Day 6: Eagle Eyed on Rugby’s Future
Between the stark increase in viewership for Women’s March Madness and the addition of a consolidated professional women’s hockey league, the drastic boost in the popularity of women’s sports has become undeniable.
Doing their part in furthering the women’s game are the members of the United States’ women’s rugby team, who won the country’s first medal in the tournament with their heroic last-minute performance on July 30, clinching bronze.
Ilona Maher, a center on the team, has taken an extra step, taking to social medial to promote body positivity and women’s sports. She has 2 million followers on Tiktok, which took off during the Tokyo Olympics. Following the Eagles’ victory on Tuesday, she surpassed 2.3 million on Instagram.
On the sixth daily edition of In the Village: An NBC Olympic and Paralympic podcast, titled “Day 6: Eagle Eyed on Rugby’s Future,” Team USA’s Maher, Naya Tapper, Sammy Sullivan and Alex Sedrick describe the importance of winning bronze and how it feels to be a part of the women-in-sports movement.
“It’s almost [that] you don’t want to dream of being a pro athlete as a woman because it’s not attainable at times,” said Maher. “But now, we’re trying to make it attainable. We’re trying to make it so that these girls can dream of playing, be in our position, going to Olympics, and training full time in San Diego and being like us.”
New episodes of In the Village will be released every day during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
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