After three long, hot and sun-soaked days in Southern California, the time had finally come for the event I, and some 400 other women, had waited for: It was time to meet the women of Splash.
In early October, hundreds of women from sports, entertainment, tech, advertising and media descended upon the Resort at Pelican Bay, nestled along the pristine coast of Newport Beach, California for the eighth annual espnW Summit. There, women like Bozoma Saint John, Uber’s new Chief Brand Officer, mingled with espnW founder Laura Gentile, WWE Chief Brand Officer Stephanie McMahon and Sports Center’s Cari Champion.
At the event, attendees listened to speeches and presentations by the industry experts and insiders about just how far women in sports have come. But it was one group of women, the ladies of Splash, an 80-plus-year-old basketball team out of San Diego, California who could truly attest to the changing tides for female coaches, announcers and athletes because they’ve been playing, or at least trying to, since before Title IX was a twinkle in your grandmother’s eye.
“What has sports brought to your life?” I ask while sitting at a round table surrounded by the team, including veteran players Meg Skinner, 92, Marge Carl, 88, and Grace Larsen, 91, who the team lovingly refers to as “money in the bank Grace” thanks to her perfectly-formed layups.
Splash player Fran Styles poses in front of the Resort at Pelican Bay at the annual ESPNW Summit. (Photo: Stacey Leasca)
“Everything,” Skinner replies quickly to my question. “Happiness, friendship, exercise, wellbeing, getting away from the house. We do so many other things, too. We go to movies, go to the theater, go to concerts, go to basketball games.”
From there, the team erupts with each woman sharing memorable events they’ve attended together including the symphony, the anniversary celebration of Title IX, even the Senior Olympic Games.
They each speak as if they’ve been friends for a lifetime, only in reality, they’ve just come together as a collective unit in the last few years thanks to the work of Skinner and one of the team’s coaches, Kirsten Cummings, who happens to also be an ex-professional basketball player herself, playing both internationally and in the U.S. for the Richmond and Philadelphia Rage.
As Skinner explained, the entire league, including her team, all came about after a chance meeting in 1992 at the California Senior Olympics.
Meg Skinner, who helped create the team in 1992. (Photo: Stacey Leasca)
“I played in the California Senior Olympics and I played tennis,” Skinner says, “so as it was over David Hall, who was head of the San Diego Senior Olympics, asked the lady who was in charge of tennis if Meg and her partner would be interested in being on a women’s basketball team for the Senior Olympics.” Skinner then looks over, wide-eyed and says pointedly, “A man started all this. I just think that’s wonderful.”
From that meeting with Hall, Skinner says she started showing up for basketball practice at the Mission Valley YMCA. However, on day one, she was totally alone. So she returned the next week, but it was the same lonely and pitiful game for one.
“I’m going one more time and if nobody shows up then I’m quitting,” Skinner says she told Hall. Her third and final attempt was, thankfully, more fruitful. In total, two other women showed up to play ball in week three. But it was all Skinner and the other women needed for inspiration. They put an ad in the paper letting other women know about their meeting time and sport of choice and that next week, Skinner says, 100 women showed up.
However, as the team explains, showing up simply wasn’t enough as they, alongside Cummings, had to fight every step of the way for their fair time on the court.
“Our team had a terrible time finding a place to practice,” Skinner says, adding that in the beginning their time was valued as less important than the other leagues, including the men’s and youth divisions. But they paid their dues, both literally at $225 per team for an 8-week season, and figuratively, by showing up, week after week to practice and play 3-on-3 with Cummings and other coaches until they could no longer be ignored.
JoAnn Jansen poses after speaking to the crowd at the annual ESPNW Summit. (Photo: Stacey Leasca)
“They’re all natural athletes, that’s a gift, but I can’t make them go shoot like Diana Taurasi,” Cummings says as the women around the table giggle and affirm her assessment that no, they cannot play quite like a WNBA MVP. “But I can say, ‘ok she moves like this, she plays like this,’ and I encourage them to shoot the ball in the hoop and through that confidence they find their form.”
And it’s their form that’s getting them noticed the world over and helping change the perception of both women and older women in sports. In early 2017, the team was featured in a short video profile for espnW that garnered more than 15 million views. After the video went viral the team even signed a sponsorship with Miracle Whip, who in turn provided them with better equipment, warm up gear and uniforms.
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This particular group of women is the oldest currently playing in the San Diego Senior Women’s Basketball Association’s lineup. In fact, as the team says, they’ve been the oldest players for more than a decade, but that isn’t what makes them remarkable. Sure, they have a few more years on the rest of us, but it’s not about their age, but rather, about the drive they exhibit and personify for women of all ages as they play against younger women, usually in their 70s, on rival teams like the Louisiana Silver Slammers during the nationals.
And, admittedly, they don’t win very often, but again, it’s not about winning. For team Splash, it’s just about the ability to play the game they love and bring out something fierce inside themselves.Because prior to the Splash, these women, and women everywhere, were denied even the chance to let it all out on the court.
“In the past, the competitive spirit was not encouraged, it was like, you were supposed to be ladylike and you don’t play, but these women defied that, otherwise they wouldn’t be here,” Cummings says. “So right now, with the senior games both locally and nationally, we’re giving the women an opportunity to be competitive at their sport and allow that part of them to come out in time. That’s why this is so important.”
Splash player Fran Styles. (Photo: Stacey Leasca)
She further notes that these women, and the women who undoubtedly come after them, will keep pushing the boundary because quite simply, women never lose the competitive spirit that drives us all to be our absolute best.
“One of the things that’s important to know is that, from my experience, the competitive spirit never really dies,” Cummings says as the woman all concur with a joyous “yes” and a laugh. “Thanks to San Diego, and Meg, we have a place for women to live out their desires in a competitive way and give themselves the challenges of being competitive.”
When I ask what advice they have for a young girl thinking about leaving sports due to societal pressures, Carl emphatically stepped in to say, “Just do it,” further pointing to the young 17 and 18-year old girls team the Splash sponsor each year. “They are learning the skills that we never learned. They grow up learning to play basketball. And you should see those girls play. That’s my heart, and telling young women, ‘it’s OK to play.’”
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