Jill Biden caused a stir after the NCAA’s Women’s National Championship when the first lady invited both teams to the White House, breaking the tradition of the winning team visiting the president’s home.
Several people voiced their concern about Biden’s offer. Shaquille O’Neal has now weighed in on the matter. During an interview on The Big Podcast, Shaq suggested that Biden’s invitation was rooted in racism—LSU’s women’s basketball team is predominately Black, while Iowa’s women’s basketball team is mostly white.
“That’s not what it was about,” Shaq said during The Big Podcast interview. “I want people to use their imaginations. You know what it was about. I’m not going to mention it. You know what it was about, right?’
‘We can say it,’ Nischelle Turner, co-host of The Big Podcast, said. ‘It became a race issue. It became a team of all-Black girls beating a team of all-white girls. That’s what it became.’
Spice Adams, co-host of The Big Podcast, added: If Iowa won, she probably wouldn’t have had LSU come there.
On April 3, after LSU beat Iowa to bring the NCAA Women’s National Championship to Baton Rouge, Biden praised both teams, highlighting Iowa’s sportsmanship.
“Last night, I attended the NCAA women’s basketball championship,” Biden said during an event. “So I know we’ll have the champions come to the White House, we always do. So, we hope LSU will come, but, you know, I’m going to tell Joe [Biden] I think Iowa should come, too, because they played such a good game.”
‘In the history of me going to the White House and all the champions going to the White House, we never even mentioned the second team, right?’ Shaq added on The Big Podcast. “But the fact that it was that versus that. And the other, that lost, that’s when they wanted to make it a participation. ‘Oh, they lost, but they were there and all that.’
LSU’s superstar hooper Angel Reese wasn’t excited about Biden’s offer, either. Reese appeared on the I Am Athlete podcast and shared her opinion on Biden’s offer.
“I don’t accept that; I’m not going to lie to you, I don’t accept that apology because she said what she said,” Reese said during the nearly hour-long sit-down. “You can’t go back on certain things that you say. You felt that they should have came because of ‘sportsmanship,’ right? They [Iowa] can have that spotlight; we’ll go to the Obamas. We’ll see Michelle. We’ll see Barack.”
Shaq, who voted for President Joe Biden, said Mrs. Biden’s offer to Iowa eats at his emotions.
‘Stuff like that bothers me because you are a woman at the end of the day, white, black, Mexican, it doesn’t matter. You’re supposed to be standing behind us before anything.’