"Social media is a cruel place": Former Iowa star Gabbie Marshall once described handling "hate" and pressure as a star hooper

Gabbie Marshall played with the Iowa Hawkeyes for five years. During this time, she won the Big Ten conference championship thrice, and the Hawkeyes advanced to back-to-back championship games. With the high level of competitiveness comes opinions and hate from people and online.

In an interview from July, Marshall spoke about the negative side of social media. She said:

"Social media is a cruel place. There's so much love, but there's so much hate. And it's so easy to just focus on the hate. Anything that you do, somebody's gonna tweet about it. It's the easiest thing to do in the world, sit behind a screen and type something mean about a player.

"I think that's kind of something that's gonna be hard for younger generations, is social media. That is going to, it can take a toll on your mental health for sure. You just naturally focus on it. It's all you're seeing, you know?"

She also spoke specifically about the Final Four game against the UConn Huskies during the 2024 March Madness. Gabbie Marshall was involved in one of the most controversial plays that split the internet in two.

"Our team doesn't have a rule about having to delete social media, but I deleted mine. I deleted my Twitter and turned off my Instagram messages during the tournament run, especially after the UConn game. Only the people I follow could message me. So I didn't see it, I didn't wanna see it."

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What did Gabbie Marshall do during the UConn Huskies game?

The UConn vs Iowa game was an intense one, with Paige Bueckers and Caitlin Clark going head-on to lead their team to the finals. It was a close game and in the final minutes, the Hawkeyes were leading by just one point.

When the clock was down to the last three seconds, referees made a foul call on UConn forward Aaliyah Edwards for an illegal screen on Gabbie Marshall. This moment gave Iowa the edge as the Huskies were never able to get possession of the ball after this. The call was the most debated topic online, with NBA and WNBA stars joining in.

However, post-game, Marshall was at the receiving end of multiple threats and hate comments that she took time off social media.

“I feel like it just kind of overlooked the fact that I played my butt off the whole game trying to guard her,” she said (via AP). “I’ve tried to get over screens the whole game. I feel like that one play just kind of consumed everything.

“I can’t believe people would be so immature as to attack a 22-year-old on doing their job and doing it really, really well,” then-Iowa coach Lisa Bluder said.

Iowa went through to the finals but lost to South Carolina. Gabbie Marshall has retired from playing and is currently pursuing her master's in occupational therapy from the University of North Carolina.