The GIST: While the entire nation of Argentina continues to celebrate their World Cup win, a disturbing soccer trend has re-emerged and is impacting runners-up France: racist abuse directed at Black players. Enough is enough.

The latest: Yesterday, the French soccer federation denounced racist social media comments aimed at national team players in the wake of Les Bleus World Cup final loss in Qatar.

• Superstar Kylian Mbappé — who notably scored a hat trick in the loss — and Bundesliga winger Kingsley Coman were among the players subjected to the hateful attacks.

• Fortunately, the response has been swift, with Coman’s club team Bayern Munich and France’s sports minister condemning the comments, and the nation’s governing soccer body saying they plan to file complaints against those who abused players.

The trend: If you’re getting the worst kind of déjà vu, you’re not alone. This latest instance comes a year and a half after Black players on England’s national team endured horrific racist abuse following their Euro 2020 final loss. Those comments prompted a police investigation that resulted in the arrest of 11 people.

Zooming out: As discussed on yesterday’s episode of The GIST of It, this World Cup, and sports in general, have the unique power to bring a divided world together, but they clearly aren’t insulated from the off-field problems that plague society beyond the pitch. Time to kick out the bullsh!t once and for all.

The GIST: Yesterday, four Congressional Democrats introduced a bill called the Fair Play for Women Act to strengthen the civil rights law Title IX, which prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded educational institutions. Level that playing field.

The reasoning: By adding to the original 37 words, the bill aims to improve gender equity by closing loopholes and holding universities and, for the first time ever, K–12 schools and the NCAA, accountable for providing representationally proportionate resources and opportunities to women in compliance with Title IX.

• Efforts to close the gap between women’s and men’s collegiate sports in both opportunities and funding have stalled since Title IX violations are routinely unreported or ignored.

The implications: Under the proposed Act, all educational institutions — not just colleges — and the NCAA would be required to report gender equity data, and those found to be non-compliant could be both sanctioned and fined by the Secretary of Education and sued by students.

• As it stands, universities that are constantly noncompliant can lose federal funding, but that provision has never been enforced.

• Besides laying the groundwork for better federal oversight and tangible sanctions, the bill would codify the right to sue an athletic department in state or federal court.

Zooming out: In June, Title IX hit its 50-year benchmark, but gender equity in college sports still has a long way to go. This isn’t the first time Congress has tried to intervene, either: In the wake of the NCAA’s attempts to address the stark inequalities between the women’s and men’s basketball tournaments, three other Reps scolded the sports governing body.

• Most notably, this new proposed legislation would override a 1999 court case that ruled the NCAA was not subject to Title IX’s standards, meaning the org could be forced to face the gender equity music for the very first time. Finally.

P.S. For updates on all things NCAA, check out our three-times weekly college sports newsletter.

🎁 Holiday (trading) cards

So close, yet so far. Needing just one more W to take the seven-game series, Team USA narrowly lost 3–2 to our northern neighbors in overtime (OT) on Monday. Forward Taylor Heise tied things up in the third period to send it to OT, but it wasn’t enough to hold off the Canadians. Time to regroup over the holiday break before the series resumes in the new year.

Phoenix basketball is officially (thankfully) under new ownership. Billionaire Mat Ishbia is buying the Suns and Mercury for a record-setting $4 billion. His first order of business? Ending the organization’s culture of abuse.

• Disgraced former owner Robert Sarver may be on his way out, but his conduct reportedly “had a trickle-down effect” that enabled abusive behavior from other high-ranking leaders. Burn it all down.

In the biggest golf plot twist since the downfall of Shooter McGavin, golfers who defected to the controversial LIV Golf league will be allowed to compete at the Masters tournament next season after some sat out last year’s edition amid the ongoing LIV fallout. Sorry, but no green jacket can distract from their corruption.