In the last two years, statistics have shown that many different women’s sports have seen a substantial amount of growth in viewership and attendance. One of those sports that have seen a large amount of growth is women’s basketball.
According to Nielsen.com, the NCAA women’s basketball championship would typically average around three to four million viewers up until 2023. When Iowa faced LSU in the championship game last year, they were able to pull in a staggering nine million viewers.
That game set a precedent for its own sport for the next year. In the championship game earlier this year, Iowa and South Carolina were able to obtain a viewership of 18 million people, which is double the previous year.
About a week after the championship game was the WNBA draft. Viewership for the draft was up 307 percent, according to The New York Times. The Indiana Fever set a new WNBA attendance record this year with over 600,000 fans in attendance.
Linda Anderson, an associate director of athletics here on WSC’s campus, said the main focus of her job is to certify eligibility of the student athletes. She also has to make sure they are able to maintain progress from year to year towards their degree and maintain the GPA they need, while making sure that the coaches and athletes are educated on those rules.
“I think when volleyball moved to a five-set match that was big for them,” Anderson said. “And when volleyball won gold at the Olympics, those were great times and set examples and inspired women.”
Volleyball has also been another women’s sport that has seen a lot of growth over the last year. In 2023, Nebraska volleyball brought in the largest crowd that women’s sports had ever seen, a crowd packed with 92,003 fans for Volleyball Day in Nebraska. After that event, schools across the nation were being impacted. More and more fans started to show up for volleyball.
That can also be said about Wayne State College’s volleyball team. In the last couple of years, the Wildcats have had very successful seasons, and have made their presence known in the Division II tournament.
“We have a good team that plays good volleyball, but our conference brings awesome teams,” Anderson said.
Payton Kincaid is a sophomore from Omaha, Nebraska and is a player for WSC’s softball team.
“Being a woman in a collegiate sport definitely feels empowering”, Kincaid said.
The softball team is one of very few teams here on campus whose head coach is a woman, Christy Warnock.
“She understands what we go through and the struggles we face because she went through the same ones, and I think it’s a lot easier to connect with her in that way,” Kincaid said.
Softball is another sport that has been seeing a rise in viewers as well. According to the Sports Video Group, the NCAA softball teams were able to average 1.1 million viewers across 15 games on ESPN platforms during the Women’s College World Series.
“You can go watch a softball game, or a women’s basketball team, and you are going to get the same amount of action, plays, and shots that you would watching a men’s game,” Kincaid said.
According to Play Today, women’s sports is an emerging industry worth over one billion dollars, and that around 66 percent of the general population is interested in at least one women’s sport.
Men’s sports being more entertaining has been the common misconception for years. However, thanks to incredible women athletes from all divisions, that misconception is being proved false.