South Car­oli­na defeats Caitlin Clark and Iowa for women’s NCAA bas­ket­ball cham­pi­onship

The Uni­ver­si­ty of South Carolina’s Lady Game­cocks bas­ket­ball team defeat­ed the Uni­ver­si­ty of Iowa’s Lady Hawkeyes 87–75 Sun­day in the NCAA Tour­na­ment cham­pi­onship.
This marked the first time since 2016 that women’s bas­ket­ball had an unde­feat­ed cham­pi­on in its tour­na­ment.
The Lady Hawkeyes had super­star play­er Caitlin Clark break yet anoth­er scor­ing record with­in the first quar­ter after she made 18 points, the most made dur­ing a cham­pi­onship first quar­ter. Clark took the title of NCAA Play­er of the Year and has since declared she will enter the WNBA draft.

South Car­oli­na guard Raven John­son (25) blocks a shot by Iowa guard Caitlin Clark (22) dur­ing the first half of the Final Four col­lege bas­ket­ball cham­pi­onship game in the women’s NCAA Tour­na­ment, Sun­day, April 7, 2024, in Cleve­land. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

At half­time, the Game­cocks were in the lead with 49 points to the Hawkeyes’ 46 points. The Game­cocks were ranked first in the SEC Con­fer­ence after an unde­feat­ed sea­son lead­ing up to Sunday’s game. Mean­while, the Hawkeyes were ranked sec­ond in the Big Ten Con­fer­ence an …