Angel Reese Calls Out Double Standard in Coverage of Ja Morant

The athlete experienced similar treatment during last year’s NCAA Tournament.

Angel Reese.G Fiume/Getty Images

In a Jan. 2 exchange on the platform X (formerly known as Twitter), LSU basketball player Angel Reese pointed out the double standards of Barstool Sports in their coverage of Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant. Reese, 21, quoted a tweet posted by the entertainment account Say Cheese! which included two different screenshots from the Barstool Sports account. 

In the first screenshot, the media outlet shared a photo of Texas Longhorns quarterback Quinn Ewers celebrating after a touchdown with gun gestures. “Quinn Ewers is having fun,” the account wrote alongside the short clip. In the second, Barstool Sports shared a photo of Ja Morant making the same gesture, but instead of including a playful caption like the one accompanying Ewers’s celebration, the outlet wrote “Ja spraying imaginary bullets into section 113 after the slam.”

lol i’ve seen this before…. https://t.co/7XZZBdQipp

— Angel Reese (@Reese10Angel) January 2, 2024

It was a drastically different expression from the social media account, and not the first time Barstool Sports has adopted a double standard in its coverage. In Reese’s quote tweet, she wrote “lol i’ve seen this before….,” in reference to the publication’s similar treatment of her during the 2023 NCAA Tournament.

At the time, the account adopted very different attitudes toward Iowa’s Caitlin Clark and Reese, though they were both celebrating big plays and wins with playful taunts toward other players. While the Iowa players largely received praise from the outlet, the LSU athletes received the opposite, even being referred to as “villains” by Barstool Sports.

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