DAILY DIRT: Win or lose, Caitlin Clark has reached GOAT status with Michael Jordan

This is also the day a long-ago conversation with a friend from long ago comes to mind … Welcome to today’s three thoughts that make up Vol. 912 of The Daily Dirt.

1. Today is a fitting time to officially make the following statement: Iowa wunderkind Caitlin Clark is the greatest of all-time, the GOAT of women’s basketball.

What Clark, who will lead Iowa against mighty UConn in one of tonight’s two NCAA semifinal games, has meant to women’s basketball can only be described — or measured, if you will — by two words: Michael Jordan.

Remember when Jordan put the NBA on his back in the mid-1980s and almost single-handedly lifted the sport to equal status with the NFL and MLB? (If you don’t, let me remind you it was as late as 1981 when the NBA Finals were broadcast on a tape-delay basis. The event “was not important enough” to interrupt regular network programming. Jordan, the original GOAT, changed all of that.)

Clark has had the same effect on women’s college basketball, and that kind of impact will most assuredly carry over to her career in the WNBA.

We are living in a marvelous age, able to see an individual like Clark raise an entire sport to the next level. It’s exciting, and it’s been a long time coming.

I can remember covering a girls varsity high school basketball game in the mid-1970s back in Ohio. The game was played in an antiquated junior high gym between two teams that — to be kind — struggled for four quarters simply to get the ball across midcourt. The only people on hand were a handful of friends and relatives. I seriously wondered that night if girls basketball had a legitimate future.

Fast forward 10 years, and it was obvious the girls game was progressing, and I remember a conversation I had with a lady named Lori Wagner. She was coach of one of the high school teams in the Ohio town I was working at during that period of my life. Lori and I would often sit and talk about the girls game, and I respected her thoughts.

“Steve, there will come a day when girls basketball will explode,” she said to me. “It’s coming, believe me, it’s coming. I may not be around to see it, but when it truly arrives it will be like nothing we ever expected.”

I tried this week to track Lori down, but was unable. I haven’t had the chance to talk with her for more than 30 years, but I just wanted to tell her one thing.

She was right.

2. Just as a reminder, tonight’s semifinals have South Carolina playing North Carolina State at 6 p.m., followed by UConn and Iowa at 8 p.m., live from Cleveland, Ohio.

Both games are on ESPN.

How big are these games? How interested is America? Consider the following:

• Iowa’s regional championship win over LSU averaged 12.3 million viewers. The audience peaked at 16.1 million during the second half. Sports Illustrated reported that makes it the most-watched women’s college basketball contest on record, and the most-watched college basketball game — men’s or women’s — EVER on ESPN platforms.
• ESPN is all in this weekend, utilizing its signature MegaCast presentation across ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3 and ESPN+.
• ESPN will using an unprecedented 43 cameras, plus a drone.
• ESPN2 will even air Saturday’s open practices (beginning at 1:30 p.m.) for the two teams advancing to Sunday’s championship. 

3. Do you find all the talk about millennials, Gen Xers, Gen Zers, etc., a bit confusing?

You’re not alone.

Here’s a guide I think you’ll find helpful. Find your birth year among the following and you’ll know what you are, or your kids, or your best friends:

• Generation Alpha (2013 to present)
• Generation Z (1997-2012)
• Millennial (1981-96)
• Generation X (1965-80)
• Baby Boomers (1946-64)
• Silent Generation (1928-1945)
• Greatest Generation (1901-27)
• Lost Generation (1883-1900)

Steve Thought O’ The Day — My picks for the women’s Final Four tonight are: UConn over Iowa and South Carolina over North Carolina State.

Steve Eighinger writes daily for Muddy River News. Could you at least let her play a couple of games as a pro before you compare her to Jordan?