{"id":101682,"date":"2023-02-06T16:34:48","date_gmt":"2023-02-06T22:34:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=101682"},"modified":"2023-02-06T16:34:48","modified_gmt":"2023-02-06T22:34:48","slug":"catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/","title":{"rendered":"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Kikue Higuchi<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Medill Reports<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The Catbackers \u2014 an organization of women with a passion for Northwestern sports \u2014 assembled a panel for women in sports media, ahead of Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\u2019s 67-64 loss against No. 21 Illinois on Jan. 22.<\/p>\n<p>The panel featured Northwestern alumni Megan McKeown, Lauren Withrow and Patricia Babcock-McGraw as well as Medill professor Melissa Isaacson. McKeown, daughter of women\u2019s basketball head coach Joe McKeown, works as a reporter and analyst for the Big Ten Network. Withrow serves as a team reporter for several Northwestern teams including football and men\u2019s basketball. Babcock-McGraw recently became a communications coordinator for Stevenson High School after 27 years at the Daily Herald.<\/p>\n<p>The panelists regaled their audience with amusing anecdotes and serious stories about the growth of women\u2019s sports and how far the industry still has to go.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would say right now, more than ever, the women\u2019s sports product is the best it\u2019s ever been,\u201d McKeown said. \u201cWhether you\u2019re watching basketball, soccer, softball \u2014 whatever it might be \u2014 women\u2019s sports is having a moment, and I don\u2019t think it\u2019s just a moment. I think it\u2019s truly here to stay.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Catbackers women in sports media panel\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/795893118?h=418d2d26f7&amp;dnt=1&amp;app_id=122963\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Transcript:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Narrator: Ahead of Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\u2019s game against No. 21 Illinois on Sunday, the Catbackers \u2014 an organization of women with a passion for Northwestern sports \u2014 organized a panel for women in sports media.<\/p>\n<p><u>Megan McKeown:<\/u> I would say right now, more than ever, the women\u2019s sports product is the best it\u2019s ever been. Whether you\u2019re watching basketball, soccer, softball \u2014 whatever it might be \u2014 women\u2019s sports is having a moment, and I don\u2019t think it\u2019s just a moment. I think it\u2019s truly here to stay.<\/p>\n<p>Narrator: The panel featured Northwestern alumni Megan McKeown, a broadcaster for the Big Ten Network; Lauren Withrow, a Northwestern team reporter; and Patricia Babcock-McGraw, a communications coordinator for Stevenson High School, as well as Medill professor Melissa Isaacson. The panelists touched on the growth of women\u2019s sports and how far the industry still has to go.<\/p>\n<p><u>Isaacson: <\/u>I had always endeavored to do the best beats at the paper, and they happened to be men\u2019s beats throughout my career. Now all of a sudden, I\u2019m covering women, and I\u2019m getting the point of those were the most satisfying years of my career was covering women because it was uncharted territory. Now you\u2019ve got women who had never told these unbelievable stories before. So, not only was I covering Serena Williams, but I was covering women who had largely never talked to the press before.<\/p>\n<p>Narrator: The panel had dozens of attendees of all ages and interests who went on to watch the game after the event \u2014 giving the matchup new meaning.<\/p>\n<p><u>McKeown:<\/u> Anytime you have a personal connection, you\u2019re more interested and you\u2019re more likely to go do something with somebody. So I think events like this are so important in order to just garner interest and just to get people talking in general about the sport.<\/p>\n<p><em>Kikue Higuchi is a sports media graduate student at Medill. You can follow her on Twitter @kychiguchi<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Kikue Higuchi Medill Reports The Catbackers \u2014 an organization of women with a passion for Northwestern sports \u2014 assembled a panel for women in sports media, ahead of Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\u2019s 67-64 loss against No. 21 Illinois on Jan. 22. The panel featured Northwestern alumni Megan McKeown, Lauren Withrow and Patricia Babcock-McGraw as well [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":883,"featured_media":101688,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,5339],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-winter-2023"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Kikue Higuchi Medill Reports The Catbackers \u2014 an organization of women with a passion for Northwestern sports \u2014 assembled a panel for women in sports media, ahead of Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\u2019s 67-64 loss against No. 21 Illinois on Jan. 22. The panel featured Northwestern alumni Megan McKeown, Lauren Withrow and Patricia Babcock-McGraw as well [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-02-06T22:34:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"kikihiguchi2023\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"kikihiguchi2023\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/\",\"name\":\"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-02-06T22:34:48+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/15fa70d05c9508ec30f4f030f98abded\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg\",\"width\":1920,\"height\":1080,\"caption\":\"Megan McKeown, seated far left at front of room, moderates while Lauren Withrow, second from left, talks about her career path during a Catbackers panel for women in sports media. (Kikue Higuchi\/MEDILL)\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\",\"name\":\"Medill Reports Chicago\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/15fa70d05c9508ec30f4f030f98abded\",\"name\":\"kikihiguchi2023\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c9f529d39edf8b8657296c5e2fe67270e8d0cacbfff0c011e231007220c7ecb9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c9f529d39edf8b8657296c5e2fe67270e8d0cacbfff0c011e231007220c7ecb9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"kikihiguchi2023\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/kikihiguchi2023\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago","og_description":"By Kikue Higuchi Medill Reports The Catbackers \u2014 an organization of women with a passion for Northwestern sports \u2014 assembled a panel for women in sports media, ahead of Northwestern women\u2019s basketball\u2019s 67-64 loss against No. 21 Illinois on Jan. 22. The panel featured Northwestern alumni Megan McKeown, Lauren Withrow and Patricia Babcock-McGraw as well [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/","og_site_name":"Medill Reports Chicago","article_published_time":"2023-02-06T22:34:48+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1920,"height":1080,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"kikihiguchi2023","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"kikihiguchi2023","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/","name":"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball - Medill Reports Chicago","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg","datePublished":"2023-02-06T22:34:48+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/15fa70d05c9508ec30f4f030f98abded"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/wp-media-folder-medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/featuredimg.jpg","width":1920,"height":1080,"caption":"Megan McKeown, seated far left at front of room, moderates while Lauren Withrow, second from left, talks about her career path during a Catbackers panel for women in sports media. (Kikue Higuchi\/MEDILL)"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/catbackers-host-women-in-sports-media-panel-promote-engagement-with-northwestern-womens-basketball\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Catbackers host women in sports media panel, promote engagement with Northwestern women\u2019s basketball"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/","name":"Medill Reports Chicago","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/15fa70d05c9508ec30f4f030f98abded","name":"kikihiguchi2023","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c9f529d39edf8b8657296c5e2fe67270e8d0cacbfff0c011e231007220c7ecb9?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c9f529d39edf8b8657296c5e2fe67270e8d0cacbfff0c011e231007220c7ecb9?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"kikihiguchi2023"},"url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/kikihiguchi2023\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/883"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101682"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101682\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101692,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101682\/revisions\/101692"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}