Caitlin Clark's college career shows a ring is not required for greatness

No matter what happens throughout the rest of her career, Iowa guard Caitlin Clark will forever be remembered as one of the greatest college basketball players of all time. However, she will not be remembered as a national champion. Some will use that as a reason to diminish her legacy, but in actuality, Clark's time at Iowa serves as the perfect example of why team championships are often overvalued when it comes to evaluating individual players.

After getting by major programs like West Virginia and Colorado, knocking off Angel Reese and the defending champion LSU Tigers and then beating UConn in the Final Four, Iowa fell to South Carolina to come up just shy of winning the national title. Clark and Iowa suffered the same fate as they did one year earlier – finishing a season as the national runner-up. Clark scored 30 points and added eight rebounds and five assists in the Hawkeyes' 87-75 loss on Sunday night. Clark did her part, but her best was not enough for her team once again. For context, Clark also scored 30 points when Iowa failed to lift the trophy in 2023, losing 102-85 to LSU.

Bur despite failing to win a championship, Clark owns a resume that is unparalleled and makes her a legend. Clark finishes her Iowa career as college basketball's all-time leading scorer and has made the most three-pointers in women's college basketball history. She also sits at the top of the Big Ten in career assists, is a three-time unanimous All-American, three-time Big Ten Player of the Year and two-time Naismith Player of the Year. And all of that doesn't even speak to what she's done for the women's game.

To anyone who thinks Clark's legacy isn't worthy to be placed among the greats, get real. New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart believes rings are required. 

"Because then you'll gonna look 10 years back," Stewart explained, "and you're gonna see all the records she's broken, the points and stuff like that. But everyone knows when you play college basketball, your goal is to win the national championship."

Stewart – who won four titles with UConn – is not wrong about a player's goal. Most athletes don't grow up dreaming of breaking records, they dream of winning titles. But in reality, it takes a team to accomplish that goal. Stewart played on stacked teams. No one else on Clark's Iowa squads will be in any Hall of Fame.

And if you're still not convinced, let's look at sports history. Is Dan Marino not one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history because he failed to win Super Bowl? Was Trent Dilfer better than him because he did? Some argue Peyton Manning's second ring moved him up the all-time rankings, but does that really make sense? Manning, a five-time MVP (all from seasons in which he did not win the Super Bowl)  threw nine touchdowns to 17 interceptions during the season he won a championship with the Denver Broncos. Just two years earlier, Manning and the Broncos lost in the Super Bowl on the heels of a season when set the NFL record with 55 touchdown passes. 

Sports history is full of ring-less legends. Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr., Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Connor McDavid, the list goes on. And while it's fair to look at what a player does when it counts the most, every great player isn't blessed with an equal opportunity. If Tom Brady had seven rings without the necessary statistics, would he be viewed the same way? 

The point is not to discredit champions, especially those who were the driving forces to capture those championships, it's to make sure the others are not disrespected.