Guest post by Joe Hoft at JoeHoft.com – republished with permission
Caitlin Clark is a phenomenon and sports fans know it.
On Wednesday night Clark broke more all-time records in NCAA women’s basketball in her team’s final Big Ten season road game, as her Hawkeyes blew out Minnesota 108-60.
The tickets for Clark’s final home game on Sunday, should she decide not to come back next year, are going for over $5,000.
ESPN writes:
Iowa Hawkeyes guard Caitlin Clark broke the NCAA women’s scoring record in early February — and looks to shatter another record by filling the seats of Carver-Hawkeye Arena.
On Sunday, the No. 6 Hawkeyes will go head-to-head with the No. 2 Ohio State Buckeyes for senior night. It’ll cost $408 to see the potential first-round WNBA draft pick in what could be her final regular-season home game in an Iowa jersey.
he most expensive listing for the game is at $5,199, according to Vivid Seats.
Tickets to see Clark’s matchup against the top-ranked Buckeyes have surpassed all women’s college basketball and WNBA games as the most expensive for a women’s game.
This comes after Clark set the scoring record against the Michigan Wolverines on Feb. 15, where tickets were $337. That price increased by 45% for the final home game.
Recently, the Big Ten sold out of tickets for the women’s basketball conference tournament, marking the first sellout in in nearly three decades of its existence.
lark is only 18 points away from passing “Pistol Pete” Maravich for the all-time scoring lead in NCAA basketball, men’s or women’s, and she is expected to surpass this mark on Sunday.
The former UCLA and Pro basketball great Bill Walton sees comparisons between Clark and Maravich.
Two days before Christmas 1969, Bill Walton first saw Pete Maravich in person.
A high school senior from San Diego headed to hoops immortality at UCLA, Walton watched at Pauley Pavilion as the LSU legend went through his pregame warmup drills.
“He was a genius,” Walton told ESPN. “And as is often the case with geniuses, they get bored very quickly. So he was constantly challenging himself. He was a showman, and he loved the show.”
Walton understands why people see similarities between Maravich and Iowa women’s college basketball star Caitlin Clark, who is closing in on passing Maravich for the Division I men’s and women’s scoring mark. Maravich scored 3,667 points from 1967-70; Clark is at 3,650. She enters Sunday’s regular-season finale at home against Ohio State just 18 points shy of breaking the record.
“When I watch her play, which is as often as possible, it just puts a giant smile on my face,” Walton said. “The beauty of basketball is that it’s not all about size and strength. It’s about skill, timing and position, and she has all of that stuff and more. She awes people with her imagination and creativity. She makes it fun.”
Maravich was born in 1947 and died at age 40 in 1988, 14 years before Clark was born. In that time, the world of basketball expanded enormously, including the modern-day women’s game. Maravich’s college career came before freshman eligibility, so he played just three seasons — 83 total games — at LSU. Before the 3-point shot and the shot clock, Maravich averaged 38.1 shots and 44.2 points per game. Clark, a senior, has averaged 19.9 shots and 28.3 points in 129 career games.
Walton said statistical comparisons between different eras in sports are problematic because of all the variables. But what players can mean to a sport, and how they make people feel while watching them are more comparable.
“Caitlin is one of those rare forces of nature that when she’s playing, you cannot take your eyes off her because she’s just moving in this graceful and productive manner,” Walton said. “She’s also a result of the evolutionary process from the late ’60s and early ’70s, when women started to be empowered to play competitive sports. A whole lot of foundational players have come before her.”
Good luck getting a ticket to Sunday’s final season game and most likely Clark’s final NCAA regular season game at Iowa.