LSU basketball star Angel Reese says that the Lady Tigers turned down an opportunity to get a pre-game pep talk from First Lady Jill Biden before their national championship game against Iowa.
“Apparently she was supposed to come to our locker room before the game but we said ‘no,’” Reese said on I Am Athlete’s “Paper Route” show on Tuesday.
“She was supposed to come to our locker room and go to Iowa’s locker room. I don’t know if she talked to them. I don’t know if she did,” Reese explained.
“But we said we didn’t want to. We didn’t want her coming into the locker room.”
When pressed by host Brandon Marshall about why the team declined the visit from FLOTUS, Reese said the team was not pleased with where Joe Biden had LSU in his tournament bracket.
“I think Joe Biden had put somebody else to win the national championship,” Reese said. “He didn’t even put us on his bucket to get out of Baton Rouge, so I was like, bet… I think that he said we were going to lose to Michigan or something.”
Angel Reese, #10 of the LSU Lady Tigers, and teammates pose for selfies after defeating the Iowa Hawkeyes 102-85 during the 2023 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament championship game at American Airlines Center on April 02, 2023, in Dallas, Texas. (Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
Indeed, President Biden did have LSU losing to Michigan in the second round and had Villanova winning the tournament.
The controversy between First Lady Jill Biden and the Lady Tigers burst onto the national stage shortly after the national championship game. Biden, who watched the game while seated alongside tennis legend Billie Jean King, said after the game that she would like to extend a White House invite to champion LSU and the team that lost, Iowa.
“I know we’ll have the champions come to the White House, we always do,” 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.”
This idea did not sit well with Reese, who called it “A JOKE” on Twitter.
A JOKE. https://t.co/9SiOKQNqbj
— Angel Reese (@Reese10Angel) April 3, 2023
A few days later, Reese still hadn’t softened her stance.
That was from the heart,” Reese said of her response to Biden. “That was from the mind. That was what it was in the moment.
“As soon as that happened, we [the team] hit the group chat, like, what’re we doing? Are y’all trying to go? … We made a lot of phone calls and that’s why she wants to come and apologize. I’m not going to lie to you, because I don’t accept her apology… I said what I said… You felt like they [Iowa] should’ve came because of sportsmanship, they can have that spotlight. We’ll go to the Obamas. We’ll see Michelle, we’ll see Barack.”
On Tuesday, FLOTUS’ spokesperson Vanessa Valdivia took to Twitter to attempt damage control by casting Biden’s invite to both teams as a gesture of praise for women’s sports.
“The First Lady loved watching the NCAA women’s basketball championship game alongside young student athletes and admires how far women have advanced in sports since the passing of Title IX,” Valdivia wrote.