USC women’s basketball coach Lindsay Gottlieb is used to getting calls about her star guard, JuJu Watkins. This season, the stakes are higher in a post-Caitlin Clark world.
Gottlieb revealed to The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch that it took 25 calls with a major network to set up the showcase game expected to challenge Clark’s college basketball viewership records this season.
Watkins is the perfect centerpiece for such a broadcast. The Los Angeles-born hooper stayed home to revitalize a Trojans program that had been dormant since the legendary days of Cheryl Miller. In her freshman season, Watkins led USC to its first Elite Eight appearance since 1994.
She’s already drawing comparisons to Clark’s game and chasing her on-court records, too. Put Watkins across from college hoops’ other biggest stars, and Gottlieb predicts that viewership records will “eventually” fall.
USC Trojans womens basketball guard JuJu Watkins (left) and Former Iowa women’s basketball player Caitlin Clark (right).
Heading into Saturday’s matchup with Hannah Hidalgo and No. 6 Notre Dame, Watkins is averaging 21.5 points, 6.3 rebounds, 4.8 assists, 3.0 blocks and 3.8 steals per game.
The top-10 showdown against Notre Dame, airing nationally on NBC, is expected to draw big numbers. It will be combined with the premiere of Watkins’ documentary “On The Rise: JuJu Watkins,” executive produced by LeBron James, on Peacock an hour before tipoff.
The game against the Fighting Irish may only be a precursor to a more seismic matchup on the horizon. On Dec. 21, USC will travel across the country to face UConn and Paige Bueckers in a rematch of last season’s Elite Eight.
Fox settled on a Sunday evening time slot on national TV for the Trojans and the Huskies. They will tip off after an NFL game between the Baltimore Ravens and Pittsburgh Steelers, expected to have 18 million viewers, Gottlieb told Deitsch.
The massive NFL audience will have a chance to stay and watch Bueckers, the consensus No. 1 prospect for the 2025 WNBA Draft, take on hometown hero Watkins, hoping to get revenge for last season’s NCAA Tournament defeat to the Huskies.
“I think we will break these viewership records eventually,” Gottlieb said. “When people see JuJu and other players at (this) level, more fans will grow. People change their lens about what it can be, and they invest.”
Clark and Iowa accounted for four of the top five regular-season games last season. The most watched broadcast was also on Fox, as 3.39 million tuned in to see Clark break Pete Maravich’s all-time NCAA scoring record against Ohio State in March.
Whether or not it breaks that record, Bueckers vs. Watkins “should be the most-watched regular-season women’s basketball game this year,” said Deitsch.
For a chance to threaten Clark’s records, 25 calls is a small price to pay.
