Paige Bueckers wins ESPY Award, advocates for Black female athletes

NEW YORK – Connecticut guard Paige Bueckers won an ESPY Award on Saturday night as the best women's college athlete, and the former Hopkins High School star used her platform to acknowledge that as a white woman in a predominantly Black sport, she gets disproportionate media coverage.

"I think we should use this power together to also celebrate Black women," the 19-year-old said at the Rooftop at Pier 17, where the award ceremony was held.

Bueckers said Black women's basketball players did not get the credit they deserve. "In the WNBA last season the postseason awards, 80 percent of the winners were Black, but they got half the amount of coverage as the white athletes," she said. "So I think it's time for a change."

And time to celebrate Black women, she said: "To all the incredible Black women in my life, on my teams. To Breonna Taylor and all the lives lost. To those names I have not yet learned but I hope to share — I stand behind you and I will continue to follow you and follow your lead and fight for you guys."

Bueckers led the Huskies to a 28-2 record and the NCAA title game in San Antonio. She thanked her coaches and teammates, saying without them she would not be standing up on the stage.

Two other athletes with Minnesota ties also received awards at the ESPYs:

• Gonzaga's overtime victory over UCLA in the Final Four men's semifinals was named the best game. Jalen Suggs, a former Minnehaha Academy star, made a 40-foot shot at the buzzer to win it and he was among the Bulldogs who accepted the award.

• Maya Moore, who left the Lynx in 2019 to help family friend Jonathan Irons — who later became her husband — win his release from prison, accepted the Arthur Ashe Courage Award. "What an amazing night," Moore said. "Thank you to so many. … Jonathan, I am so happy for you. Let us say hallelujah that Jonathan is sitting here and now." Moore also said she would continue working for those wrongfully imprisoned.

News Services