According to a study done by the University of Southern California's Annenberg Institute for Sports, Media & Society, only 5% of sports media coverage was dedicated to women's sports in 2019.
This woeful statistic remains true for newsletter coverage and social media. A previous study done by USC in 2015 found that SportsCenter, an ESPN series, dedicated only 2% of its airtime to women’s sports in 2014. Women’s sports, at both the professional and college level, have been overlooked and neglected in favor of their male equivalents.
Yet this phenomenon cannot be explained away by lack of interest or demand. Some people have theorized that media outlets favor male sports because the majority of sports fans are men. In actuality, though, people are interested in watching women’s sports — they’re just simply unable to find adequate coverage. Media outlets, in short, have failed to meet the desires of their audiences.
Clearly, in the years that followed the USC study above coverage, little has changed. Until now.
The past year has seen a dramatic uptick in women’s sports viewership. Even in 2019, excitement and passion around the women’s world cup was only at around 34% globally. In just four years, this number jumped to 41% of the global population being excited about the game. These numbers increase even more when looking at 2024. The rise is partly due to the exciting NCAA women's basketball season that just wrapped up.
This season, promising young players like Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers, and Angel Reese have drawn attention to the previously neglected league. Sports viewership, ultimately, is about rooting for teams and watching players excel in their sport — no matter their gender. And these women didn’t just excel — they broke records and reminded viewers that they came to win.
Caitlin Clark led the Iowa Hawkeyes to beat out the University of Connecticut Huskies and advance to the championship, falling to the undefeated South Carolina Gamecocks, who took home the NCAA championship trophy. The game between Iowa and UConn, according to the Washington Post, was the most-watched basketball game ever aired on ESPN, with around 14.2 million watchers on average throughout the whole game. The broadcast peaked at 17 million viewers.
Clearly, the tide is turning when it comes to women’s sports. This year saw unprecedented attention, outsized excitement, and a magnified spotlight, with the statistics to back it. Whether the trend will ebb or increase remains to be seen.