There was concern that attendance and overall interest in women’s college basketball would drop this year with the departure of Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese and other stars for the WNBA.
Both took a dip — but only a dip.
With JuJu Watkins and Paige Bueckers and a host of other standout players leading the way, attendance across the country was just short of last season’s record numbers in women’s hoops and still the second-highest ever.
More networks showed more games on TV this season and ratings were strong heading into March Madness that starts this week. ESPN will have the lion’s share of tournament games again, but Fox increased its footprint in the sport with five games in primetime on Saturday nights and 18 total on the network.
“There are great stars, great brands, we’ve done more than we have done before and we’re not alone in doing that,” Fox Sports President of Insights and Analytics Mike Mulvihill said. “The 3-5-10 year trend clearly is an upward trend.”
While the network’s overall ratings are down from last season’s record mark that was due in large part to Clark being on Fox a lot, Mulvihill is happy with where they are.
“To go from zero exposures a few years ago to 18 on our biggest platform speaks to the growth and interest in the sport,” he said. “There’s growing confidence in this building that we can put it on broadcast and justify it. I love that we are able to put games on in primetime. It means something to the coaches and players.”
Having great matchups helps. The game between Watkins’ USC and Bueckers’ UConn on Dec. 21 was shown in primetime after an NFL game and averaged 2.2 million viewers, peaking at nearly 3.8 million. That was the second-most watched women’s game on the network behind only Clark’s game last year when she set the NCAA scoring record.
The network also helped spearhead two new tournaments this year with the Champions Classic and the Coretta Scott King Invitational. Both were renewed for next season.
CBS showed the third matchup of the season between UCLA and USC, two of the top teams in the country, in the Big Ten title game and it drew 1.44 million viewers, trailing only last season’s league championship which saw Clark and Iowa win.
ESPN had big numbers with regular-season ratings up 3% from last year and 41% from two seasons ago. This was the most watched year for the network before the NCAAs since 2008-09 (the network didn’t have many of Clark’s regular-season games at Iowa last season).
A doubleheader on Feb. 16 was huge for ESPN: UConn vs. South Carolina drew 1.8 million viewers while LSU vs. Texas had 1.7 million. In all, 15 games on ESPN networks averaged over 500,000 viewers, the most in a single year.
ESPN, which owns the rights to the NCAA Tournament and shows women’s games every week during the season, has faith that March Madness will deliver.
Women’s basketball programming director Dan Margulis knows that the network had a perfect storm last season to achieve the record ratings that saw the women’s championship game outdraw the men. Clark, a generational player, had guided Iowa back to the championship game where they were facing an undefeated South Carolina team looking for its own place in history.
“We’re looking at early rounds and everything growing going into it,” Margulis said. “Compared to two years ago, we see that growth.”
It wasn’t just the championship game that drew huge numbers. A rematch between Reese and Clark in the Elite Eight game was massive as well.
“Certainly the floor has risen dramatically,” said lead ESPN announcer Rebecca Lobo. “The expectation for this year’s tournament, Final Four or national championship shouldn’t be what we saw a year ago. Will it be better than pre-Caitlin? That floor should be much higher than it was.”
While there isn’t an undefeated team this year or a generational player like Clark on her last run, there is more parity in the sport.
People aren’t just watching on TV, but also showing up at games. The power conferences had strong attendance marks. The SEC led the way, setting numerous conference records, including total for its tournament and the mark in both the semis and the finals.
The Big Ten had its second-highest average attendance in the last 15 years.
“Granted we get to see some of the best ones, but the energy was different throughout the country,” Lobo said. “The South Carolina-LSU game on a Thursday night with 2,500 students has a different energy. The increase from students across the country has made for incredible environments.”
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