Last year, a Nebraska vs. Omaha NCAA volleyball game became the most-attended event in US women's sports history, with more than 92,000 spectators. And that wasn't even for the championship: It was just a regular season match. The turnout was the biggest sign yet that fans are ready and willing to support women's sports, even if it means paying $400 for tickets on the secondary market.
Historically, women's sports have been something of an afterthought, always secondary to men's. And while there's still a lot of catching up to do, the gender gap is shrinking, thanks to increased media coverage, a wider pool of sponsors and investors, and relatable star athletes. The goal right now is to keep that momentum alive.
Favorite Players
Every so often, individual athletes act as gateways to an entire sport. Audiences tune in for one person, but they might stick around to see all the other players. We saw it with Michael Phelps in swimming, Conor McGregor in mixed martial arts, and unfortunately, even YouTube goofus Jake Paul deserves plenty of credit for all the new eyes he's brought to the world of boxing.
In women's basketball, those gateways are Indiana Fever point guard Caitlin Clark and Chicago Sky power forward Angel Reese. This past season was the most-watched in WNBA history, with 54 million unique viewers across multiple networks. That was thanks in large part to the pair's rivalry, which became must-see TV.
"For basketball it's all about storylines and stars," Kevin Hennessy, spokesperson for Fanatics Sportsbook, told The Daily Upside.
Place Your Bets: Beyond the amount of people tuning in, one of the best ways to measure audiences' interest in sports is to look at how much money they're throwing down. And for women's sports, it's a lot.
- In April, sportsbook Cloudbet reported a 500% increase in bets placed on the 2023 NCAA Women's Championship finals compared to the previous year.
- The group's data also suggests the increased popularity of women's basketball is having a halo effect on other women's sports, with betting volumes on squash, volleyball, and tennis seeing year-over-year increases of 290%, 57%, and 49%, respectively.
According to Fanatics data shared with The Daily Upside, Clark alone has sparked significant interest among betters, and the sportsbook said as of mid-September, there was more money on the Fever to win the WNBA title than every other team combined. Additionally, BetMGM and ESPN BET saw wagers on the 2024 WNBA regular season increase 108% and 150%, respectively, from last year.
"The growth year-over-year was exponentially driven by prominent players like Clark becoming household names and an increase in the number of televised women's games," Hannah Luther, a BetMGM sports trader, told The Daily Upside.
Of course, the Fever never got to the finals this year: It was eliminated in game 2 of the playoffs by the Connecticut Sun. But that loss only fuels next year's storyline: Clark's redemption arc.
You See the Game Last Night?
What about after Clark and Reese are gone? How do you keep the women's sports frenzy alive? It all comes down to exposure, according to Caroline Fitzgerald, CEO and founder of women's sports marketing group GOALS.
"We say a lot here at GOALS, 'If you put women's sports on TV, more people can watch,'" she told The Daily Upside. "If more people can watch, brands will invest more. And if brands invest more, women athletes are going to make more money."
That road to greater exposure has been a rocky one, though. Fitzgerald said antiquated attitudes toward things like women not dunking as much as men have led to a lack of media coverage. "It's really hard for people to become a fan of something when they haven't been exposed to it," she said.
In a 2023 report, marketing group Wasserman found that women's sports makes up 15% of sports media coverage, and when you take away collegiate competitions, it falls to just 8%. While that is low, it still marks an improvement.
"Traditional media — that's linear TV — has been stuck at around 5% for a long time for women's sports coverage," Fitzgerald said. "And the growth that we've seen recently has almost exclusively come from new, emerging digital and social media."
Money Where Your Mouth Is
The second part of Fitzgerald's formula for success in women's sports is investments. In 2023, brands on average spent just 9% of their total sports media investments on women's sports, according to a report from Sports Innovation Lab. That has been one of the biggest factors holding women's sports back. However, major strides have been made recently, as sponsors pour into the space:
- In its 2022-2023 marketing report, the LPGA reported that the number of active brands in its association has doubled since 2019, totaling more than 1,000 for the first time. It added that certain sponsors reap up to a 400% return on their investment.
- Fitzgerald noted that brands such as Ally Financial, Google, and State Farm have been making meaningful investments in the space and are seeing significant returns, too.
On the Ground Floor: Women's sports have the potential to be a better bang for your buck than men's sports. Think of it like securities. Men's sports are blue chips: They're safe bets that can provide modest returns over a long period. By contrast, women's sports are the cool, new startup all the aggressive investors want a piece of because the ability for growth is stronger.
For example, a group of investors including tennis star Serena Williams, actor Natalie Portman, venture capitalist Kara Nortman, and others founded the Angel City soccer team in 2020. Before the team had even played its first game, it was valued at $100 million. And this July, Disney CEO Bob Iger and his wife, Willow Bay, bought a controlling stake in the team in a deal valuing it at $250 million.
Similarly, French holding company OL Groupe closed its sale of the Seattle Reign women's soccer team in June for $58 million, a more than 1,500% return from when it bought the team in 2020.
"We've had these peaks in the past where women's sports have gained popularity quickly, but then there's been a bit of a backslide, and I don't think that's going to happen anymore because the proof points stack up in a way like they never have," Fitzgerald said. "We have media results. We have sponsorship results. We have attendance numbers. We have merchandise sales. We have every single proof point to show that it is a great investment."
Written by Griffin Kelly
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