uh gold medals at the Olympics so soccer is the gold standard but you mentioned Ally and Ally really is at the forefront of the brand space when it comes to supporting women's sports why because Andrea Brimmer at Ally the company's CMO she plays soccer at Michigan State she knows exactly what the She Got Game series is all about Adam she knows about the power of women's sports about what we learn the life skills we master as athletes and how we are able to parlay that into professional success and so because Andrea is a byproduct of Title IX she's in a decision-making position at Ally they have decided that over the next five years they're going to do a 50-50 spend they're going to equally spend on men's and women's sports and I know they're a big ACC sponsor they're also a big NWSL sponsor and they basically went to CBS and Paramount where the NWSL broadcast their games and they said look you want our money you're going to put the NWSL championship on prime time on the mothership and sure enough for the first time ever the NWSL championship game was on CBS in prime time and you need people who pull the purse strings to be a proponent of women's sports in order to see sustainable change and Ally is one of those companies that's really leading the way. It's awesome to watch my son is he's like a brand new basketball fan and that is one of my missions is to force him to watch the game as the women play it and understand just how great they are because you know we get it like the highlights that we see sometimes are like Brittney Griner dunking like that ain't it that ain't it for me right it's watching Kaitlyn Clark do what she does she is one of the best basketball players in the entire world. Give me one thing about the podcast series that struck you as you were doing it as you are putting it together before we have to say goodbye. Well I wanted to find a different way to celebrate Title IX beyond showcasing the athletes and the game changers and what I learned through this research from Ernst and Young about 94 percent of women in c-suites having a background in sports the light bulb went off and I said this is going to empower me to tell stories about the power of sports in a different way so yes you will know who Laila Ali is and Shawn Johnson is because these are world-class athletes who have parlayed what they've learned through sports to achieve professional success you know who Chelsea Clinton is you probably know who Ayesha Tyler the actress is but you probably don't know that they played sports and they tell stories about how their experience as athletes has empowered them to achieve success in their industries and then you have badass industry women like Amy Trask the only woman to serve as an NFL CEO like Sheila Johnson who is the first female black billionaire who played tennis and broke the color barrier as the first black cheerleader in Illinois history who oh by the way is also the only woman to have ownership stakes in three pro sports teams in the Wizards and the Capitals and the Mystics all of these women have the common bond that they achieved incredible life skills that have enabled them to achieve extraordinary professional success and what that allows your listeners to do whether you're a girl dad or a girl mom or an email athlete is to understand that yes as athletes we all want to win championships but even if you're not a championship caliber athlete what you will learn through sports is the reason why you should play as long as you possibly can because there's just no substitute for the leadership the teamwork the self-confidence the accountability the resilience that we learn as athletes that will propel you to success in life so says a four-time all-american gymnast at the University of Maryland well done academic all-american but we'll take it okay well either way you were gymnast and that's uh I was I mean I have the scars to prove it I'd fall off the balance beam just looking at it Bonnie Bernstein uh I appreciate your time she got game inspiring women inspired by sports on audible.com go check it out 10-part series I thank you so much hopefully we can talk again down the road that's awesome and Adam by the way if in the event you're not an audible subscriber and you want to check it out you can get a 30-day free trial all of the episodes are between 20 and 30 minutes so they're super snackable if you like please rate and review because these things are very important in podcast land but I just really appreciate y'all listening hey thank you very much Bonnie I appreciate your time thanks Adam