Louisiana State University basketball player Angel Reese (left) and University of Iowa player Caitlin Clark each wave their hand in front of their face in a "You can't see me" gesture. Images courtesy of Twitter user @ThirdRail44.

The NCAA Championship game was not without its charismatic personality favorites as Louisiana State University battled University of Iowa yesterday in Dallas. The LSU Tigers beat the Iowa Hawkeyes 102-85 for the title, but for Baltimore County, it’s all about the connection to LSU’s Angel Reese.

Reese is a Randallstown native, who went to University of Maryland, but transferred to LSU to play for Kim Mulkey. The Baltimore area still runs through her veins, though, which for her, is a point of pride.

None of this would be an issue, of course, had the sports world not dished out the double standards it does, both for women’s sports and for Black women in particular.

The backstory is simple. Iowa’s Caitlin Clark was lionized as an “elite trash talker,” and her profile as such rose as Iowa advanced during March Madness.

Everyone thought it was baller when Clark pulled the “You can’t see me” wave during the Elite Eight.

Bleacher Report thought it was hilarious when she didn’t even bother guarding a shot.

Nobody was upset when she told a Louisville player, “You’re down by 15 points. Shut up.”

Finally, many concluded happily, some swagger and passion is acceptable on the court for women’s sports.

Not so fast. LSU brought some Baltimore to the championship game, and suddenly the internet was offended by such displays.

Reese, who talks trash with the best of them, gave Clark a taste of her own medicine, complete with a handwave and an additional pointing to her ring finger when they were about to clinch the title. Suddenly folks on the internet considered trash talk extremely unbecoming.

The negativity and abuse directed at Reese, who is Black, came mainly from white people, and white men in particular.

Dave Portnoy, creator of Barstool Sports, rebuked Reese:

Sports and political commentator Keith Olbermann had this to say:

“Classless” was trending on Twitter as of the writing of this article.

Black Twitter users pointed out the discrepancy, the racism, the misogynoir, and the sexism that only seemed to pop up once a Black woman dished taunts back to a white woman.

Even Shaq and Samuel L. Jackson came to Reese’s defense.

Although Olbermann partly walked back his original tweet, neither he nor Portnoy apologized to Reese. Instead, Olbermann expressed regret for “being uninformed,” seemingly about the fact that Caitlin Clark had also been trash talking, then going on to pronounce that “both were wrong.”

Meanwhile, Clark has not expressed the slightest concern or consternation about Reese’s trash talking. She said she didn’t even see Reese’s gesture.

Here’s Reese talking about how she’s going to be herself, regardless of the criticism lobbed her way:

“This was for the girls that look like me, that’s going to speak up on what they believe in, that’s unapologetically you.”

At least we have Mike Leslie, local Dallas broadcaster, defending both women for their athleticism and their trash-talking.

Reese will continue to call her Baltimore roots to the forefront, as she should, and locals learning about her connections to their hometown are thrilled to have new reasons to stan her.

She summed it up best all the way back in January.