In 2017, UConn women’s basketball saw its 111-game winning streak come to an end at the NCAA Women’s Final Four. Mississippi State’s two-point jumper as the clock expired in overtime was dubbed one of the most historic upsets the sport had ever seen. A year later, UConn fell at the buzzer once again in the semifinal, this time at the hands of Notre Dame. Associated Press national college basketball writer, Doug Feinberg, credits those two shots with drawing attention back to the sport.
"It wasn’t women’s basketball. It was just basketball,” Feinberg said. “I’ve been fortunate enough to cover this once in a lifetime era with UConn. That transcended the game.”
The interest in women’s college basketball has indeed been growing in recent years, combined with an increase in coverage on TV and digital platforms. According to Sports Media Watch, ratings for the women’s national championship game have shown steady growth since 2018.
College softball has also experienced a growing audience and expanded coverage in the last few years. In February of 2020, ESPN announced its record-breaking expansion of college softball coverage to 1,600+ games.
“A lot of things go into that expanded schedule,” said Kimberly Elchlepp, senior publicist at ESPN. “ESPN+ really opened the door to bump up a lot of numbers. Every year, we try to do more on TV if we can. That’s one of our biggest growing sports.”
The Toll of the Pandemic on Sports
About a month after ESPN’s press release detailing plans for the 2020 college softball season, the COVID-19 pandemic brought the sports world to a standstill. Spring sports were cut short and the NCAA tournaments were canceled altogether. One year later, television networks and college athletic programs are striving to match and even exceed the numbers for women's sports they were achieving prior to 2020, while still dealing with COVID-19 obstacles.
The challenges faced by all sports in keeping audiences during the height of the pandemic were substantial, as proven by an overall decrease in viewership when sports made a return to our TVs in 2020. To cite a few examples, viewership of the 2020 NBA Finals on ESPN was down 51% overall from last year. The NHL Stanley Cup Finals on NBC were down 61% from last year. The World Series on Fox was the least-watched in history (all according to Nielsen Media Research). Elchlepp said this overall decline in viewership is a result of several factors, but perhaps at the forefront is the history that unfolded in 2020. The news, predominantly related to COVID-19, social justice issues, and the presidential election, captivated the television audience.
Women’s college sports have not been spared these challenges. This year, ESPN likely won’t reach the 1,600 softball games it previously strived to broadcast, as cancellations for COVID-related reasons continue to occur. SportsNet New York (SNY) was unable to expand the number of UConn women’s basketball games on its network due to the same issue.
Overcoming COVID-19 Obstacles
Still, reporters, producers and school athletic programs are finding unique ways to keep audience eyes on NCAA women’s sports. Zoom provides a platform for a higher level of accessibility to players for writers like Doug Feinberg and UConn women’s basketball reporter, Maria Marino.
“I might not have been able to get those one-on-ones with Paige Bueckers and Christyn Williams if we didn't have Zoom,” Marino said of her coverage of two of UConn’s most prolific starters. “Those interviews were able to happen because we could do them wherever. They could be in their dorms.”
Feinberg said Zoom has helped his coverage of women's basketball extend across the country.
“I’m based in New York, but I’m able to jump on Zoom calls all day if I want to for every team across the country,” Feinberg said. “I couldn’t do that before the pandemic. Zoom has allowed me and many other writers to cover more teams nationally.”
Additionally, social media has helped school athletic programs keep engagement numbers up during a time in which in-person attendance is limited.
Photo: Kristan Bravo
“From the jump, we all had to change our approach,” said Michael Sivo, social content specialist at UConn Athletics. “The way we could make up for a lot of our various business deals was to enhance content on our social channels. That was easily the best way to reach out to our fan base when we were all stuck at home not knowing how long this would last.”
Any thoughts of the pandemic derailing the growth of women’s college sports need only look at the women’s athletic powerhouse of UConn, where coverage of women’s basketball is expanding and new social media strategies are boosting audience engagement for softball. This in-depth look at UConn will showcase the overall upward trends that women’s collegiate sports are experiencing.
“Women’s sports are having wins and overall sports are not,” Elchlepp said. “The sports that are winning right now, during COVID-19, are women’s sports."
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