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Ramona Shelburne, ESPN Senior WriterApr 15, 2024, 10:45 PM ET
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- Senior author for ESPN.com
- Used 7 years at the Los Angeles Daily News
Scott Van Pelt chuckled aloud and clapped. Take legal action against Bird’s face illuminated with bemusement. Due To The Fact That Diana Taurasi didn’t simply respond to the concern that was on his mind as an ESPN “SportsCenter” anchor. She responded to the concern every gamer and coach who has actually been following the increase of Iowa Hawkeyes super star guard Caitlin Clark has actually been discussing this spring:
“What will the league have in shop for [her] when she arrives?” Van Pelt asked, gently goading Taurasi.
“Look, SVP. Truth is coming,” Taurasi stated. “We all went through it. That occurs on the NBA side, and you’re visiting it on this side. You look superhuman playing versus 18-year-olds, however you’re going to feature some grown ladies that have actually been playing expert basketball for a very long time.”
It was traditional Taurasi. Bold. Competitive. Unapologetic. And it appeared to turbocharge the discussion amongst WNBA stars previous and present who had actually made the journey to Cleveland to enjoy the females’s Final Four along with text chains all over the world with existing gamers overseas.
Simply how great will Clark be as a novice? Can she perhaps measure up to the buzz she has produced for the ladies’s video game as a college professional athlete? How will veterans who’ve defended years to make more cash and take advantage of the league react to a gamer who has been generating 7 figures in NIL cash as an university student for the previous 2 years? Which veteran will lay the very first shoulder into her chest to see how she reacts?
The response to the last one was consentaneous: Taurasi.
“Diana’s like Kobe [Bryant],” two-time WNBA MVP Elena Delle Donne informed ESPN. “She’s going to check you, so you need to be all set. That’s her, her character. I enjoy her from being on Team USA. She’s Kobe. I suggest, Kobe raked his own colleague [Pau Gasol] in the Olympics, so nobody’s safe.”
Sure enough, Delle Donne stated Taurasi did the very same thing to her as a novice.
“Dee did that thing where she attempted to rake me when I was making a cut,” she stated. “But after I returned at her, it didn’t occur once again.”
For 2012 No. 1 choice Nneka Ogwumike, Tamika Catchings was the veterinarian who provided her the “welcome to the league” treatment as a novice.
“Tamika is such a sweetie, so I do not understand if it was always outwardly like, ‘Hey, I’m attempting to school you,'” Ogwumike stated. “But it’s like, ‘OK, they’re going to put the novice on me. Let me go to work.’
“She didn’t need to state it for me to understand that was what was going on.”
Bird was the No.