Lily Mullens

Roanoke Swim ‘25

[ICONS @icons_women]

Breaking: Federal judge rules the NCAA can force men onto women’s teams and into women’s locker rooms—not beholden to Title IX.

The NCAA has been fighting @Riley_Gaines_ and dozens of other female athletes in court, defending allowing men to steal women’s titles, records and scholarships in women’s sports.

A federal judge has just given the NCAA the green light to continue.

[ICONS @icons_women]

Female athletes are important!!!

Thank you to the Senate Judiciary Committee for holding an important hearing today to protect women’s sports ✨

[ICONS @icons_women]

🏛️SUPREME COURT WIN FOR WOMEN!!!

ICONS STATEMENT:
Today's decision is a landmark victory for women and girls.

The Supreme Court has made clear that Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause apply on the basis of sex defined by biology. While the cases before the Court involved laws in just two states, the decision also clarified both Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause. These are federal protections that apply nationwide.

This ruling reinforces what female athletes have argued all along: women and girls deserve equal opportunities, fair competition, and sex-based protections under the law. The courageous young women who have lost opportunities and spent years in court have been fully vindicated.

ICONS' legal battles are far from over. Armed with today’s ruling, we expect a clear path to success in the courts moving forward. We will continue fighting to ensure this decision is fully enforced in every state and across the collegiate landscape where female athletes are facing illegal policies allowing men and boys into their sports and locker rooms.

Every female athlete must have the protections guaranteed under federal law. States and institutions that govern policies for female athletes must be held accountable where they have violated the law.

[Steve Magness @stevemagness]

Team USA just won its first Olympic hockey gold in 46 years.

On February 22. The exact anniversary of the Miracle on Ice.

Forget the storybook narrative for a second.

What happened today is a masterclass in what performance science teaches us about pressure, identity, and legacy.

Consider the pressure this team was under.
They walked into today carrying 46 years of near misses.

The US hadn't won Olympic gold since 1980.

They lost the gold medal game in 2002 and 2010...both times to Canada. Last year at the 4 Nations tournament, Canada beat them in overtime. That loss was still raw.

The 1980 hero, Mike Eruzione, was in the building. He told the players before the game: "It's just a hockey game."

It wasn't. And everyone knew it.

Canada outshot the US 41-26.

They dominated the second and third periods.

Nathan MacKinnon missed an open net. Macklin Celebrini had a breakaway and couldn't convert. Devon Toews had Hellebuyck beaten and somehow the puck stayed out. Then Charlie McAvoy cleared a puck off the goal line with his glove.

This was not a dominant performance. It was a team surviving enormous pressure and refusing to break. That distinction matters.

How does a team perform under that kind of weight? It starts with the environment the coach creates.

Mike Sullivan is now the only American-born coach to win multiple Stanley Cups AND Olympic gold.

When he took over the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2015, the team was loaded with talent — Crosby, Malkin, Letang — and completely broken. His description: "There was a dark cloud over the locker room."

His first move wasn't a new system or a motivational speech. It was a reframe.

He told the team: "There are certain things in life we can control and certain things we can't. We needed to focus on the things that we could control and not dedicate any cognitive resources or worry to things we couldn't control."

The team adopted a two-word motto: "Just play."

Six months later, they won the Stanley Cup. Tonight, he helped USA do it again on the biggest stage in the world.

Sullivan builds what he calls a "safe zone for learning."

His video review sessions are explicitly NOT about blame.

"We don't want a player walking into our video room on eggshells worried about 'Am I going to be in the film? Is Coach going to yell at me?' It's a game of mistakes. Our responsibility is to learn from them."

His guiding principle from his college coach:

"Before players want to know what you know, they want to know that you care."

It's the difference between compliance and buy-in. Buy-in wins championships.

Research backs up Sullivan.

Fear-based environments don't produce peak performance. Especially when pressure is already high...

They produce anxiety, risk-aversion, and choking.

When people feel psychologically safe — when they know mistakes won't be weaponized against them — they take smarter risks, recover faster from errors, and perform better under pressure.

We could see it in how Sullivan framed this moment in the weeks before the game.

"What an incredible opportunity we have in front of us."

Not a burden or expectation...Opportunity.

He took the unusual step for a hockey team and kept the team in the Olympic Village instead of a hotel.

His reasoning: "The Village is part of the experience."

The Hughes brothers roomed together. The Tkachuk brothers roomed together.

He didn't try to ignore or isolate them from the pressure. He was embedding them in it, together.

And then there's the guy who scored the goal.

Jack Hughes came into the Olympics injured, underperforming, slotted on the fourth line.

Sullivan moved him up mid-tournament because, as he put it, "We thought by moving him and getting him more ice time, he could impact the game more."

Hughes's response: "I believe in myself more than anyone. Wherever I was slotted coming into this thing, I knew I was going to play well."

A coach who believed in him when results said otherwise. A player who believed in himself when the lineup said otherwise.

Then two teeth got cracked in half by a high stick in the third period. And he scored the golden goal anyway.

Everyone's going to remember this as the night the US ended a 46-year drought.

On the anniversary. In overtime. Against Canada.

But the real lesson is quieter than that.

The environment you create determines the performance you get. A safe zone for learning. A focus on controllables. Relationships built on care, not fear. Pressure reframed as opportunity.

That's what it looks like when a team is ready, with the right environment and support to tackle the ghosts of history.

They built a culture where a team could survive 41 shots and a kid with two broken teeth could score the biggest goal of his life.

The 1980 Miracle was about belief overcoming talent. Today was different.

Today was talent, preparation, identity, and 46 years of accumulated hunger arriving at the same moment.

-Steve

[GoldenAge @GoldenAgeUnfold]

If Charlie Kirk has touched your life in any way, drop 🇺🇸 in the comments.

We love you, Charlie.

[Collin Rugg @CollinRugg]

"I'm just flesh and bone, but more importantly, I'm a soul, and that soul is accountable to one being."

"I've had an unbelievably blessed life... So praise God. I've been all across the world. I've met with world leaders."

"I've flown Air Force One, got to know a president. I have an amazing family, the podcast Turning Point USA... And so you experienced that, and you're like, 'What actually matters?'"

"What matters is your relationship with the divine, your relationship with your family, your kids, and maybe a close collection of friends, and your relationship with the truth."

So much wisdom and taken way too soon. Charlie Kirk will never be forgotten.

[Riley Gaines @Riley_Gaines_]

Full article here:
https://t.co/R9AhVN9KUl

[Réka György @Gyorgy_Official]

Prevent biological males from female sports, locker rooms and bathrooms in Virginia.

You can find the Petition on the link below and have time to comment on it until May 26. You can use your name or be anonymous when you comment:
https://t.co/GwvRqEuvBi

Please help! 🙏

[Riley Gaines @Riley_Gaines_]

The new NCAA policy is in direct conflict with President Trumps beautifully written Executive Order, "Keeping Men Out of Women's Sports".

We see you, @NCAA

[ICONS @icons_women]

“Light it on fire and throw it in the garbage.”

📺 Must watch: @KimJonesICONS rips the NCAA’s new “transgender participation policy,” calling it a complete failure in protecting collegiate women’s sports for female athletes only.

[Independent Women @IWF]

Fighting for women + girls at the White House! 🇺🇸