Angel Reese’s double-double streak came to an end in the Chicago Sky’s 81-67 loss to the New York Liberty on Saturday.
In recent weeks, Reese was criticized for getting rebounds off her missed layups to pad her stats. But Reese denied stat padding allegations.
It seems her own teammates agreed with claims that Reese was stat padding to keep her WNBA record double-double streak going.
Reese needed 2 points to extend her double-double streak to 16 games on Saturday. She called for the ball while being quadruple teamed by Liberty players. Reese threw the ball back out to a teammate.
Then, in the final seconds, she desperately called for the ball again. But her own teammate dribbled the clock out.
Four New York Liberty players surrounded Angel Reese in the final possession of the game.
She was two points away from her 16th-straight double-double. pic.twitter.com/wHEy10egG3
— ESPN (@espn) July 13, 2024
Last month a viral TikTok video showed 2 women pretending to shoot like Reese. The girls bounced a basketball off a backboard repeatedly while grabbing their own rebounds.
Why they playing with Angel Reese man?? pic.twitter.com/WsP1w00f8D
— jay (@jayisbacc) July 3, 2024
Fans who were rooting for Reese to win Rookie of the Year turned on her amid accusations of stat padding.
ROTY debate that should’ve never been is over.
Reese doesn’t belong in the same sentence with Clark and everybody knows it
3-14 for 8 points and 6 of her Rebounds were from her own misses! Actually hard to watch.
Clark ROTY on lockdown.
— HockeyGuy66 (@MNHockeyGuy66) July 13, 2024
One member of a manosphere message board wrote: “It’s obvious to anyone with a brain she’s been stat padding…. She’s 6-26 on layups in the last two games.”
Another man wrote:
“If you a post player that just took 17 [field goal] attempts and you gotta beg for a 18th attempt to get your 10th point, I’m sorry but that’s not impressive.”
While a third person wrote: “I mean….she could of easily had her double-double but she cant make layups.”
South Carolina basketball coach Dawn Staley insists Reese is still the leader for the ROTY award.
Staley can’t hide her contempt for Indiana Fever rookie phenom Caitlin Clark. Staley is on the Olympic committee that voted not to send Clark to the Paris Olympics.
Others say Clark is the obvious choice for 2024 Rookie of the Year. Clark has the first WNBA rookie triple-double and she has broken more WNBA records than Reese.
Clark also won 2 ESPY awards on Thursday, though she lost the top female athlete award to A’ja Wilson of the Las Vegas Aces.
Clark became the first woman to win the ESPY award for best record-breaking performance.
When asked about the ESPY award, Clark said, “It probably shouldn’t have been the first woman to win that award… how did Serena Williams never win that award?”
CC on being the 1st woman to win the Best Record Breaking Performance ESPY: “Yea I didn’t know that until my little brother sent it to me this morning…. It probably shouldn’t have been the first woman to win that award… how did Serena Williams never win that award?”
Full clip: pic.twitter.com/v11LfHKciK
— Matthew Byrne (@MatthewByrne1) July 12, 2024
