Iowa State women’s basketball star Audi Crooks has a love-hate relationship with social media.

Sometimes she’ll scroll through her direct messages and find a note from a little girl who sees her as a role model and asks for advice or to take a picture with her after the next game.

Other times, the Big 12’s leading scorer will receive a message criticizing the way she looks, the way she plays or the way she acts.

“They’re missing the whole point of social media, of the internet, of being able to interact with us,” Crooks said. “I want to use my social platform for positive connections.”

With March Madness approaching and International Women’s Day on Saturday, Crooks and Iowa’s Hannah Stuelke are promoting healthy digital habits through their name, image and likeness partnerships with UScellular.

“I think making connections with people online can be very healthy,” Stuelke said. “There are a lot of younger girls who reach out to me and I get to respond and encourage what they’re doing. That’s the upside to social media, being able to mentor people and be a leader to people who may not have a leader.”

Online abuse of college athletes received attention last weekend when Kansas men’s basketball player Zeke Mayo shared screen shots of hateful social media posts directed at him after he struggled in a loss at Texas Tech.

An NCAA study released last fall found female college athletes are targeted for online abuse three times as much as male athletes. Among types of content targeting athletes, 18% was sexual in nature, 17% was general abuse, 14% was sexist and 12% dealt with gambling.

The NCAA said abusive content can cause targeted athletes to suffer from anxiety, depression, loss of confidence, panic attacks and in extreme cases can be a contributing factor in suicidal tendencies or actions. Most athletic departments have counselors to help athletes who are struggling to deal with online negativity.

“Most of the time,” Crooks said, “I try to just brush it off.”

But it’s not always easy to do, she said.

“For women in sports specifically, there’s just not many things that you can do without being criticized, whether you’re celebrating, you’re getting a little chippy. All of a sudden that’s out of line,” she said. “But if a men’s basketball player were to do the same thing, then they’re OK.

“From a social media perspective, it’s the opinions of, ‘Oh, she’s cocky, she’s this, she’s that. She looks this way. She appears this way. That’s not very ladylike.’ ”

Stuelke said she follows Iowa coach Jan Jensen’s advice to the players, which is to put the phone down and spend time with people who matter the most, whether it’s teammates, coaches, friends or family. When Stuelke does look at Instagram, she knows it’s possible there’ll be a nasty message waiting for her from an anonymous keyboard warrior.

“I think it’s important we spread the message that this is happening to us and that there are ways to handle it,” Stuelke said, “and that you aren’t alone if you are struggling with this.”

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The celebration started in Santa Rosa, California.

March is Women’s History Month, a celebration of women’s accomplishments that began forty-five years ago as a local event in Santa Rosa, California as Women’s History Week. Billie Jean King is part of that history.  King spoke out against sexism in sports in the 1960s. In 1967, King took on the United States Lawn Tennis Association and its policy of paying top players under the table to guarantee their entry into tournaments. King felt the under the table payments practice was corrupt and kept tennis highly elitist. 

King and other women players risked their careers to start the first professional women’s tennis tour in 1970. The group had trouble finding a sponsor. In 1964, the United States Surgeon General’s report concluded that cigarette smoking was harmful to a smoker’s health, but Phillip Morris’s Virginia Slims brand was the only company interested in supporting King’s circuit. King’s backers took the money despite the health risks and warnings. King defended the decision saying people could decide whether they smoked. King pushed for equal prize money in the men’s and women’s matches after winning the 1972 U. S. Open. She was paid $15,000 less than the men’s champion Ilie Nastase and threatened to sit out the 1973 U. S. Open if the prize money was not equaled.  In 1973, the U. S. Open offered equal prize money for men and women. In 1973, King became the first president of the Women’s Tennis Association, the first women’s union in sports. In 1974, she helped start the Women’s Sports Foundation. Also, that year she helped launch World Team Tennis. King was part of a movement that culminated in getting Title IX of the 1972 Education Amendments signed into law by President Richard Nixon. Nixon’s signature gave women equal opportunity in higher education and sports in the United States with men.

Evan Weiner’s books are available at iTunes – https://books.apple.com/us/author/evan-weiner/id595575191

Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com