Bridget Pettis was 6 years old when she started playing sports. Basketball was her passion, and as she hit the streets and blacktops of East Chicago, Ind., in the late 1970s, she heard the same phrase over and over again. "I was a tomboy," Pettis said.These days, in addition to her duties as an assistant coach with the WNBA's Mercury, Pettis coaches the girls' basketball team at Madison Park Middle School in north-central Phoenix. Recently, more than 30 players tried out for the team, and Pettis can't recall a single one of them being called a tomboy.

"I guess that's progress," said Pettis, who played with the Mercury for parts of six seasons. Indeed it is. Wednesday is the 25th anniversary of National Girls and Women in Sports Day. The U.S. Congress adopted the day in 1986 to honor female athletic achievement and recognize the positive influence of sports on women.

By then, Title IX was part of the culture - it was enacted in June 1972 - and women's sports were blossoming. Before Title IX, only one of 27 girls participated in high school sports. Today, one of every three girls plays on a high school team.

In the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, women participated in 13 of 24 events. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, female athletes competed in 28 of 32 events.

"We've seen tremendous progress in the last 39 years in terms of opportunities for women," said Shawn Ladda, president of the National Association for Girls and Women in Sport. Yet there remains the need - or desire - for a national day to honor female athletes. Meanwhile, we don't celebrate Boys and Men in Sports Day.

Whether that's insecurity or inequality, you decide. "It will be great when we don't have to recognize it," Pettis said. "I would say that for Black History Month, too. When we don't have to have days like these it means we are just accepting each other in everything we do and everything we are. But we're not there yet."

For that, Pettis and others put the onus in part on the media. It's no surprise that Wednesday's 25-year anniversary has generated so little attention. For one thing, it's the same day as college football's national signing day. That's not the smartest scheduling.

Advocates, however, say it's another example of the media's unwillingness to cover women's sports, thus relegating females to minor-league status except for the occasional big event such as the Olympics or the World Cup. They believe the WNBA, the LPGA and, to a lesser extent, women's professional soccer would have greater relevance if they received more widespread exposure.

One recent study showed that women's sports get 8 percent of all print and television sports coverage. Over the past 60 years, only four percent of Sports Illustrated covers have portrayed women.

"The media is deciding what's important," Pettis said. "I think they decide it's not as important as men's sports. You watch ESPN, and you'll see billiards more than you will see women's basketball. I think we deserve just as much exposure and let the public decide for themselves."

But media companies are in the business of making money. And if televising poker brings in more viewers than a WNBA game, should they have to alter their scheduling to advance a cause?

Furthermore, isn't it the responsibility of the teams or leagues to earn media attention? The University of Connecticut women's basketball team, for example, received little or no exposure - both locally and nationally - until coach Geno Auriemma arrived on campus and started competing for championships. Now the Huskies women receive as much ink and air time as the men.

"What comes first, the chicken or the egg?" Ladda said. "You can say, 'Well, people aren't interested in women's sports.' For example, if you stop the average person on the street and ask them to name five prominent female athletes, they'll have a hard time doing it. But that's because they don't hear about them or see them on TV."

Ask Ladda her wish list for 20 years out, and she'll rattle off a number of items: Equal funding for women's sports in high school and college; more media exposure; women coaching men's professional sports teams, etc. Then she laughs. "And I hope we're not talking about this day," she said. "Then we'll know everything is fair and equitable."