Episode Introduction and Hosts’ Favorite Moments

Alex: Hey everyone, Alex here. Quick heads up — the episode you’re about to hear was actually the second one we ever recorded, back when we were just sharing these with friends and family. We decided to release it now because it gives important context for conversations coming up in Episode 3 and beyond. The audio is a little raw, but we think the content is worth it. Enjoy!

Caitlin: Hi, I’m Caitlin, I’m Alex, and you’re listening to Raising the Game — a podcast covering the rise in opportunity, visibility, and accessibility of women’s sports globally. We’re a husband-wife team who are avid sports fans raising two young girls, and we find the exposure and investment in women’s sports a gateway for them and other young girls like them to see their passions for play, performance, and leadership — not just as extracurriculars to be added to a resume or a discipline with an expiration date after high school — but as a real opportunity to build a career as an athlete, a coach, an analyst, an athletic trainer, a director of sports operations, or maybe even a podcaster.

Each week, we’re bringing you the top stories in women’s professional and sometimes collegiate sports. We’ll highlight prime-time performers, key business decisions, economic impacts, and the growing opportunities for women’s athletics. You’ll hear our perspectives on these stories as fans, but perhaps more importantly, as parents who value what these stories mean for our kids. If there’s a storyline or topic you’d like to hear us talk about, reach out via email or on social media at RTG_pod on Instagram.

Nice. Yeah, we did it. I think the first thing we’re going to do this week is start with something we do with our kids every night at dinner — what is your favorite thing? What was your favorite women’s sports moment from this past week?

Caitlin: Oh my gosh. There are a lot to choose from. I’ll mention this throughout the episode — I had the pleasure of going to two, three live sporting events last week: high school, college, and professional. All three. I have to say, one I’ll mention here because we probably won’t bring it up is I went to a high school girls basketball game at my alma mater and got to see a player who used to play soccer — which I coach at this high school — drop 51 points in a game against a good team. This was not a sleeper matchup. She played her heart out, and that was awesome. It was so fun to watch.

Alex: Yeah, that’s great. What about you?

Caitlin: I think my favorite thing was bringing the girls to the Frost game on Sunday. I think we walked away — five to one? Five to two?

Alex: Six to two. It was wild. A lot of offense.

Caitlin: So yeah, I think it was just fun. A lot of people — they did, I think, 9,700 in attendance.

PWHL Frost Game Attendance and Family Highlights

Alex: Yeah, almost 9,800. That’s really cool to see, and just the girls getting to watch these women play sports at a very high level.

Caitlin: Yeah, it’s really cute. Our three-year-old gets really into just cheering for the Frost.

Alex: She gets into it. Our six-year-old is kind of just taking it in — but that sort of describes them pretty well, actually.

Top Headlines Overview

Alex: All right, I think next we’re going to go into our top headlines. Starting off: the WNBA and the WNBA-PA failed to reach their agreement by the January 9th deadline, are operating under the status quo, and a work stoppage by either side could happen at any time.

Caitlin: Yeah, so we’re going to talk a little more about this one, but just a reminder — WNBA-PA is the Players Association in the Women’s National Basketball Association. So the union for the players. We’ll get into an update. We talked about this at length last week, and we wanted to provide an update because we had that deadline coming up.

Alex: We did. Next: Unrivaled had its first full weekend of play and there was no shortage of fantastic performances. Yo, we’re going to deep dive Unrivaled. I’m repping today already — I’ve got my Unrivaled hat on.

Caitlin: I’m ready to go. I’ve got my Paige Bueckers t-shirt on, representing Buckets. We’re going to talk about Unrivaled. Super fun to watch. It was our first time watching it this weekend — great time.

Alex: The NWSLPA is pushing back on the high-impact player rule, arguing it fundamentally changes salary structure and therefore should be collectively bargained. The current agreement was ratified in August of 2024 and is set to run through the 2030 season.

Caitlin: Yeah, so this one — we have a few more headlines around this, but again the Players Association in the National Women’s Soccer League is basically claiming they may need to move to early bargaining and renegotiation of their current CBA. That’s a lot to consider given the current agreement runs to 2030. But you’re seeing that pattern of players looking at the growth and saying, “Hey, pay us what you owe us.”

Alex: Exactly. Sam Coffey, U.S. Women’s National Team midfielder, is in advanced talks to sign with WSL club Manchester City, which would make her the seventh USWNT regular headed to the WSL. And I think there’s also some collective bargaining we need to get into in a future episode with the WSL — there’s some drama over there right now.

WSL Funding Structures and USWNT Camp News

Caitlin: Oh, awesome. Yes, we’ll absolutely have to dive in. I think it’d be great to cover the funding structures and how they differ. We mentioned in the last episode that those WSL teams are usually backed, at least partially, by funding from the men’s side — so it’s just structured very differently from what we see here in the States.

Alex: Sticking with the U.S. Women’s National Team — the January camp roster was named, and youth is on the menu. This group will compete in friendlies against Paraguay and Chile at the end of January. She Believes Cup teams and locations have been announced: USA will be joined by Canada, Colombia, and Argentina for matches in Nashville, Columbus, and Harrison, New Jersey in early March. 2026 marks a big qualifying year for women’s national soccer teams as they prepare for the 2027 Women’s World Cup in Brazil.

And I want to add a quick late-breaking headline — this came out just a couple of hours ago. We’ve talked a lot about USWNT players leaving the NWSL to go play overseas, but news just came out tonight that USWNT captain Lindsey Heaps is actually coming back from a pretty long stint at OL Lyon in France to be a part of the Denver Summit expansion team, which is set to start this year. That’s really exciting. She’s a Colorado native, so she’s coming home. She’s done a couple stints overseas — she’s kind of been there, done that.

Caitlin: A movement in the PWHL standings over the weekend, as Olympic teams continue to be named. Canada and Germany have been announced, along with the U.S., which was named about a week ago. We’ll talk about the PWHL in one of our longer segments — give you a rundown of where the standings sit, players to watch, and how the playoff picture is shaping up. The standings are very interesting right now.

Alex: League One Volleyball served up their first matches this past week, with defending champions LOVB Austin beating Nebraska in five matches in the opening match.

Caitlin: Yeah, and we’ll also talk about LOVB. All three of the spotlights we have today are these newer organizations providing opportunity for women to play professional sports. It’s really cool to compare and contrast the funding structures, the investment, and the interest in these different leagues.

Amber Glenn Wins Third Consecutive U.S. Figure Skating Championship

Caitlin: Finally, in U.S. figure skating qualifying action — Amber Glenn’s stunning short program performance propelled her to win her third consecutive U.S. figure skating championship, the first woman to do so since Michelle Kwan. I cannot stop thinking about watching that performance. You were obsessed — you were like, “Here, look at this one.”

Alex: It was so good. Was it like a prayer? She did Madonna?

Caitlin: And she was perfect — it was literally perfect. I also noticed she toppled defending world champion and her Team USA teammate Alyssa Liu en route to that national championship. All right.

Unrivaled Deep Dive: League Format, Rules, and Players

Caitlin: Our first deep dive: Unrivaled, kicking off. So we mentioned this in the headlines. We had our first full weekend of Unrivaled action. They actually opened the season last Monday night and played back-to-back games. Let’s get into it. We teased this a little last week. This is a new league founded in 2025 — as you can see on the hat for those who are watching.

The league was founded by Breanna Stewart — two-time WNBA MVP, World Champion, WNBA champion — and Napheesa Collier, our hometown hero with the Minnesota Lynx. She should have gotten MVP last season, just between us. Essentially, Unrivaled is a 3-on-3 women’s basketball league. It’s made up of eight teams with six players per team. They added two teams this season — they had six last year, eight this year. The league features some of the top WNBA talent. Teams go by the Laces, the Lunar Owls, the Vinyl, the Rose, the Mist, the Phantom — and then the Breeze and the Hive are the new additions this season.

Players new to Unrivaled this season include Paige Bueckers, Kelsey Mitchell of the Indiana Fever, Dominique Malonga of the Seattle Storm, Kiki Iriafen and Sonia Citron of the Washington Mystics, and Cameron Brink. Returning players this season include Chelsea Gray from the Las Vegas Aces, Kahleah Copper and Alyssa Thomas from the Phoenix Mercury, Jackie Young also of the Aces, Skylar Diggins-Smith from the Storm, and Sabrina Ionescu from the Liberty — teammates with Breanna Stewart — and players from the LA Sparks.

So these are marquee names. For those who follow WNBA basketball, these are big gets for a league like this. And really the point behind this league was to provide a space for these players to play in the WNBA offseason without having to go overseas. The script for years — and I remember this growing up — was you may play in the W, but you have four to five months where you need to make more money and want to keep playing at a high level. The opportunity to do that was overseas in Europe. I think this was a really innovative idea that Napheesa and Breanna brought to the table. The league is also supported by Napheesa’s husband, who I believe organizes operations.

So, tipped off January 5th, with the championship to be played on March 4th. It runs quick — about a two-month season, 56 regular-season games. Every weekend, basically, two teams will play Friday night, then another game right after. The next night, another set of four teams. Then Sunday and Monday night they reshuffle so you’re not playing the same team again — and you’re never playing a back-to-back, which is a change from last year. Quicker games — seven-minute quarters for three quarters. And they play this down in Miami, Florida at Sephora Arena. They’ll play their first games outside of Miami on January 30th in Philadelphia.

Alex: Is that like a normal four-day schedule?

Caitlin: I believe so. Let’s talk about the rule differences. 3-on-3, full court — this differs from FIBA rules, which is a half-court game. The court’s about 15 feet shorter than regulation, same width. For the fourth quarter, Alex mentioned this in the last episode — they call it an Elam ending. Do you want to talk about it?

Alex: That’s my favorite rule. So they get to the fourth quarter, stop play, add 11 points to the highest team’s total, and that is the target score. If you’re relatively close, it’s still anyone’s game. The thing that really stood out — in the Breeze versus Hive game we watched, the Hive was down by a lot, but defense stepped up dramatically in the fourth quarter. And you get into that last two minutes of an NBA game and it’s just a foul slog — going back and forth, really slow. This speeds it up, you’ve got more defense happening, and you always have that exciting winning shot.

Caitlin: The coolest part is that regardless of how the game is going, there’s still a “next shot wins” mentality — it’s really fun. One of the games we watched, a team needed one or two points and it took a few trips up and down the court.

Alex: Yeah, you were kind of waiting — could they erode the lead, make it interesting? They didn’t, but it was still fun. A couple other differences: 18-second shot clock versus 24. For free throws — this was one of my favorite things — you always shoot one shot, but it’s equivalent to the points of the shot you were fouled on. So if you get fouled on a three-pointer in Unrivaled, you shoot one free throw and it’s worth three points. That makes the Elam ending even more compelling — you can’t just foul to get out of trouble. Six fouls to foul out. There are special rules if you get down to three players — I haven’t looked into those yet.

Unrivaled 1-on-1 Tournament, Salaries, and Investor Lineup

Caitlin: In mid-February, they do a 1-on-1 tournament — all the players get together, I think it’s over a few days around the 11th through the 14th, single-elimination bracket style, head-to-head. What’s awesome is it’s another opportunity for players to earn money. The winner of that 1-on-1 tournament gets $250,000 in prize money, and all her teammates get $10,000 each.

Alex: Is there any like — I don’t want to say strife, but with your teammates getting the $10k while you get $250k?

Caitlin: I don’t think so. I think they’re professionals. And it encourages camaraderie — you’re gonna cheer your teammate on. Speaking of compensation: this league has the highest average salary in all of U.S. women’s professional sports. Minimum six figures for every player. The Season 1 salary pool was $8 million — spread across the roster, that’s an average of about $220K, which is really close to the super-max salary in the W right now. Players also receive equity ownership in the league. And this is an all-inclusive experience — housing, training facilities, recovery resources, nutrition support. They basically show up and can focus entirely on basketball.

Where does the money come from? Founded by Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier, they have a slate of celebrity investors — Steph Curry of the Golden State Warriors, Coco Gauff, the U.S. tennis star, Michael Phelps, Dawn Staley — head coach of the University of South Carolina Gamecocks and multiple national champion — and JuJu Watkins of the USC Trojans, who I think is literally turning her NIL money around and investing in the league she’s going to play in someday.

Alex: We also just read that Serena Williams is an investor in the Toronto NWSL expansion team. You’re going to keep seeing that cross-pollination — people recognizing it not just as an opportunity for women’s sports to grow, but as a genuinely smart business investment.

Caitlin: I want to hit on the equity piece again. The WNBA feels like it’s trying to give more money upfront in new CBA negotiations, but it kind of spreads out over the long term as less overall. Whereas Unrivaled says: here’s a bunch of money, here’s some equity — you’ll help us grow it. It’s actually really clever from the founding group, because now the players have a vested interest in seeing it succeed. Like a tech startup — we’re going to give everyone equity, make it in your best interest to work hard and grow this.

Unrivaled Week One: Standings, Standout Performances, and Format Fit

Caitlin: Really quickly, how’s it going so far: the Breeze are breezing. They’re the expansion team — Paige Bueckers, Dominique Malonga, Cameron Brink, Kate Martin, Rickea Jackson — youngest team by far but having a lot of success. I think they had their first loss last night to the defending champs. But they’re fun to watch. The defending champion Rose are undefeated, but winning tighter games.

You’re seeing some insane performances. Can I pull out my favorite stat? Chelsea Gray, through three games with the Rose, has 95 points. The next closest player has 67 — she’s got 28 more points than anyone else. 31.6 per game and almost 1.5 points per minute played.

Alex: That’s crazy. In games that are like 70 to 85 total points, she’s scoring a third of the points every night.

Caitlin: And that actually highlights something interesting about the format. In 3-on-3 you can’t hide defensively — and you can’t hide offensively either. You have to be good one-on-one. This format is really well suited to players with a strong mid-range game or a great pick-and-roll game. I predicted last week that Paige would have success in this format because of her strong mid-range game. And you’re seeing players like Chelsea Gray — Dearica Hamby had 40 points in the game we watched — have a ton of success.

Alex: That actually leads into my last question: do you think there are certain system players who are afraid of this league because it might expose them?

Caitlin: Potentially. You kind of get put on an island. There’s no help. You can’t hide. So yeah, there could be some players who see it that way. You’d hope they see it as an opportunity to grow.

WNBA CBA Negotiations Update: Deadline Passes Without a Deal

Caitlin: All right, we’re going to try to keep this pretty short. The WNBA CBA deadline passed on Friday. Reportedly, there’s been no contact from the league to the union since the union provided their latest response — over two weeks ago now. The union was understandably pretty disappointed. I’m going to read the statement they put out, then the league’s response.

The statement from the union read: “At midnight on January 9th, the 2020 WNBA-WNBAPA collective bargaining agreement will expire. Despite demonstrating our willingness to compromise in order to get a deal done, the WNBA and its teams have failed to meet us at the table with the same spirit and seriousness. Instead, they have remained committed to undervaluing player contributions and dismissing…”

The league issued a statement after the deadline passed that read: “As the league experiences a pivotal time of unprecedented popularity and growth, we recognize the importance of building upon that momentum. Our priority is a deal that significantly increases player salaries, enhances overall player experience, and supports the long-term growth of the league for current and future…”

Caitlin: Sounds like a lot of words to me. And the momentum comment has me thinking about the expansion teams. Are they stuck? Can they draft? Can they play? Because if you’re somehow locking these expansion teams down from doing anything… at least I don’t think they have any players yet, because the drafts haven’t happened.

Alex: So they move into what’s known as a period of status quo — I read this is very standard for union negotiations. What it means is they continue to operate as if the current agreement is in place. However, a work stoppage could come at any time from either side. The problem they’re running into: we’ve got two expansion teams supposed to start this year with drafts scheduled to pull players from existing teams — and then the college draft. Free agency was supposed to start, and they are able to do that under the status quo. However, the Players Association is basically recommending that no one negotiate new contracts right now, because the terms may change and you could end up in a worse contract.

Caitlin: I do some communications as part of my job, and that league statement sounds like a nothing burger to me. I want to try something: is there any notification process when a lockout or strike happens? Do they just announce it one morning?

Alex: That’s a good question. I think when they were in the extension period there were some parameters around notification — let’s make that a to-do for next episode.

I think you ended on tones of disappointment. Do you want me to read the quote from Napheesa Collier?

Caitlin: Yeah, absolutely. We love Queen Phee.

Alex: Quote — and this was last week when the deadline was coming up: “Our deadline is coming up, and I think you’ve heard a lot of chatter that what we’re asking for is not sustainable for the business. And being on this side with Unrivaled, I know what it takes to run a sustainable business.” — side-eye. “If they can’t find a model that makes that happen, they need to put people in place who can. Because we’ve proven it is possible. There is a way, and we’re thriving. I do think a deal is going to get done, but we’re standing firm. We’re not going to back down. We can’t take less. The sport has grown too much. It would be a disservice to the people who came before us and to the work we’ve put in.”

Caitlin: There’s a lot there. If you’re raising young people and you want a model of graceful, articulate, smart leadership — go find some Napheesa Collier videos. She has a really awesome backstory rooted in politics and diplomacy. Yeah, we’ll keep you posted. Right now it’s not looking good, but I’m optimistic the players have the upper hand. I don’t think the league can afford to walk away from the momentum, and I don’t think the players are going to give.

Alex: I’m optimistic because I really want them to have a season. I want to go to some games.

Caitlin: Me too. Every night they played last summer, we had it on. The girls were watching. Our oldest would go to our little tablet and ask, “Are they playing tonight?”

PWHL Standings, Top Performers, and the Olympic Break

Alex: Right. We’re Lynx fans — Stud Buds, yeah. All right, we’re going to move into some newer leagues. We mentioned we went to a Minnesota Frost game on Sunday — our third game there, our first non-playoff game. Let’s talk about the PWHL.

So the Boston Fleet are currently leading the standings — they’ve got a bit of an edge, though I believe they just went down to the streaking Ottawa Charge last night. Ottawa has something like six wins in a row. Our very own Minnesota Frost moved into second place with their victory over the Seattle Torrent. The New York Sirens have about 18 points, which was putting them in second before the games this weekend. And the Charge and Toronto Sceptres are coming up in the middle.

The expansion teams — Seattle and Vancouver — are struggling, but it’s early days. One fun tidbit: the league uses a three-two-one-zero scoring system. So a record has four numbers. You get three points for a regulation win, two for an overtime win, one for an overtime loss, and zero for a regulation loss. It always breaks my brain when I look at the standings.

Top performers — shoutout to our Minnesota Frost. Kendall Coyne Schofield, our captain, leads, or was leading, the league in goals.

Caitlin: I actually think this changed a little bit last night. She has 12 points — she’s tied with Brianne Jenner of Ottawa. So I think Brianne Jenner may have taken the lead for top goal scorer after last night. Britta Curl-Salemme also has 11 — maybe more now after that game. Six goals went in last night, so people were racking up points left and right. Kelly Pannek of the Minnesota Frost, Abby Roque from the Montréal Victoire, Daryl Watts from the Toronto Sceptres, and Mae Batherson — also of the Minnesota Frost — have been surging in points lately.

And in net, Aerin Frankel, the Boston goaltender, has a 1.36 goals-against average and an almost 95% save percentage, which currently makes her the league’s top netminder. Really cool performances out there.

Alex: But we have this little thing called the Olympics on the horizon. The PWHL is taking a break for a month — unusual for a normal season. It’ll be really interesting to see who has momentum going in and whether it stays sustained coming out. The rust-versus-rest storyline. Some players will rest, some will be skating hard at the Olympics — playing a lot of games, fueled by national pride, and they might come back a little gassed. Ottawa has started out poorly and then surged — will that carry past the break? Will Boston’s success continue?

We’ve got a lot of veteran Olympians in the PWHL — all of Team Canada plays in the PWHL, which is cool. We have six players on the Minnesota Frost who are on Team USA. And we had the pleasure of watching Hilary Knight, captain of the Seattle Torrent and a multiple-time Team USA captain — she’s going to the Olympics for the fifth time, which is the most ever by an American hockey player, men’s or women’s.

I actually also saw another Olympian this weekend. I went to a Minnesota Gophers vs. Minnesota State Mankato Mavericks women’s college hockey game. I know a player who plays for the Mankato Mavericks — shoutout Zoe Lopez. But on the Gophers, they have Abby Murphy. Her viral assist is going crazy on the internet right now. We’ve watched her play three times and she just skates at a completely different level than everybody else. Really awesome. I got to bring my older daughter to that game along with two women I coach with and their kids.

LOVB League One Volleyball: Origins, Format, and Teams

Alex: All right, I think that’s more or less all we’ve got on the PWHL. Shall we move to LOVB?

Caitlin: Yes — League One Volleyball. L-O-V-B. I always say “Love” in my head. Love me some volleyball.

So what is League One Volleyball? This was a learning experience for me. I knew nothing about it until it drew my attention because we’re apparently getting a team here next year. Founded in 2020 by Caitlin Gao, Peter Hirschman, and Olympian Kevin Wong. It was founded as a network for youth volleyball clubs across the United States, with the goal of eventually providing a pipeline to professional play — a unique, holistic ecosystem from youth all the way up through the pros.

As of July 2025, LOVB’s youth business includes 77 club locations in 28 states, with over 22,000 youth athletes and over 3,500 coaches. There are eight teams — with expansion on the way. Current teams: Atlanta, Austin — defending champions — Houston, Madison, Nebraska, and Salt Lake. Three expansion teams are expected in 2027: our lovely hometown of Minneapolis, plus Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Alex: I’m interested in the business model — this youth network into professional play is very interesting. There’s a sneaky cost-of-customer advantage here. Their built-in customer base acquisition is almost free or they’re being paid for through the club network. Now you look at how to increase the average customer value — that probably comes through sponsorships, broadcast deals, ad revenue.

Caitlin: That’s a good point. And it’s worth a dive into how it’s being sustained. So the 2026 season kicked off on January 7th. One really cool thing about this league — they spotlight a match of the week every Wednesday on USA Network. Cable, so you can get that pretty much anywhere. And the first match of the season is always a rematch of the two teams who played in the championship. Other leagues, take note. That’d be like replaying the Super Bowl teams first thing in the new season.

So Austin hosted Nebraska and won. Austin beat Nebraska again in five matches. To be clear, five matches is the full distance in volleyball. Each team will play 20 matches in a season — 10 home, 9 away, plus one neutral site match at the LOVB Classic in Kansas City, Missouri in February. The postseason features four teams in the semifinals in early April, with a two-match series format.

LOVB Players to Watch and Funding History

Caitlin: Where can you watch? USA Network, ESPN Plus — you might need a subscription, might be free — and there’s an app called Victory, not Victory Channel — please do not go to Victory Channel — just the Victory app. A few games are also on ESPN2.

Players to watch on Austin: Madison Skinner — the 2025 Finals MVP, ranked among the league’s top four in points, kills, and kills per set. And Logan Eggleston, a 6’2” outside hitter and four-time All-American with Texas. I wonder if she’s participating in an ownership group.

On LOVB Nebraska: Jordan Larson — actually a team co-owner. So similar to what we talked about with Unrivaled, you’ve got player ownership stakes. She’s an Olympic medalist and finished top five in the league in aces last season. And Lexi Rodriguez is making her debut as Nebraska’s starting libero — that’s the player who wears the different color jersey. I do need to learn more volleyball rules.

Other stars to watch: Kelsey Cook of Atlanta — she’s actually going to be out this season; she’s pregnant. Jordan Thompson from Houston. Lauren Carlini and Mika Hancock are both Olympic medalists from Madison and Houston, respectively. And the players collectively hold 23 Olympic medals — serious talent on the court. Volleyball is also probably one of the most exciting sports to watch. When rallies go on and on and people are diving around — they’re so athletic and can jump so high. It is insane.

I want to revisit one thing: my understanding is that Jordan Larson on Nebraska was more than just an equity stake — she’s more of a full owner. That seems like an interesting locker room dynamic when an owner is also playing.

Alex: Yeah, that seems like a potential conflict of interest worth watching.

Caitlin: As with Unrivaled, let’s talk about LOVB investors. They’ve raised $160 million across multiple funding rounds. $16.8 million in Series A in September 2022, led by the great Billie Jean King — who loves to invest in women’s sports. She’s also a PWHL investor and part owner of Angel City FC in the NWSL. Alongside Billie Jean King: Kevin Durant. Then $35 million in Series B funding in 2023, with investments from Minnesota native Lindsey Vonn, Jason Tatum of NBA fame, and Candace Parker. And then approximately $100 million from Atwater Capital in November 2024.

Alex: And I noticed there was a franchise sale to Spurs Sports & Entertainment — the group that owns the San Antonio Spurs. When you have a group like that, it feels like a validation of the business model. They’ve seen something they like and think it has legs.

Record-Breaking Women’s College Volleyball Attendance and Viewership

Caitlin: One thing I want to call attention to before we move on: women’s college volleyball. The all-time attendance record for any women’s sport was set on August 30th, 2023 when Nebraska defeated Omaha at Memorial Stadium — their football stadium — in front of 92,000 spectators. It annihilated the previous record for women’s college volleyball and set the world record for women’s sports attendance.

These playoff games are averaging roughly 20,000 attendees and about 1.7 million viewers on ABC. You’re seeing 45 to 50% increases in viewership across the board over the last three years. And there’s something like 1.3 billion minutes of women’s college volleyball watched — I don’t know the exact timeframe, but that tells you advertisers need to be paying attention. This is being watched and you need to get something in front of these eyeballs.

Alex: For sure. Name of the game — invest in women’s sports. All right, that’s all I have on volleyball for this week, but we’ll be watching a match of the week on Wednesday night.

What to Watch This Week: Unrivaled, PWHL, LOVB, and College Basketball

Caitlin: All right, we’re going to move on to our “What to Watch” for the week. For Unrivaled, games continue Friday through Monday. I’m most looking forward to Saturday night’s Breeze vs. Vinyl game. The Breeze have been playing well and they take on the Vinyl, who I believe were last year’s runners-up. And the Vinyl sport another Lynx favorite, Courtney Williams — alongside Brittney Griner and Dearica Hamby, who had that 40-point game over the weekend. It’s going to be a good one.

Alex: PWHL: someone told us our bias was showing last episode, but I’ve got to talk about the Frost again. Friday is a matchup between the number-two Minnesota Frost and the number-three New York Sirens — they’re one point apart in the standings. A win there puts the Sirens back into second place. And if Boston loses on Wednesday and the Frost win Friday, they’d be within one point of Boston. Their next two opponents are in the bottom half of the standings — Toronto and Seattle — so Boston will probably win at least one. But we can get our hopes up.

Caitlin: And LOVB — I mentioned USA Network, ESPN Plus, sometimes ESPN2, and the Victory app. They have three games this week: game of the week is Austin taking on Atlanta on Wednesday night on USA — check that one out. Nebraska taking on Madison on Friday on Victory — that’s a Midwest rumble. A lot of passive-aggressiveness happening between the cheese and the corn.

Alex: Who will win? And then Atlanta playing Nebraska on Sunday on ESPN Plus. I do like that the games aren’t all at once — you can spread them out and watch all of them.

Caitlin: College hockey: only two or three fully ranked games this week. St. Cloud State, who is number 15, versus UMD — both ranked. The closest other matchup is the Mavericks playing Ohio State, but I’m not sure the Mavericks will be ranked after their display Friday night. And Ohio State is just really good — they’re number two right now, behind Wisconsin. Go Badgers.

Alex: So that’ll probably be the better-fought matchup — it’s an in-state rivalry. St. Cloud State’s ranking is kind of hanging in the balance here. We’re midway through the season, playoffs run March to April, so you don’t want to blow your ranking.

College basketball: I went off the power rankings and found this — number-eight Maryland vs. number-four UCLA. Maryland is 16-2, UCLA is 14-1. If you want to watch one game this week, I think it’s that one. For a while there was an absurd number of teams that had zero losses, and then it seemed like they all got their first loss in one weekend — except probably UConn. Last I looked they were still undefeated.

Caitlin: Geno doing Geno things. He’s still there.

Wins and Losses of the Week

Alex: All right, that sort of wraps up our content. I want to try something new this week — finish with wins and losses. Just kind of a reflection through our conversation today, our research as we prepped. What’s a win? What’s a loss?

Caitlin: I had my loser picked out, but it’s hard to single out a single person — I’ll say the WNBA as a league is kind of the loser in the current situation. It just doesn’t feel like they’re handling it right.

Alex: I agree. I want to come up with a more creative loser, but mine is also… the WNBA fans. Alex mentioned last episode he didn’t like basketball when we met.

Caitlin: Honestly, the NBA — not really. I had sort of lost interest in it too. And this has really rejuvenated that. A lot of conversation, a lot of fun, women that I am just like, “Yes, I want my daughters watching these people on TV and in press conferences.” So I feel like the fans are losing. The league doesn’t seem to be handling it well, but we’re the ones losing out. We’ll do some number-crunching in a future episode on what these percentages actually mean in terms of what players take home.

Caitlin: Winner? I am the winner this week. I got to see a high school basketball star drop 50 points, I got to see one of my former players play hockey and watch a U.S. Olympian do incredible things on the ice, we watched Amber Glenn’s performance, we watched Unrivaled — there was so much good stuff. And watching it and then seeing my girls want to watch it and ask when we’re going again — and the community that’s built around it, the love that’s shared at these events. There was a really cool intro video about the community the Frost have built. Yes, yes, yes. That’s my winner.

Alex: My winner — I’m going to go with Phee. She is a phenomenal player, leader, woman. She knows what to say and how to say it. She’s doing incredible things with Unrivaled. She’s the winner. She should have won MVP and we hope her ankle surgeries go well so she can fully recover.

Caitlin: Absolutely. If there’s a silver lining, she’d have more time to recover. She’ll be back on her feet. We’ll just declare Phee the winner. Call it good.

Alex: All right. Well, thanks for joining us — we appreciate you being here. Come back next week for more.

Caitlin: Yeah. All things women’s sports. Check us out — RTG_pod on Instagram and YouTube. Until next time.

Alex: Until next time.

Both: Bye.