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Angel Reese not interested in Jill Biden's pitch to invite Iowa to White House alongside LSU

jason owens
Staff writer
·4 min read
5.9k

White House visits are traditionally for champions.

Iowa is not a champion. LSU is. So when First Lady Jill Biden suggested on Monday that the White House invite both teams from Sunday's NCAA tournament final, Angel Reese was not interested. The LSU forward and Final Four Most Outstanding Player made her thoughts clear on Twitter:

Biden floated the idea during a speaking event in Denver on Monday, a day after she watched Reese's LSU team score a 102-85 win over Iowa in Dallas for the national championship. She told supporters in Denver that she'd run the idea by President Joe Biden.

“I know we’ll have the champions come to the White House, we always do," Jill Biden said. "So, we hope LSU will come. But, you know, I’m going to tell Joe I think Iowa should come too because they played such a good game.”

White House visits by champions were once a given. That dynamic changed during the Donald Trump presidency and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. It's not clear if LSU will visit the Biden White House. The First Lady's invitation wasn't a formal one, and it was essentially rescinded on Tuesday when her press secretary walked back those comments.

LSU head coach Kim Mulkey told reporters after the game that she would accept an invitation if one was extended. But Reese and teammate Alexis Morris floated another idea on Twitter after the First Lady's remarks — celebrating instead with former first lady Michelle Obama.

There's no word from Michelle Obama or former president and noted basketball fan Barack Obama, who tweeted his congratulations to LSU on Sunday.

Reese has remained in the headlines since Sunday's game for more than her MOP performance. She taunted Iowa star Caitlin Clark in the moments after the game, igniting social media criticism and subsequent debate over that criticism.

The taunt she employed was frequently used by Clark when Clark was winning. Reese is Black. Clark is white. Reese asked after the game why others didn't receive the same kind of criticism that she has.

"All year, I was critiqued about who I was," Reese said. "The narrative — I don’t fit the narrative. I don't fit into the box that y’all want me to be in. 'I’m too hood. I’m too ghetto.' Y’all told me that all year.

"But when other people do it, y’all don’t say nothing. So this is for the girls that look like me, that’s gonna speak on for what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you. And that’s what I did it for tonight."

LSU's Angel Reese (10) doesn't seem to be a fan of the idea of inviting an Iowa team she just defeated to the White House. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images)
LSU's Angel Reese (10) doesn't seem to be a fan of the idea of inviting an Iowa team she just defeated to the White House. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images)

The suggestion of LSU sharing a championship stage with its vanquished title game opponent further fanned the flames of the conversation on Monday.

Biden, meanwhile, spoke glowingly about Sunday's game in terms of Title IX, the 1972 law enacted to prohibit sex-based discrimination in educational settings.

“It was so exciting, wasn’t it?" Biden said. "It was such a great game. I’m old enough that I remember when we got Title IX. We fought so hard, right? We fought so hard. And look at where women’s sports have come today.”

The White House didn't immediately respond to an Associated Press request on Monday on whether it would extend a formal invitation to Iowa.