Skylar Diggin’s fame sky-rocketed when she led the Irish women’s basketball team to the national title game two weeks ago.
However, there’s a price to pay for fame, as Diggins found out over the weekend, when naked photographs, rumored to be of Diggins, were posted to the Internet.
I have not seen those photographs – nor do I need to – to know they’re not authentic. Neither does anyone else who knows Skylar Diggins.
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Diggins put the rumors to rest on her Twitter account, noting that she would never handle herself “in such a careless and classless manner.”
That some cowardly low-life would do this is unspeakable. It is, however, also an indication of just how much Diggin’s popularity has grown, not just in South Bend but nationwide.
You don’t see anyone doctoring photographs of Maya Moore, do you?
Diggins’ popularity reached epic proportions during Notre Dame’s run to the Final Four. Rapper Lil Wayne began reaching out to her on Twitter. Her following includes more than 100,000 people. That’s more than Chicago Bulls guard Derrick Rose, soon to be the MVP. It’s more than two-time NFL MVP Tom Brady, and nearly as many as White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen.
What’s happening here? We’re watching Skylar Diggins become the face of women’s basketball. Coach Muffet McGraw agrees.
“I think she is the face of women’s basketball in the future,” Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw told me last week, when discussing Skylar’s popularity. “I think she’s definitely somebody that the whole country is following.”
Unfortunately for Diggins, that fame carried with it an unfair challenge over the weekend. But she seems to be handling it with the same savvy she displays on the court.
And yes, the world will be seeing a WHOLE LOT more of her, on the basketball court, for years to come.
