Raising the Game: Covering WNBA, NWSL, PWHL & More

The Golden State Valkyries are 2026 WNBA champions, and they did it in year two of the franchise's existence.

Golden State beat the Atlanta Dream 68-63 in the first winner-take-all Game 7 in WNBA Finals history, with Gabby Williams taking Finals MVP. We get into why Atlanta's offense lived and died by the three over the last three games, why we're not interested in any Angel Reese slander after she led the Dream in points, rebounds and blocks for the series, and why Natalie Nakase's willingness to tear up her own script in the second half of Game 7 was the difference. Then it's the NWSL playoff bracket, now that Decision Day did plenty of deciding.

This week we dig into:

We also hit the Goldman Sachs report putting women's sports on pace for $3 billion globally, Alexia Putellas winning a third Ballon d'Or (and the nonsense about her speech), Ashley Sanchez's 20-goal Golden Boot on a team that missed the playoffs, the WNBA Draft Lottery on November 15, Unrivaled's 2027 roster reveal, Team USA at the IIHF Worlds, and the return of NCAA women's basketball.

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The WNBA could crown a champion at 12:30 in the afternoon on a Thursday, and that tells you most of what you need to know about how women's sports still get scheduled.

Game 6 of the WNBA Finals tips at 12:30 p.m. Eastern at State Farm Arena, 9:30 a.m. on the West Coast, because the Atlanta Hawks had the building that evening. Caitlin's word for it is egregious. Not surprising, which is its own indictment, but egregious. The reporting says the conflict has been in conversations for months, and if that's true it makes the outcome worse rather than better: the league had time to figure it out and we still got a mid day game. Meanwhile the Dream have dropped two straight and now have to impose their will seven hours before their normal tip-off.

This week we dig into:

We also get into the Rodman rule losing its restrictive criteria, Mark Walter's reported $700 million ask for the Los Angeles Sparks, Croix Bethune's record-setting 11th assist, FIFA putting $2.5 million of prep funding behind every 2027 World Cup qualifier to match the men, Portland and Chicago bidding for 2031, and the Utah Royals making the playoffs in year three.

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Ep. 42: Angel Reese went for 30 points and 16 rebounds on 60%+ shooting to even the WNBA Finals, and Golden State has no obvious answer for her.

The Dream and Valkyries are playing the best-defense-against-second-best-defense series everyone expected, which means the winner isn't whoever shoots better, it's whoever gets more possessions. Golden State took game one 68-64 behind Gabby Williams' 26 points. Atlanta answered 79-65 by turning steals into 24 points off turnovers, 19 of them on the fast break. Games three and four are in a fully open State Farm Arena, where 42,000 people queued for tickets.

This week we dig into:

We also get into Nneka Ogwumike's record fifth Kim Perrot Sportsmanship Award, Michele Kang and Lise Klaveness being floated as UEFA's FIFA presidential candidates, Corinne Schroeder's off-ice injury before San Jose's first PWHL season, the women's flag football tournament coming to Super Bowl week, three Zambian internationals stuck in Uganda on an Ebola travel restriction, and a record 13 NWSL players in double-digit scoring.

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The Atlanta Dream are headed to the WNBA Finals and might have to play them in Gateway Center, their 3,500 capacity home arena, and not the State Farm Arena that holds 17,000+.

NOTE:We are leaving our original description, but before publishing our episode, the scheduling conflicts have been resolved and both games 3 and 4 will be played at State Farm Arena.

Golden State and Atlanta both swept their semifinal series, setting up a WNBA Finals matchup between the league's highest-revenue franchise and its lowest-attended one. Meanwhile, scheduling conflicts at State Farm Arena could push the Dream back into 3,500-seat Gateway Center for the biggest games in franchise history since 2013. We get into why that happened, who could have fixed it, and why "step aside, Hawks" is a reasonable position.

This week we dig into:

- The WNBA Finals picture: Golden State's absurd depth under Natalie Nakase, Atlanta's hounding defense, points off turnovers as the deciding stat, and why the Aces' field goal percentage fell roughly 10 points from their regular season mark without NaLyssa Smith

- A'ja Wilson's record fifth WNBA MVP, her third straight, plus the full voting breakdown including Olivia Miles' second-place finish and the Caitlin Clark first-place-vote discourse

- The reset timeout disaster in Dream-Liberty game two: what Brianna Stewart was told, what the referees said afterward, and why WNBA officiating and national commentary both need fixing

- USWNT's 2-0 loss to a shorthanded Spain: the new back line, the double pivot that didn't defend, why the team needs a true six, Lily Yohannes' penalty, and Emma Hayes on closing the gap in the final third

- NWSL playoff math with three matches left, goal differential as the first tiebreaker, and the early regular season MVP conversation

We also cover the league's record 3.79 million fans in 2026, the Golden State Valkyries becoming the first women's pro team past $100 million in revenue, Cheryl Reeve adding Executive of the Year, PWHL expansion jerseys, and Serena Williams joining the Barbie Role Model series. Plus what to watch: Finals games one and two, a loaded NWSL weekend, LPGA Shanghai, and ranked NCAA volleyball and hockey.

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The Protect College Sports Act just cleared the Senate, and the fine print may hand universities a way around Title IX.

The bill calls revenue sharing "compensation" rather than athletic benefits, and that one word swap could let schools sidestep the equal-opportunity obligations Title IX was written to enforce. The programs that get cut first are the ones that don't generate revenue, which means women's sports. Meanwhile the WNBA playoffs delivered the best basketball of the year, Angel Reese picked up Defensive Player of the Year, and the USWNT named a forward group nobody saw coming.

This week we dig into:

- The Protect College Sports Act: the Title IX language that got left out, NWSL Players Association director Meghan Burke's warning that the bill undermines the law it claims to protect, and why the collective bargaining restrictions look like union busting before a union exists. The House hasn't voted yet.

- WNBA awards season: Angel Reese takes Defensive Player of the Year with 46 of 74 votes, the first in Atlanta Dream history, after a season that set the league's single-season rebounding record. Jessica Shepard wins Most Improved for Dallas, and Golden State's Janelle Salaün goes unanimous for Sixth Player of the Year.

- WNBA playoffs: the Liberty become the first eight seed to knock off a one seed, Arike Ogunbowale drops a playoff-record 45 points, and the semifinals open with Atlanta beating New York 92-82 and the Valkyries holding the defending champion Aces to 60 points.

- The fan problem at Gainbridge: the A'ja Wilson incident, Fever GM Amber Cox defending the fan base in her exit interview, Kelsey Mitchell saying the quiet part out loud, and why the league's player protection keeps falling short.

- The Women's Sports Foundation's inaugural report on the youth pipeline: girls want to keep playing, access and belonging are what stop them, and under half of young girls surveyed could name a professional athlete.

We also cover Unrivaled's $650 million valuation and Issa Rae joining as an investor, Project B's January launch in China, the PWHL's new conference alignment and playoff format, equal prize money coming to all combined WTA 1000 events in 2027, the Denver Summit stadium groundbreaking, the NWSL playoff race with four games to go, and Emma Hayes' roster for the USWNT's two-match set against Spain.

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WNBA playoffs are here, and game one already told us something uncomfortable about the Minnesota Lynx.

The one seed dropped its opener to the New York Liberty 91-75, and Breanna Stewart looked unguardable doing it. Meanwhile the PWHL announced the first women's professional hockey all-star game in history, the NWSL playoff picture came down to a tiebreak system almost nobody has read, and the WPBL crowned its first champion behind one of the best pitching performances of the year.

This week we dig into:

We also get into Atlanta City FC's underwhelming NWSL expansion name, Unrivaled adding San Francisco as a tour stop and switching to Adidas, a Vancouver ownership group eyeing a 2031 WNBA bid, Kori Cheverie taking over as Team Canada's head coach, and Jess Fishlock breaking Megan Rapinoe's Seattle Reign scoring record in what looks like a perfect final season.

Plus why a three-game first round is bad for players and bad for the league's bottom line.

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The WNBA regular season ends Thursday and the playoff bracket from the four seed down is still completely unsettled, with six teams able to finish almost anywhere.

Minnesota, Golden State and Las Vegas have the top three locked, but Atlanta, Indiana, New York, Washington and Dallas are all bunched together with two games left, and four of those teams are playing each other to close the season. We walk through the tiebreakers and the realistic seeding scenarios, including a few brackets where three of the four first-round matchups feature a lower seed that owns the season series against the higher seed.

This week we dig into:

We also get into Adam Silver's comments on more independence for the next WNBA commissioner and the names being floated for the job, Lisa Leslie's statue in Los Angeles, ESPN's Toronto Tempo docuseries, the WPBL championship series going to a winner-take-all game five, a monumental PWHL announcement coming Thursday, Unrivaled adding Minneapolis and Houston tour stops, and the NWSL golden boot race with 11 players already in double digits.

Plus our What to Watch slate: the final day of the WNBA regular season, playoff openers on ABC and Prime, five NWSL matches, the LPGA in Northwest Arkansas, Oregon at Wisconsin volleyball, and the start of NCAA hockey.

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Team USA won its fifth straight FIBA Women's World Cup gold in Berlin, and the whole thing turned on one quarter of basketball.

France led 45-43 at halftime, shot the lights out from three, and looked like the more consistent team for most of the tournament. Then the U.S. won the third quarter 30-12 and closed it out 97-79. Breanna Stewart took home her second World Cup MVP, the first player ever to win two. We break down the Kara Lawson substitutions that swung the end of the first half, the role players who made it work, and why the loudest media narratives around this team were nonsense.

This week we dig into:

- FIBA World Cup final: the 30-12 third quarter, Stewart's double-double and MVP, Angel Reese leading the team in field goal percentage and blocks, Caitlin Clark playing freer off the bench, and Jackie Young becoming the first player ever to win a high school title, an NCAA championship, a WNBA championship, 3x3 Olympic gold, 5x5 Olympic gold, and a World Cup gold

- WNBA playoff seeding: the Lynx sitting at a 96% chance to lock the one seed, the Valkyries, Aces, Fever, Dream, Liberty, Mystics, and Wings all fighting for position, and how the FIBA break changes who's rested and who's rusty heading into the September 27 playoff start

- USWNT roster prediction for the October friendlies against world number one Spain, including the injury list (Emily Sonnett, Olivia Moultrie, Catarina Macario), Rose Lavelle's return from concussion protocol, and the case for Ashley Sanchez that we think Emma Hayes can't ignore

- NWSL parity check: two million fans through the gate for the second time in league history, eight players already in double digits for goals to break the league record, Ashley Sanchez one goal off the single-season record, and Portland giving away two points in stoppage time to Chicago

- PWHL finally landing a U.S. national broadcast deal with Scripps Sports, including a Saturday Game of the Week on ION and a reported first-ever All-Star Game in Toronto

We also cover ESPN adding 11 more weeks of Women's Sports Sundays, Elena Rybakina's U.S. Open title and rise to world number one, Taylor Townsend completing her doubles career Grand Slam, new Unrivaled tour stops in Boston, Detroit, and Philadelphia, the WPBL championship series, and a setback segment about the media speculation neither of us has patience for.

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This bonus episode is our full conversation with Jeff Goldberg, the Hartford Courant writer who covered UConn women's basketball from 2001 to 2006 and whose books became source material for Apple TV's The Dynasty: UConn Huskies.

If you already caught this week's regular episode, this is the same conversation pulled out on its own so you can share it or revisit it without the rest of the show. If you're new here, welcome: this one stands alone.

Goldberg wrote Bird at the Buzzer, about the 2001 UConn-Notre Dame classic, and Unrivaled, about the UConn-Tennessee rivalry and the Geno Auriemma-Pat Summitt relationship it wrecked along the way. He was in the chair for seven hours of interviews for the Apple TV docuseries, and he brought stories we'd never heard even as longtime fans of the sport.

In this conversation:

- The blizzard game that introduced a freshman Diana Taurasi to the UConn-Tennessee rivalry, with the Connecticut governor sitting courtside after telling everyone else to stay home

- The inside joke about baseball's "evil empire" that Pat Summitt took completely the wrong way, and how it soured her relationship with Geno for good

- The 1998 Nykesha Sales scoring-record controversy, the Sports Center commentary it drew, and the death threat that followed

- Muffet McGraw's account of the flight she was booked on out of Boston on September 11, 2001, and the phone call that kept her off it

- Why Goldberg thinks the WNBA at 30 years old looks a lot like the NBA did in the late 1970s, and what that means for where the league goes from here

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Women's basketball has been so busy fighting for its future that it never learned to look after its past. That's Jeff Goldberg's line, and it anchors our first-ever RTG interview. Interview starts at 49 minutes.

Goldberg covered UConn women's basketball for the Hartford Courant from 2001 to 2006, wrote Bird at the Buzzer and Unrivaled, and is featured as one of the main interviewees in "The Dynasty: UConn Huskies" on Apple TV (not to mention his books were also a lot of the source material). He walks us through the blizzard games, Diana Taurasi, the UConn-Tennessee rivalry, the Red Sox joke that accidentally blew up Geno Auriemma's relationship with Pat Summitt, the Nykesha Sales free basket that generated more mail than any story in his paper's history, and why he thinks the WNBA at 30 looks a lot like the NBA in 1977. Before that, a full slate of headlines from a loaded week in women's sports.

Check out "The Dynasty: UConn Huskies" out now on Apple TV:Click HERE

This week we dig into:

- Cathy Engelbert announcing her retirement as WNBA commissioner, why the reaction split between celebration and dread, and our worry about who the NBA installs next

- FIBA Women's World Cup in Berlin: Team USA smoking China 94-61, then surviving an ugly, physical grind against Italy, plus Kara Lawson calling out her veterans and Caitlin Clark's 14-point, 11-assist, zero-turnover night

- A record 3.65 million girls competed in high school sports in 2025-26, the fifth straight year of growth, with girls flag football exploding past 100,000 participants and Nebraska offering 16 flag football scholarships

- A wild NWSL weekend: three of the top five lost, Denver Summit swept Gotham, Washington won at Providence Park for the first time ever, and Ashley Sanchez's hat trick made her the highest-scoring American in a single NWSL season

- Olivia Miles taking Rookie of the Month again, A'ja Wilson's MVP case, and Unrivaled fumbling the rollout of a bus tour announcing a tour

We also get into the WSL kicking off in England with more than half its clubs led by women, Alexia Putellas buying the Spanish broadcast rights to WSL games, WPBL playoffs, Jordan Chiles aiming for LA 2028, and the US Open quarterfinals.

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Angel Reese just set the WNBA's single-game and single-season rebounding records, and the comment section already has its rebuttal loaded: they're all "me-bounds." So we ran the numbers.

Alex pulled every rebound Reese has this season, stripped out the putbacks off her own miss, and the answer is not what the discourse wants it to be. We walk through the math, the league-average baseline, and what's actually left of the argument. From there it's the last week of WNBA basketball before the FIBA World Cup break, with all eight playoff teams locked in and the seeding still a real fight, plus an NWSL playoff race where five teams are scrapping over one spot.

This week we dig into:

- The Angel Reese "me-bounds" math: 26 rebounds in a game to break Chamique Holdsclaw's 23-year-old record, past A'ja Wilson's single-season mark, 29 double-doubles to pass Alyssa Thomas, and what her rebounding numbers look like with every putback off her own miss removed

- WNBA playoff picture heading into the FIBA break: four games left for everybody, the odds each team holds the seed it's sitting in, and why the actual movement is all in the five-through-eight range

- Kelsey Mitchell becoming the second player in WNBA history to score 1,000 points in a season, and Caitlin Clark's back-to-back 30-point, 10-assist games, a first in league history

- Golden State's 10-2 August: a defense holding opponents under 45% from the floor, one of the deepest benches in the league, and why nobody wants to draw the Valkyries in a playoff series

- NWSL playoff race with six match weeks left: Gotham's refusal to lose, the North Carolina Courage leading the league in goals from sixth place, and Seattle, Denver, LA, Houston, Orlando and Angel City fighting over the last spot

We also get to Unrivaled's $650 million valuation after an oversubscribed Series C raise, A'ja Wilson and Kelsey Plum out of the FIBA World Cup with Sonia Citron and Kiki Iriafen called in, the Williams sisters' US Open doubles wild card, the 2027 National Soccer Hall of Fame ballot, the Global Alliance for Female Athletes expanding from four countries to nine, Boston Legacy FC's 2028 move into White Stadium, Masai Russell's 12.09 world record in Zurich, and the first Upshot League championship.

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The Portland Thorns and Portland Fire just opened a $150 million training facility built for two professional women's teams, and it might be the clearest answer yet to the "nobody watches women's sports" crowd.

The Kaiser Permanente Performance Center in Hillsboro, Oregon is 100,000 square feet on a 12-acre campus, and it's the first facility in the world designed to house two pro women's teams from two different sports under one roof. We use it as a jumping-off point to walk through what NWSL clubs are actually spending on training facilities right now, and the total is not small. Then we get into the WNBA playoff picture, our full bracket predictions, and the harassment that keeps hijacking games the league should be celebrating.

This week we dig into:

- Women's sports facility investment: inside the Thorns and Fire's new home, from two full-size pitches and a 17,000-square-foot practice gym to family lounges and full-service dining, plus a rundown of what Denver, Chicago, Gotham, Atlanta, Columbus and Manchester City are building. Alex's quick math on the NWSL projects alone lands somewhere north of $240 million.

- WNBA playoff predictions: all but one spot is claimed, the seeding fight is really a home-court fight, and we give you our full bracket. Lynx over the Liberty in five, and we explain why NaLyssa Smith's knee injury may have flipped the Aces-Liberty series before it starts.

- The harassment problem in the W: objects thrown onto courts, a man who walked onto the baseline to make himself the story, racist messages sent to Dearica Hamby, and our case for lifetime bans and actual leadership from the league office.

- Standout performances: Angel Reese's 31 and 14 against the Mercury, Kelsey Mitchell's 20-point streak now at 23 straight games after passing A'ja Wilson's record, Natasha Cloud's career night against the Liberty, Awak Kuier's seven blocks, and Sydney Taylor's second game-winner of the month.

- NWSL playoff race: eighth through eleventh separated by two points, Gotham's nine-game unbeaten run, Washington's winless August, and a game-by-game look at whose remaining schedule is actually survivable.

We also get to Nneka Ogwumike's retirement after 15 seasons, Tobin Heath's jersey retirement in Portland, Georgia drawing an NCAA-record 25,433 for women's soccer, San Francisco landing the 2027 WNBA All-Star Game, Team USA's FIBA World Cup roster, Coco Gauff's Cincinnati title, Miyu Yamashita's record-tying nine-shot win in Canada, and 12-year-old Kinley Rasmus tying Mo'ne Davis' Little League World Series strikeout record.

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The WNBA is in its 30th season, records are falling almost nightly, and the conversation around the league keeps getting uglier. We spend a chunk of this episode on why that is and what could actually fix it.

We're back from vacation with two weeks of catching up to do. Caitlin lays out the pattern: the Stephanie White press conference walkout, the Sophie Cunningham and DiJonai Carrington flagrant, a Dallas reporter and his family threatened online over Azzi Fudd coverage, fans removed from Gainbridge. Then she names three causes and four possible fixes, and we argue about a couple of them. We also got to our first live NWSL game in Denver, and we left the stadium at exactly the wrong moment.

This week we dig into:

- The WNBA discourse problem: why criticism of play keeps turning into name-calling, the correlation between the new-fan influx and online vitriol, the case for new league leadership before Cathy Engelbert's contract is up in December, an NWSL-style digital code of conduct the WNBA could copy, and Caitlin's argument that active players shouldn't be running podcasts about their own league in season

- WAFCON: Cameroon beat debutants Malawi 3-0 in the final for their first ever title, 22-year-old goalkeeper Michaely Bihina's absurd tournament including nine saves against Nigeria and four penalty saves against Morocco, Nigeria missing a World Cup for the first time in ten tries, and Malawi qualifying for 2027 ranked 153rd in the world

- Standout WNBA performances: Kayla McBride's WNBA-record 10 three-pointers and 43 points at 34 years old while leading the league's toughest defensive assignments, Rae Burrell's 20 points in a 40-point Sparks fourth quarter, Kelsey Mitchell's 18 straight 20-point games, Shakira Austin's post-All-Star run in Washington, and the case for Nia Coffey as Sixth Woman of the Year

- NWSL playoff race: Gotham pulling away on 43 points, Denver trending up at the right time with home games left, Chicago firing Martin Sjögren with nine goals all season, Olivia Moultrie's season-ending ACL as the 18th knee injury in the league this year, and three players chasing 10 goals and 10 assists

- Our first live NWSL game: Denver Summit vs Utah Royals, kickoff moved to 8 p.m. for wildfire smoke and 98-degree heat, a genuinely temporary stadium, two kids under eight, and walking to the car in the 90th minute right before Janine Sonis' free kick winner in stoppage time

We also get to Diana Taurasi's jersey retirement in Phoenix, Alyssa Thomas making the second three-pointer of her career, Iga Świątek's first title of 2026 in Toronto, the Williams sisters back in doubles at the Cincinnati Open, Mark Walter selling the Lakers and what it might mean for the PWHL, Kaleigh Kurtz's 132-match ironwoman streak, and the weekend What to Watch.

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Women's professional baseball is back after more than 70 years, and the new WPBL is playing its entire first season in Springfield, Illinois. We wanted to know how we got here.

This is a history episode with a purpose. Caitlin walks through 160 years of women trying to get on a baseball field, from college teams in the 1860s to a league that finally stuck in 2026, and then we get into how the Women's Pro Baseball League is actually built, funded, and staffed. After that, playoff math: who grabs the last two spots in the NWSL and the WNBA.

This week we dig into:

- The long history: Vassar's Resolutes fielding a team in 1866, the first known paid women's game in Springfield in 1875, the barnstorming era of the Bloomer Girls and the Dolly Vardens, and Jackie Mitchell striking out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in a 1931 exhibition before commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis voided her contract for being "too strenuous" for women

- The AAGPBL and everything "A League of Their Own" skipped: the charm school and skirts, 910,000 fans at the 1948 peak, the Negro Leagues players like Toni Stone, Mamie "Peanut" Johnson and Connie Morgan who were shut out of it, and Maria Pepe's Little League fight that opened youth baseball to girls in 1974

- Inside the WPBL: co-founders Justine Siegal and Keith Stein, four teams named for women pioneers (Boston Hunters, New York Heights, Los Angeles Queens, San Francisco Firebells), a 30-game season at Robin Roberts Stadium, seven innings and aluminum bats, draft names like Kelsie Whitmore, Ayami Sato and Mo'ne Davis, and why MLB's total silence is getting noticed by fans

- NWSL playoff race: North Carolina's brutal closing slate, Angel City's streakiness, why Seattle Reign are suddenly live with Jess Fishlock back and Lumen Field theirs again, and Orlando's Barbra Banda dependency problem

- WNBA playoff picture: New York hanging on by Breanna Stewart's health, a surging Washington Mystics team leaning on very young players, Chicago's inability to close one-score games, Kelsey Plum's move to Phoenix, and why Indiana is the top-six team we think is most likely to slide

We also get into the 17-day FIBA World Cup break and what it does to momentum, the WAFCON semifinals and World Cup qualifying stakes, and the weekend What to Watch, including the first WPBL games we've put on the list.

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FIFA tried to sell a piece of the World Cup and world football said no. Gianni Infantino's $20 billion plan died in about three days, and the women's game was squarely in the blast radius.

Episode 31 walks through the whole timeline: the FIFA Forward Enterprises pitch, UEFA's 55 member associations voting unanimously to boycott, CONCACAF and the Asian Football Confederation following, and the resignations inside FIFA that made it look less like strategy and more like one person's project. We also get into what almost got canceled, including the U-20 Women's World Cup in Poland and 2027 Women's World Cup qualifying. Then it's WAFCON, a tightening NWSL playoff race, the WNBA trade deadline, and a Lynx-Fever game we watched from the Target Center stands.

This week we dig into:

- FIFA's $20 billion collapse: the FIFA Forward Enterprises proposal, UEFA's unanimous boycott vote, 143 of 211 member nations lined up against it, and the two women, UEFA vice president Laura McAllister and Norway's Lise Klaveness, who moved fastest

- WAFCON in Morocco and the coverage problem: Malawi's Temwa and Tabitha Chawinga taking down record champions Nigeria, Barbra Banda's four-goal game in Zambia's 6-0 win over Egypt, and a tournament almost nobody in the U.S. can legally watch or even get live scores for

- WNBA trade deadline and playoff math: Kelsey Plum from the Sparks to the Mercury, Aneesah Morrow to the Toronto Tempo, a five-game gap between the top eight and bottom seven, and why Minnesota has the toughest remaining strength of schedule

- Lynx 108-100 over the Fever at Target Center: Kelsey Mitchell's 37 points, Olivia Miles' "welcome to the W" moment, Napheesa Collier at 4-0 since returning, and Cheryl Reeve handling the off-court noise the way you'd want a coach to

- NWSL playoff race: seventh through tenth separated by a single point, Jess Fishlock scoring seconds into her return for the Reign, Sam Kerr on the board for Gotham, and Utah putting five past Portland

Also in this one: the Women's Pro Baseball League's sold-out opening weekend, the Los Angeles Queens beating the New York Heights 10-8 and the San Francisco Firebells beating the Boston Hunters 11-3, the WNBA hitting 73 million unique viewers with a third of the season still to play, Netflix paying a reported $200 million for 2027 Women's World Cup rights, the NWSL terminating its Victory+ streaming deal, Athletes Unlimited pausing pro basketball and volleyball for 2027, Marina Mabrey's three-point contest raising $6,500 for the Black Women's Institute for Health, girls high school flag football drawing 1.12 million viewers, and Alex Eala becoming the first Filipina to win a WTA Tour title by beating Jessica Pegula at the DC Open.

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The WNBA All-Star Game just made history: 19,783 fans at Chicago's United Center, the biggest All-Star crowd ever and the first to outdraw the NBA's All-Star Game.

Episode 30 covers a packed week in women's sports. All-Star weekend delivered record attendance, a rookie shooting star, and some genuinely messy moments, from invite confusion to a game where nobody wanted to play defense. We also take a hard look at the coordinated attacks on Title IX and trans athletes, and reboot your guide to 2027 Women's World Cup qualifying.

Content note: our Title IX segment includes discussion of anti-trans legislation, abuse in sports, and youth suicide statistics. If you or someone you love is struggling, call or text 988, or reach The Trevor Project at 1-866-488-7386.

This week we dig into:

- WNBA All-Star weekend: the record crowd, Azzi Fudd becoming the first rookie to win the 3-point contest, Jonquel Jones completing her MVP collection (regular season, Finals, Commissioner's Cup, and now All-Star), plus the invite miscommunication with Sabrina Ionescu and Kayla McBride

- Title IX under attack: inside the Heritage Foundation report, the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, and what the actual numbers say about trans athletes in high school and college sports. Our question: protect young girls from who?

- WAFCON is underway in Morocco: Nigeria defending their title, World Cup spots on the line, and the NWSL stars playing for their nations, including Temwa Chawinga, Barbra Banda, and Rosemonde Kouassi

- 2027 Women's World Cup qualifying explained: who's already in, England and Sweden still waiting on UEFA playoffs, and how the 10-team inter-confederation playoff works

- NWSL check-in: a brutal week of ACL injuries (Jordyn Huitema, Trinity Armstrong), Denver Summit's stadium delay, and a playoff race where the top five sit within five points

Plus: Napheesa Collier returns for the Lynx with 24 points and 10 rebounds, the WNBA announces a centralized replay center for 2027, NWSL viewership jumps 41.7% on YouTube, Gotham FC coach Juan Carlos Amorós takes paternity leave, Brazil announces discounted World Cup tickets, and the Minnesota Vixen bring home a football championship.

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The WNBA is having a leadership crisis, and All-Star Weekend is about to put it under a spotlight. This week we dig into whether Commissioner Cathy Engelbert is the right person to lead the league through its current moment.

The reporting is not flattering: Sports Business Journal says Engelbert wasn't going to suspend Alyssa Thomas until NBA commissioner Adam Silver stepped in and pushed her to act. Meanwhile players are fielding online harassment and death threats, and the players association had to request the meeting with the commissioner rather than the league leading from the front. We lay out why a business-first commissioner may not be built for a player-safety moment. Then we flip to the fun stuff: the 30th-anniversary All-Star draft, a stacked three-point contest field, and some of the best individual runs we've seen all season.

This week we get into:

We also cover the NBA/WNBA TikTok partnership, the 2027 NCAA tournament expanding to 76 teams and ditching conference protection, the European Broadcasting Union's new guidance to stop filming female athletes through an objectifying lens, Michele Kang's plan to own a women's soccer club on every continent, and the women's sports merchandising gap. Plenty to chew on before the All-Star break.

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Is it still fair to assume the U.S. Women's National Team just wins? This week we dig into how six countries develop their women's soccer talent, and why the American pay-to-play system might be quietly capping the USWNT's ceiling heading into the 2027 World Cup.

With men's World Cup fever in the air, we run a full comparison of the development pipelines in the U.S., Spain, Japan, England, Brazil, and Colombia, from cost and coaching philosophy to participation numbers, and ask whether the rest of the world is finally closing the gap. We also cover a wide-open NWSL race, an Orlando Pride statement win, and a Dallas Wings team that suddenly looks dangerous.

This week we dig into:

- The pay-to-play problem: why elite U.S. youth clubs can run $5,000 to $20,000 a year, how Title IX and college soccer became America's de facto academy system, and whether that ceiling is letting Spain and England catch up

- How the top programs build players: Spain's subsidized club academies, England's federation-funded emerging talent centers, Japan's school-based dual-track model, and Brazil and Colombia growing from a much thinner foundation

- NWSL parity check: bottom-table teams knocking off contenders, Barbara Banda and Marta powering Orlando Pride past Kansas City, and a playoff picture nobody can call

- WNBA roundup: Paige Bueckers making the case as the best guard in the league, Azzi Fudd's two-way rookie surge for the Dallas Wings, and expansion teams Portland and Toronto refusing to be punching bags

- Momentum and setbacks: Marina Mabrey's scorching stretch for the Toronto Tempo, the negativity clouding the WNBA's 30th season, and Utah's worrying skid

We also hit the week's headlines, from the USWNT's $6.4 million equal-pay World Cup payout and 11 members of Congress writing the WNBA over Caitlin Clark's safety, to Gotham FC's move to Queens, ESPN's "Life in the W" docuseries, PWHL roster-format changes, and the launch of the Women's Pro Baseball League. Plus our full What to Watch slate across the WNBA, NWSL, and Women's Elite Rugby.

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The WNBA's officiating controversy hit a new level this week, and Alex and Caitlin dig into why the Alyssa Thomas–Caitlin Clark incident is really about years of inconsistent officiating, not one bad night.

A viral still frame of Alyssa Thomas's hand landing on Caitlin Clark's neck during a loose-ball scramble turned into a media firestorm, complete with a flagrant-two review, a one-game suspension, and a wave of racist threats directed at Thomas and her partner DeWanna Bonner. Alex and Caitlin unpack what actually happened on the floor, why the missed call in real time is the real story, and what it says about the WNBA's ongoing struggle to get officiating right heading into the All-Star break.

This week we dig into:

We also cover Wimbledon's wild week (Naomi Osaka's upset of Aryna Sabalenka, Coco Gauff's curfew-beating comeback), Michele Kang becoming Lyon's sole majority owner, Alexia Putellas signing with London City Lionesses, and Marie-Philippe Poulin's upcoming knee surgery.

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This is The Door Part 2, part of our Trailblazers series — the women's sports history special that picks up where Episode 13 left off, moving into the modern era with six athletes who each forced a renegotiation of the terms the sports world handed them.

Timely on two fronts: Venus and Serena Williams are playing Wimbledon doubles together as this drops, and the WNBA is celebrating its 30th anniversary. From a 1979 NBA training camp in Indiana to Simone Biles on the floor in Paris, this episode traces what "opening the door" actually cost — and what it made possible.

This week we cover:

The episode also covers Caitlin Clark's impact on WNBA attendance (up nearly 50% year-over-year in 2024) and the hosts' honest take on the complicated narrative forming around her heading into the 2025 season.

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Serena Williams is back in Grand Slam singles for the first time since 2022, and she's doing it at Wimbledon, on the grass, with a wild card and no ranking. At 44, she's entering the draw at its most unpredictable entry point while also teaming up with Venus (who just turned 46) for doubles, where the two have won six Wimbledon titles together. The Queens Club already showed what her presence means: sellout days, a 300% spike in social media engagement, and capacity at 95%. All eyes are heading to the All England Club.

This week also brings major news from the WNBA, which announced a 50-game regular season beginning in 2027, and the NWSL resumes from its World Cup break with one of the busiest transfer windows the league has seen.

This episode covers:

We also run the WNBA heat check at 15 games, break the league into contenders, challengers, and disruptors, and preview the All-Star game in Chicago on July 25th. Plus, it's Episode 25 — we celebrate with stats from 24 episodes of covering women's sports.

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The Men's World Cup is in the U.S., and the NWSL isn't sitting it out — they're turning 1.42 billion soccer fans into a fan acquisition opportunity.

With their "Summer of Soccer" initiative, the NWSL is making one of the most intentional marketing plays in women's sports history. Caitlin and Alex dig into the research on who the women's sports fan actually is — the fluid fan, the new-to-sports fan, the one who learned to navigate a dozen streaming apps because broadcast TV never made room — and why that fan base represents a structural shift in how women's sports grows, not just a short-term spike. The data is genuinely wild: televised women's sports content hit 370 million viewer hours in 2024, up 430% from 2021. The product has always been there. The access is finally catching up.

This week we cover:

Plus: Serena Williams back on the doubles court at the Berlin Open and eyeing Wimbledon, Wimbledon's record 20% prize money bump to £64.2 million, Kelsey Plum officially signs with Adidas, and Gotham FC breaks ground on a new purpose-built training facility in New Jersey.

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Hilary Knight's PWHL expansion saga ended with the wildest move of the process: Vegas signed her via an expansion franchise offer and immediately traded her to Detroit for a first-round pick. It was completely legal, it was a long time coming, and it tells you everything about how expansion teams are already thinking about winning before the draft even happens.

Episode 23 breaks down both phases of PWHL expansion in full detail. We cover who got protected (and who got surprisingly left out, including Knight herself by Seattle), how Detroit and Hamilton built rosters that already look like playoff contenders, and what San Jose and Vegas are working with heading into next week's draft. We also react to Nelly Korda's dominant LPGA season and a stunning result at Roland Garros.

This week we dig into:

Also on the show: Serena Williams' doubles comeback with Victoria Mboko at the HSBC Championship, the Texas Longhorns winning their second consecutive college softball World Series with 1.5 million viewers per game (up 33% year over year), and Team USA's Women's Basketball 3-on-3 squad claiming the World Cup in Warsaw.

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After a 16-point blowout loss to the Portland Fire, the rest of the WNBA is circling something on the whiteboard: Caitlin Clark's defensive game is a weakness teams are now actively targeting.

Alex and Caitlin break down the Fever's recent skid — a viral bench huddle moment, Clark skipping a postgame press conference after the Golden State loss, and Portland's suffocating defensive game plan that turned an 8-2 Fever lead into a 17-2 Portland run. The bigger concern isn't any single game. It's the pattern: teams are ISo-ing whoever Clark is guarding, she's getting blown by or into foul trouble, and the team's offensive firepower can't always bail them out. On the flip side, the Minnesota Lynx are sitting at the top of the WNBA standings, Olivia Miles is already a rookie of the year frontrunner, and Natasha Howard is playing some of the best basketball of her career.

This week we cover:

Plus: Alexia Putellas leaves Barcelona after 14 seasons and 232 goals, Bunny Shaw becomes the highest-paid women's footballer at $2.3M per year after signing a new deal with Man City, Serena Williams is returning to doubles, and Holly Rowe live-streamed the College Softball World Series after ESPN cut the feed. Dense week.

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Caitlin Clark missed a game this week with a reported back injury, and the Fever's "strategic management" framing — announced less than two hours before tip — raised more questions than it answered. We dig into what it means for her, for the league, and for fans who bought tickets expecting to see her play.

Also this week: Montreal Victoire made PWHL history, becoming the first Canadian team to win the Walter Cup. They closed out Ottawa in four games, with Ann-Renée Desbiens posting a shutout, Abby Roque scoring twice in the clincher (including one that deserves a replay or five), and Marie-Philip Poulin finally adding the one award missing from her trophy cabinet: Ilana Kloss Playoff MVP. The Ottawa Charge crowd showed out all series long, with over 53,000 fans through the doors of Canadian Tire Center and a record finals crowd of nearly 17,000.

This week we dig into:

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The Ottawa Charge pulled off a stunning late comeback to stay alive in the Walter Cup Finals, and the WNBA's new foul-calling emphasis is already reshaping games just days into the season. Episode 20 has a lot going on.

Caitlin and Alex recorded this one right after Game 3 wrapped, so the energy is real. They walk through Ottawa's dramatic third-period rally against the Montreal Victoire, break down PWHL's wave of expansion announcements, dig into WNBA opening weekend numbers (spoiler: the league is doing great), and then get into the officiating overhaul that has players, coaches, and fans still figuring out what basketball is supposed to look like now. NWSL Week 8 rounds things out with Mallory Swanson back on the pitch and a couple of league storylines that deserve more attention.

This week they cover:

Also in the mix: Elina Svitolina wins her 20th career title at the Italian Open over Coco Gauff, Sam Kerr confirms her Chelsea departure after 115 goals and five WSL titles, and an NCAA softball super regional field heavy with SEC teams.

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The PWHL playoffs have been an absolute mess in the best possible way, and the path to the Walter Cup Final is still wide open heading into a postponed Game 5.

Ottawa pulled off one of the bigger upsets in PWHL postseason history, eliminating the Boston Fleet in four games despite being outshot 142 to 94 for the series. Meanwhile, the Minnesota-Montreal semifinal has been everything: a triple-overtime thriller, back-to-back games that raised serious player safety concerns, a suspension, and now a Game 5 postponed due to illness running through the Victoire. And on top of all that, the PWHL officially announced Detroit as its ninth team, with Las Vegas, Hamilton, and San Jose reportedly next in line.

This week on Raising the Game:

- PWHL playoffs recap: Ottawa's gritty run to the Walter Cup Final, Gwyneth Phillips standing on her head, and why the low seed has won every single PWHL semifinal so far

- Minnesota-Montreal series breakdown: scheduling injustice, discipline moments with Laura Stacey and a Frost forward suspension, and what a postponed Game 5 means for both teams

- PWHL expansion draft: We go team-by-team with our mock protected player picks, plus the NHL venue complications that knocked Washington and Denver out of contention

- WNBA Season 30 opener: Olivia Miles posts a historic debut (21 points, 8 assists) for the Lynx, the Aces get blown out by 30 on ring night, Azzi Fudd starts quietly in Dallas, and the GM survey crowns Paige Bueckers as the player GMs would build a franchise around

- NWSL Week 7: Temwa Chawinga's hat trick (first in Kansas City Current history) sparks a table surge, Utah's shutout streak hits six consecutive games and 465-plus minutes, and we ask whether Barbara Banda can carry Orlando alone

We also hit the Portland Fire's 19,000-plus WNBA home opener record, Kwanzaa Jones' historic Padres ownership bid, Marie-Louise Eta making Bundesliga history as the first woman to win a match managing a men's top-five European league team, LOVB's 113% viewership jump in year two, Rachel Entriken's outright win at a 250-plus mile ultra marathon, and Women's Elite Rugby on this weekend's watch list.

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The PWHL playoffs are delivering drama on both sides of the bracket, the WNBA's 30th season is officially here, and women's sports infrastructure is growing faster than ever, a lot to unpack this week.

Ottawa stole a road win in Boston to even their series 1-1, then headed to a sold-out Canadian Tire Center with a freshly repainted PWHL logo under the ice. Minnesota took game one against top-seeded Montreal and we saw the first playoff hat trick in PWHL history from Montreal's Laura Stacey. And the league quietly dropped a detailed five-phase expansion plan with no official teams yet, but a Detroit press conference looming.

This week we get into:

We also cover Hailey Baptiste's comeback win over world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka at the Madrid Open, Olivia Moultrie's 100th NWSL cap with a goal and assist, Brighton's plans for the first purpose-built women's stadium in England, Lyon reaching the UWCL final, the MNBA's long-overdue SNL cameo, and expansion city predictions.

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The PWHL playoffs are here, and Montreal made a pick that has Frost fans cautiously optimistic.

The PWHL wrapped its regular season with Kelly Pannek setting a new single-season points record (33 in 30 games), the league surpassing one million fans for the first time, and Montreal selecting Minnesota as their first-round opponent instead of the weaker Ottawa Charge. We break down why that may have been the wrong call, what to expect from the Boston-Ottawa matchup, and who has the star power to make a deep run.

This week we dig into:

We also touch on Jess Fishlock's retirement announcement and devastating injury, the ACL research initiative launched by the NWSL and NWSLPA, and Sophia Wilson's emotional first goal back from maternity leave.

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The WNBA is officially back, and Episode 16 is your full preview of the 2026 season — from A'ja Wilson's record-breaking supermax to the teams you need to watch on opening weekend.

The Las Vegas Aces re-signed their entire core four (A'ja Wilson, Chelsea Gray, Jackie Young, and Jewell Loyd), and Wilson's three-year, $5 million deal is the largest contract in women's professional basketball history. The 30th WNBA season tips off May 9th across five broadcast platforms, and the league has never been more watchable. We break down the scary contenders, the sleeper teams, and the biggest questions heading into the year.

We also dig deep into the U.S. Women's National Team's three-game series against Japan — a 2-1 series win that told us a lot more than the scoreline suggests. Emma Hayes played the long game in every sense of the phrase, and we cannot stop talking about her coaching philosophy and what it means for the 2027 World Cup.

This week we cover:

- A'ja Wilson's $5M supermax and the Aces dynasty: reigning champions return 90% of their scoring, with Becky Hammon running the show again

- WNBA season preview: our scary contenders (Las Vegas, New York Liberty, Dallas Wings), honorable mentions, and the teams with the highest upside

- USWNT vs. Japan series breakdown: Rose Lavelle's 100th cap, Sophia Wilson's return from maternity leave, record attendance in Seattle, and Emma Hayes' masterclass in building for the World Cup

- Emma Hayes deep dive: her possession-first tactical shift, her relational leadership style, and why she is the best coach in the modern era

- PWHL playoff picture: Montreal, Boston, and Minnesota are in — but the fourth seed battle between Ottawa, Toronto, and New York is going down to the literal last game of the regular season

We also cover the 2026 WNBA Draft viewership numbers (1.5M average, up 20% year-over-year), the PWHL hitting 1 million in-person fans faster than projected, the NWSL calendar shift debate, Oklahoma's back-to-back NCAA gymnastics title, and LOVB Austin's golden-set championship win.

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The 2026 WNBA Draft just happened live as we recorded, and women's sports is officially a $3 billion industry. There's a lot to unpack.

Azzi Fudd went No. 1 overall to the Dallas Wings, reuniting with former UConn teammate Paige Bueckers and picking up a historic $500,000 rookie salary under the new CBA. The draft class was stacked, UCLA made history with six players selected, and free agency has teams looking very different heading into the 30th WNBA season. We break down the winners, the head-scratchers, and what the new CBA era means for the league.

For a good chunk of this episode we dive deep into Deloitte's 2026 "Game Changers" report, which projects global women's sports revenue to exceed $3 billion this year, a 340% increase since 2022. We go beyond the headline number and get into what actually got us here: Title IX, the 1999 Women's World Cup, the Wubble, the NCAA weight room moment, Caitlin Clark, the Paris Olympics. And then we talk about what makes women's sports grow differently than men's sports ever did.

This week we dig into:

We also cover the White House stalling the US's 2031 Women's World Cup bid, SI Swimsuit featuring WNBA stars Napheesa Collier and Sophie Cunningham, Sue Bird joining NBC's WNBA desk, and the WNBA formally approving expansion teams in Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia.

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UCLA just won the national championship, and they did it convincingly. Episode 14 covers the Bruins' blowout over South Carolina, the Geno-Dawn Staley postgame controversy, and what Cori Close's transformational coaching style says about the future of the program.

From there, the WNBA news is wall-to-wall this week. The Connecticut Sun are officially moving to Houston as the Houston Comets in 2027, ending a 23-year run in New England under circumstances that raised serious questions about how the league handled the sale. Angel Reese landed in Atlanta. Free agency is live. The WNBA draft is days away. And amid all of it, the league just announced a long-term broadcast deal with CBS Sports.

This week we get into:

We also hit the figure skating World Championships (Kaori Sakamoto's fourth world title and retirement, Amber Glenn's redemption skate), Sabalenka's Miami Open win over Coco Gauff, the NFL's women's flag football league launch, NCAA gymnastics nationals bracket, and LOVB playoffs.

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The pioneers who broke down the doors in women's sports didn't just play the game. They rewrote the rules, fought segregation, and built the infrastructure that every female athlete walks through today.

This is Part 1 of "The Door," the first installment in a new series called "What's the Story" from Raising the Game. For Women's History Month, we trace the origin stories of five women who each faced a different kind of barrier and refused to let it stand. From Althea Gibson breaking tennis's color line in 1950 to Donna Lopiano transforming a $57,000 women's athletic budget into a national model at the University of Texas, these are the stories behind the sports we cover every week.

This episode covers:

Stay tuned for Part 2, where will break in to more of the modern era and cover six more pioneering women athletes.

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The WNBA just agreed to a transformational new CBA — and the numbers are staggering. Salary caps jumped from $1.5 million to $7 million, super maxes hit $1.4 million, and minimum salaries now exceed last year's super max. This changes everything.

After months of tense negotiations and over 100 hours of face-to-face bargaining in New York City, the WNBA and WNBPA reached a landmark seven-year deal that ties player compensation to league revenue for the first time. We break down the key provisions, the EPIC rule that rewards breakout rookies, and what a chaotic April of expansion drafts and free agency is about to look like.

This week we dig into:

We also cover NCAA women's gymnastics conference championships, Jessie Diggins' retirement, the Kara Lawson coaching phenomenon at Duke, and why Vanderbilt's Mikayla Blakes is must-watch basketball.

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It's a big week for women's sports — and we happened to record on the night the WNBA CBA was supposed to get done.

This week:

Plus:Catarina Macario signs an $8M record deal with San Diego Wave making her the highest-paid women's footballer in the world, NCAA women's basketball brackets are out and we are doing brackets, the Frozen Four is set with Northeastern upsetting Minnesota, college gymnastics conference tournaments, Aryna Sabalenka wins Indian Wells, Oksana Masters dominates the 2026 Winter Paralympics with four golds, Team USA rolling 4-0 in FIBA World Cup qualifying, and Sephora cements itself as the women's sports sponsor to know.

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The NWSL season is officially here, and we spent most of this episode getting you ready for it.

This week:

Plus:StubHub launches Her Sports Hub with data showing 215% post-Olympics ticket purchase growth, Team USA Women's Basketball tips off World Cup qualifying in Puerto Rico with Caitlin Clark and crew, a chaotic NCAA conference tournament weekend, the Boston Fleet and New York Sirens heading to TD Garden and MSG, Oksana Masters winning her 20th Paralympic medal, and the Women's Africa Cup of Nations postponed just two weeks before it was supposed to start.

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Get an idea of the women's sports topics we talk about with this trailer.

It's March and women's sports is absolutely delivering.

This week:

- The PWHL is back and riding a massive Olympic wave. We dig into the attendance records, injury news (Hilary Knight, Kendall Coyne-Schofield), and expansion chatter.

- The WNBA CBA hits a March 10th deadline with players divided and Kelsey Plum suggesting a strike might not be the move.

- We break down the U.S. Women's National Team's She Believes Cup opener with a youth-heavy lineup, questionable officiating, Trinity Rodman scare, and preview USA vs. Canada.

Plus:

UConn's perfect season, who can actually challenge them, NCAA hockey, Unrivaled playoffs heading to Brooklyn, and the fallout from the presidential phone call to the men's hockey team, and why we had to say something about it.

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This week we go through a comprehensive breakdown of Team USA's historic Winter Olympic performance—where women won 61% of all American medals. Emma Hayes' strategic roster selections for the upcoming She Believes Cup. And a critical look at the WNBA's stalled collective bargaining agreement and ownership's refusal to open their books to the players union.

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This week, we dive into the overwhelming dominance of the U.S. Women's Olympic Ice Hockey team, outscoring opponents 26-1 as they head toward a showdown with Canada. We also analyze the stalled WNBA CBA negotiations and the potential impact on the upcoming season, including expansion drafts and free agency. Finally, we discuss Angel Reese's return to the court in Unrivaled and major roster moves in the NWSL.

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The 2026 Winter Games in Milano Cortina have begun with a record 47% female participation rate . We analyze the massive viewership shift toward women's events before diving deep into the historic roster of Black female athletes representing Team USA, including Laila Edwards and Erin Jackson . Finally, we address the polarizing reaction to Lindsey Vonn’s downhill crash and why the criticism regarding her return is unfounded .

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Caitlin and Alex are back to break down one of the biggest story in women's sports: the WNBA CBA negotiations. We crunch the numbers on the revenue sharing dispute and discuss the possibility of a work stoppage or strike. We also cover different women's collegiate sports story lines. Plus, get your full preview of the 2026 Winter Olympics, including schedules for Team USA Hockey, figure skating, and alpine skiing.

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Caitlin and Alex deep dive into the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL), explaining the "Jailbreak" rule, special league rules, and the league's expansion plans. They analyze Trinity Rodman's record-breaking contract with the Washington Spirit and recap the USWNT's first match of 2026. Plus: Unrivaled's first in-game dunk, and Australian Open quarterfinalists.

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Caitlin and Alex tackle the NWSL's complex offseason, discussing the new "Rodman Rule," the Players Association's demand for rescission, and major moves for Sam Coffey and Lindsey Heaps. This episode also covers the current WNBA free agency moratorium and potential strike, alongside a countdown to the 2026 Winter Olympics featuring updates on Mikaela Shiffrin, Chloe Kim, and Team USA Hockey. Plus: 2027 World Cup contenders and weekly Winners & Losers.

Instagram/Threads/YouTube: @rtg_pod

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https://www.victors1959cafe.com/

https://www.holaarepa.com/

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Caitlin and Alex break down the WNBA's uncertain offseason following the CBA deadline, discussing the "status quo" implications and Napheesa Collier’s call for a sustainable business model. This episode also recaps the Unrivaled League’s debut weekend and innovative player-equity structure, alongside a deep dive into League One Volleyball’s (LOVB) holistic ecosystem backed by icons like Billie Jean King. Plus: PWHL standings ahead of the Olympic break, Amber Glenn’s historic third U.S. title, and our top watch picks for the week.

Instagram/Threads/YouTube: @rtg_pod