College hoops star praised at Augusta

Masters chairman gives kudos to Clark

As if Caitlin Clark's rise to superstardom wasn't insane enough, on Wednesday the U.S. college basketball star received a shout-out from Augusta National Golf Club at the Masters.

“Every once in a while somebody comes along that just captures the imagination of the sporting world,” chairman Fred Ridley said in his annual remarks on the eve of the Masters. “And I say sporting world because it really goes beyond basketball.”

Clark's incredible play has propelled women's sport to another level, with television numbers for the NCAA women's final eclipsing 18 million U.S. viewers.

“I have to confess that in spite of my love of the game and the women's game of golf, that I haven't watched a lot of women's basketball, but I watched the last three or four games that Iowa played this year,” Ridley said. “So there you go. I mean, it's just the way she plays, the way Caitlin plays the game, her passion, her energy, it really just captures the imagination of the fans.”

In recent times, Augusta National has been working toward improving its relationship with the women's game and now hosts the Augusta National Women's Amateur on the weekend before the Masters, where some of the club's higher profile women members such as Annika Sorenstam are seen in their green jackets. Ridley hopes Clark's popularity will raise the profile of women and amateur sports.

“Caitlin Clark is an amateur. She's a collegiate player,” Ridley said. “And so we think that the young women who play here in the Augusta National Women's Amateur have that same capability. There's something about, even with all the change in rules and NIL and transfer portal, but amateur athletes just have an appealing characteristic to me.”

Bobby Jones, who co-founded Augusta National Golf Club, has been long revered as golf's, and perhaps sport's, most famous amateur athlete.

CLARK DETERMINED TO DEFY THE ODDS

It doesn't faze Wyndham Clark that no player has won in his Masters debut since Fuzzy Zoeller 45 years ago.

“Stats like that are meant to be broken,” Clark said.

Of course, Clark is not your ordinary Masters newcomer.

He has the rare distinction of playing in his first Masters as the U.S. Open champion, not to mention being one of the hottest players on the PGA Tour.

Clark followed up two PGA Tour victories last year by winning at Pebble Beach in February and finishing second at the Arnold Palmer Invitational Pro-am and the Players Championship, where he finished one shot behind world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler in a three-way tie.

Ranked fourth in the world, Clark enters this tournament as a 40-1 shot to win, according to Fanduel Sportsbook.