A guys v. girls sports debate
 

This is kind of in the spirit of a debate going on over in the Sklansky forum. I've been debating this one with some guys I work with, and we're split pretty closely on it. Theoretical basketball game: the Division I NCAA women's national champions versus a good but not great boy's high school team. By good but not great, I would say, oh, a 16-5 Class B New York State high school team (classes in NY are AA (largest), A, B, C and D) that wins its league, maybe its section, and goes out early in the state Class B playoffs. Who would win, and why? I'm thinking the NCAA women's champions in a pretty close game, as long as the high school team's success is due more to solid team play and not the presence of a Division I-bound star or two on the roster who could physically overwhelm the women. If you think the women would win, what caliber of boys' high school team would you think would be required to beat them, and if you think the boys would win, do you think an average WNBA team could take them out? Discuss.

--Scott

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

I didn't realize how bad chicks are at sports if that would be a close game. Kind of funny actually.

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the uconn womens team with diana tuarasi and sue bird would beat the majority of high school teams with a girls ball.

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I didn't realize how bad chicks are at sports if that would be a close game. Kind of funny actually.

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Why do you think that? Living in upstate NY, I can tell you that a typical sectional-contending Class B boys team (I'm thinking someone like Elmira Free Academy, for those of you who are familiar with the teams here) will have at least a couple of players who will play four years of college ball at the Division II or III level. They're not going to be at an athletic disadvantage to the women...at least their best players won't.

--Scott

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

If only I was American and knew exactly how good/bad the boys team you're talking about is (I do somewhat follow CBB), and if only I was a judge of basketball talent.

An educated guess? I' think I'd pick the boys, because they are the clear underdogs in this kind of matchup.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

Hey cognito,

There was a long thread on this subject last Spring.

Your hypothetical matchup would probably be a good game, but I would give a small advantage to the women.

A very good HS boys team will beat any women's college team. For example, my HS won the Pennyslvania AAAA Championship last year. AAAA is the largest division. That team had two kids who are now playing significant time in DI this year as freshman. A HS team like that would simply be too strong and athletic for the women.

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A very good HS boys team will beat any women's college team. For example, my HS won the Pennyslvania AAAA Championship last year. AAAA is the largest division. That team had two kids who are now playing significant time in DI this year as freshman. A HS team like that would simply be too strong and athletic for the women.

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Sorry to hi-jack the thread, but PokerFink, are you perhaps from the Lower Merion area? As in, the two players you're talking about are Henderson and Ellington?

Back on topic, I think it would probably be a close game. I give the shooting advantage to the women's team, but the overall athleticism would go in favor of the HS team in my opinion.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

A good HS mens' team will beat a college women's team every time. Most HS starters on solid squads can dunk with the possible exception of the PG. They will have the speed, strength, height, and jump advantage likely at all positions and moreso on the bench.

I'm assuming the women have to use the men's regulation ball? Boys HS wins 9 of 10.

Any good college men's team would destroy a WNBA team.

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Sorry to hi-jack the thread, but PokerFink, are you perhaps from the Lower Merion area? As in, the two players you're talking about are Henderson and Ellington?

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Right area, wrong school.

Ellington and Henderson went to Episcopal Academy, a small private school. I went to Lower Merion High School. The two teams play occasionally before league play, but didn't last year (unfortunately).

The kids I mentioned are Garrett Williamson (St. Joe's) and Ryan Brooks (Temple). Williamson is playing really well, about 25 minutes per night. I saw a St. Joe's game the other night and he was in during crunch time for his defense. Brooks has struggled lately and his minutes are down, 7 per game.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

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Sorry to hi-jack the thread, but PokerFink, are you perhaps from the Lower Merion area? As in, the two players you're talking about are Henderson and Ellington?

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Right area, wrong school.

Ellington and Henderson went to Episcopal Academy, a small private school. I went to Lower Merion High School. The two teams play occasionally before league play, but didn't last year (unfortunately).

The kids I mentioned are Garrett Williamson (St. Joe's) and Ryan Brooks (Temple). Williamson is playing really well, about 25 minutes per night. I saw a St. Joe's game the other night and he was in during crunch time for his defense. Brooks has struggled lately and his minutes are down, 7 per game.

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Yeah, I wasn't sure about the exact school. I know someone, who knew both Henderson and Ellington, that lives in Lower Merion. I'm about half an hour away from there myself.

Any HS basketball team with 2 D-1 caliber players I think could take just about any women's college basketball team.

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Episcopal would have slaughtered any women's team.

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I'm pretty sure the team at my high school would have beaten any WNBA team.

We did have Mike Doleac and Matt Santangelo though.

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I'd take the women's team by a moderate amount.

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A very good HS boys team will beat any women's college team. For example, my HS won the Pennyslvania AAAA Championship last year. AAAA is the largest division. That team had two kids who are now playing significant time in DI this year as freshman. A HS team like that would simply be too strong and athletic for the women.

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QFT. I've seen Harrisburg play (a very strong Pa. AAAA team) and I have to believe they would beat any college women's team just because of the size/strength/athleticism edges.

That being said, I could see the Duke women beating a Pa. Class AA middle-of-the-road team relatively easily. I guess that's be the best comparison to New York Class B, which I'm not familiar with.

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You guys are all severely underestimating how bad women suck at sports. Seriously. I worked in sports media for several years and the Texas women's team had a bunch of student manager scrubs that they used to scrimmage against. The guys would beat the women every time if they didn't hold back, and the Texas women were in the top 10 at the time.

Any decent high school boys' team would destroy a team of WNBA all-stars 100 times out of 100. Hell, pick 5 guys off the court at just about any decent pickup court in a big city and they'd run the WNBAers off the court.

There's simply no comparison.

When Chris Evert was a dominant #1 women's player, she was married for a time to John Lloyd, a pro men's player. He was usually ranked between 150th and 250th in the world, and I don't believe he ever was ranked higher than 100th. They used to play competitive tennis at least once a week, best 2 out of 3 sets, at full strength.

Do you know how many times she beat him? Zero. Never. In fact, she said she never really came close.

There is a vas deferens between men's and women's sports.

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The worst thing about watching women's sports (if you are ever subjected to such misery) is the utter lack of fire and grit they show. They barely even look like they care what the score is or who wins. When down 20 points, some girl makes a little layup and her teammates all surround her high fiving and woo'ing like they all accomplished something.

A+ in encouraging of teammates
F in any and ever other category you can think of

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When down 20 points, some guy makes a little dunk and his teammates all surround him high fiving and woo'ing like they all accomplished something.

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Sorry, this would never happen in men's sports.

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It happens, but much more rarely. Girls have a pep ralley after every made free throw.

It's every bit as stupid in guy's sports too. Like when a guy gets a sack down 40 points and does his little sack dance.

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2 levels of talent rule:

High School -> College -> Pro

Take a woman's pro team and let them grind it out against a high school team.


If I was only a girl, I'd be playing soccer at UNC. Beat: I'd likely be a dyke.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

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You guys are all severely underestimating how bad women suck at sports. Seriously. I worked in sports media for several years and the Texas women's team had a bunch of student manager scrubs that they used to scrimmage against. The guys would beat the women every time if they didn't hold back, and the Texas women were in the top 10 at the time.

Any decent high school boys' team would destroy a team of WNBA all-stars 100 times out of 100. Hell, pick 5 guys off the court at just about any decent pickup court in a big city and they'd run the WNBAers off the court.

There's simply no comparison.

When Chris Evert was a dominant #1 women's player, she was married for a time to John Lloyd, a pro men's player. He was usually ranked between 150th and 250th in the world, and I don't believe he ever was ranked higher than 100th. They used to play competitive tennis at least once a week, best 2 out of 3 sets, at full strength.

Do you know how many times she beat him? Zero. Never. In fact, she said she never really came close.

There is a vas deferens between men's and women's sports.

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That's not quite the same issue though. Chris Evert's husband, although he was not a very good pro, was a pro nevertheless. I am not disputing whether a professional male athlete, however marginal, could take out the world's best woman. Of course he could. Make the question "could Chris Evert in her prime beat a state boys high school tennis champion (or maybe the Division III NCAA men's champion)?" and it becomes a lot more interesting, and the answer not quite as pat. I suppose in the case of the above question, knowing the state the guy was the HS champion of would make a big difference, as the Florida, Texas, and California state champions >>>>>>>> in quality over New York, New Hampshire, North Dakota state champions due to climate, training opportunities, etc.

--Scott

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

I would take the guys from Murderball in a volleyball match against the Russian national team.

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You guys are all severely underestimating how bad women suck at sports. Seriously. I worked in sports media for several years and the Texas women's team had a bunch of student manager scrubs that they used to scrimmage against. The guys would beat the women every time if they didn't hold back, and the Texas women were in the top 10 at the time.

Any decent high school boys' team would destroy a team of WNBA all-stars 100 times out of 100. Hell, pick 5 guys off the court at just about any decent pickup court in a big city and they'd run the WNBAers off the court.

There's simply no comparison.

When Chris Evert was a dominant #1 women's player, she was married for a time to John Lloyd, a pro men's player. He was usually ranked between 150th and 250th in the world, and I don't believe he ever was ranked higher than 100th. They used to play competitive tennis at least once a week, best 2 out of 3 sets, at full strength.

Do you know how many times she beat him? Zero. Never. In fact, she said she never really came close.

There is a vas deferens between men's and women's sports.

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That's not quite the same issue though. Chris Evert's husband, although he was not a very good pro, was a pro nevertheless. I am not disputing whether a professional male athlete, however marginal, could take out the world's best woman. Of course he could. Make the question "could Chris Evert in her prime beat a state boys high school tennis champion (or maybe the Division III NCAA men's champion)?" and it becomes a lot more interesting, and the answer not quite as pat. I suppose in the case of the above question, knowing the state the guy was the HS champion of would make a big difference, as the Florida, Texas, and California state champions >>>>>>>> in quality over New York, New Hampshire, North Dakota state champions due to climate, training opportunities, etc.

--Scott

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Yeah, but the 150th ranked men's player dominated the #1 women's player. It wasn't like they were about equal.

Everyone talks about how hard Serena serves, but it's like 110 mph, right? That is a poor first serve for the men. There's simply no comparison in speed, power, etc. that gives men a huge advantage over the women.

So I think any good high school boy's tennis player would probably wipe the court with Serena.

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I've played in pickup games against girls that play D-I college ball.

Needless to say, I was not impressed at all.

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I've played in pickup games against girls that play D-I college ball.

Needless to say, I was not impressed at all.

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Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

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When down 20 points, some guy makes a little dunk and his teammates all surround him high fiving and woo'ing like they all accomplished something.

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Sorry, this would never happen in men's sports.

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You beat me to this punchline.

I'd like the chances of one of the top 2 woman's CBB teams (Tennessee, UConn in prime, UNC) vs. a winning HS team in a smaller school bracket. The dropoff from the big name programs and the other "top" teams is pretty huge.

Bedridden with a fever this past weekend, I accidentally flipped through some of the womens' games. Majority of teams I saw were pretty bad. May you & yours never be bedridden with a fever (at least not until football season).

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I've played in pickup games against girls that play D-I college ball.

Needless to say, I was not impressed at all.

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I have as well, and I never even had the size or talent to play on my HS team. They weren't difficult to cover or shoot over. Any decent HS team would beat a women's college or WNBA team.

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I've played in pickup games against supposedly the best player in womans D-I college ball at the time.

Needless to say, I was not impressed at all.

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Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

Regarding the tennis version of this debate, I was a practice partner for the Vanderbilt Women's tennis team for 3 years. They were ranked in the top 10 all 3 years I was there, and lost in the NCAA finals in one of those years. I could beat them all except the #1 singles player, and I wasn't in the top 50 high school boys players in Texas.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

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Regarding the tennis version of this debate, I was a practice partner for the Vanderbilt Women's tennis team for 3 years. They were ranked in the top 10 all 3 years I was there, and lost in the NCAA finals in one of those years. I could beat them all except the #1 singles player, and I wasn't in the top 50 high school boys players in Texas.

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Did they let you shower with them?

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

In most team sports, a pro or national women's team is probably the equivalent to the type of high school team described by the OP.

In individual sports, women fare a bit better but the gap is still wide. For individual sports, the typical world class woman is about the equivalent of a middle of the road D-I athlete. I think this holds pretty much across the board whether it's track, tennis, weightlifting, wrestling, or whatever. In team sports, I think the disparities in size, strength, power, and general aggressiveness are magnified.

Re: A guys v. girls sports debate
 

25 Marissa Coleman G/F SO 6-1 Cheltenham, Md./St. John's College [D.C.]
22 Shay Doron G SR 5-9 Ramat Hasharon, Israel/Christ the King (N.Y.)
15 Laura Harper F/C JR 6-4 Elkins Park, Pa./Cheltenham
1 Crystal Langhorne C/F JR 6-2 Willingboro, N.J./Willingboro
11 Christie Marrone G RS SO 5-6 Brooklyn, N.Y./St. John Villa Academy/Virginia Tech
21 Ashleigh Newman G JR 5-10 Shelbyville, Tenn./Shelbyville Central
44 Aurelie Noirez C SR 6-2 Vandoeuvre, France/Lycee Francois Arago
55 Jade Perry F/C JR 6-1 Central City, Ky./Muhlenberg North
20 Kristi Toliver G SO 5-7 Harrisonburg, Va./Harrisonburg
33 Emery Wallace F FR 6-1 Roanoke, Va./Hidden Valley
2 Sa'de Wiley-Gatewood G RS JR 5-9 Pomona, Calif./Lynwood/Tennessee

Maryland's Team this year, defending 2006 champs. One player over 6'2. I think average men's high school team is much bigger. Given a pool of say 600 boy students, I would think there should be two or three that are 6'6'' or taller.

My high school team was pretty average, we had 6'6" and 6'7" centers pretty much every year. Plus stronger, we always has a few football players, not that skilled, but some 6'3" power forward/linebacker that benches 300lbs. We also had a few dunkers, or at least 3-4 guys who could punch it. I would say nobody on the MD team can dunk.

The women will be better coached, play smarter, and likely shoot better. If we split the difference on the size of the ball, I'd take the men.

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Your HS team would kill Maryland. Your HS team would kill a team of WNBA all-stars.

Don't forget that in the WNBA, using a smaller ball, smaller slower players and inferior defenses, the shooting percentages are LOWER than in the NBA (around 37%).

I'm telling you, they suck.

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My U-15 mens soccer team beat the University of Oregon Women's team back in the day, it was fairly close skillwise but we were definitely quicker than them and that made a huge difference. Not really what were talking about here, but thought I'd chime in.

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OP,

The two teams would be fairly similar as far as talent goes, but I think that the women would win. I think they would win because an NCAA team (women's or not) is coached at a much higher level than a B division high school team ever would be. To be honest, I don't even think the game would be close (unless the high school team had like a 7 foot tall tenth grader or something).

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OP,

The two teams would be fairly similar as far as talent goes, but I think that the women would win. I think they would win because an NCAA team (women's or not) is coached at a much higher level than a B division high school team ever would be. To be honest, I don't even think the game would be close (unless the high school team had like a 7 foot tall tenth grader or something).

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I wouldn't count on coaching strength to help. When Katie Smith was at Ohio State they would scrimmage the intramural teams and lose.

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OP,

The two teams would be fairly similar as far as talent goes, but I think that the women would win. I think they would win because an NCAA team (women's or not) is coached at a much higher level than a B division high school team ever would be. To be honest, I don't even think the game would be close (unless the high school team had like a 7 foot tall tenth grader or something).

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alot of HS Bteams will have 3-4starters taller than the tallest player on the girls team and the vast majority will have a size advantage at every position, size and athleticism>>> coaching

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I played in college pickup games with 2 different girls who saw playing time for a team that made the NCAA tournament (Missouri St./SMS). I'm about 5-9 and played as a freshman in high school and got cut every other year in Nebraska (a state not known for good high school basketball). I was way better than both of these girls. In fact, the girls were always the 10th best player on the court during these games and it wasn't really close. As long as the boys HS team is fairly well coached, the boys win rather easily.

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I've played in pickup games against supposedly the best player in womans D-I college ball at the time.

Needless to say, I was not impressed at all.

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Who was this? I always wanted to play vs. Jackie Stiles (all time women's NCAA scoring leader from SMS) but never got to.

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In 1991 and 1992, I played in many pickup games featuring Ms. Clarissa Davis, who had been the women's player of the year in 1986.

She was consistently the worst player on the court, including myself, a B-grade athlete who played JV basketball in H.S. but never made the varsity.

She also called the most ridiculous ticky-tack fouls I've ever seen on a pickup court when she realized she couldn't drive past anyone.

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If only I was American and knew exactly how good/bad the boys team you're talking about is (I do somewhat follow CBB), and if only I was a judge of basketball talent.

An educated guess? I' think I'd pick the boys, because they are the clear underdogs in this kind of matchup.

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you'd pick the boys because they are underdogs?
question wasn't who you would root for