Help The Gazette pick 50 greatest moments in Hawkeyes women’s athletics history ahead of Title IX 50th anniversary

This year is a landmark one for women’s athletics, at the University of Iowa and around the country.

June 23 will mark the 50th anniversary of Title IX, and the 2022-23 academic year will mark 50 years of intercollegiate women’s athletics at Iowa.

Title IX, passed in 1972, stated “no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”

At the time, many people expected that to affect admissions criteria and scholarship criteria at universities, which were different between sexes at the time, the late Christine Grant said.

“Most people in 1972 didn’t realize that Title IX was going to apply to sport,” said Grant, Iowa’s first women’s athletics director and a nationally-renowned Title IX pioneer, in a 2008 interview with an Iowa student.

Those people were wrong. While there’s more work be done to achieve complete gender equity in sports, Title IX — and the work by Grant and others in Iowa City to implement it — had a transformational impact on the opportunities available in women’s sports.

Leading up to the 50th anniversary of the passage of Title IX this summer, The Gazette will be highlighting the 50 greatest moments in Hawkeyes women’s athletics history — ranging from the early moments following Title IX that set up future success to the recent Big Ten titles in 2021-22.

We’re reaching out to people involved in many of these moments, looking back at the archives and searching through team records books.

But we also want to hear from you. What moments stand out to you? Which ones do you think belong in the top 50? What made these moments special for you?

You can submit your ideas in the form included in this article or via email to john.steppe@thegazette.com.

Comments: (319) 398-8394; john.steppe@thegazette.com