News

Women’s professional sports continue to boom in national popularity, with western cities and states leading the way.  

Last year, the WNBA posted its most-watched season in league history, with viewership jumping 16% over 2024. The NWSL also saw a massive leap in popularity, growing its audience by 61% last season. At the Olympics, the women’s hockey gold medal game between the United States and Canada smashed records with an average of 5.3 million viewers, while the US Open women's tennis final saw a 50% increase in viewers over the previous year.  

The leap in popularity of women’s sports is also translating into a substantial economic driver. According to a Deloitte analysis, revenue tied to women’s sports is expected to reach $3 billion in 2026, a 340% increase in just four years. The same report forecasts soccer and basketball to be the biggest sports globally this year, with each projected to drive about 35% of total revenue.  

As women’s sports continue their ascension, western states are jumping at the opportunity to bring in new teams and support existing beloved franchises.  

In basketball, the West is home to some of the most devoted fanbases in the sport, as well as the league’s newest teams. The Golden State Valkyries debuted just last year, and they quickly broke the WNBA record for both average and total attendance, as they sold out every home game in their inaugural season.  

This year, the newest WNBA team is the Portland Fire, who tipped off their first game back in Portland in front of a sold-out crowd last week. The Fire originated in Portland in 2000 during the early years of the WNBA and they are back in the Rose City after a 24-year absence.  

Elsewhere in the West, popular WNBA teams like the Seattle Storm, Las Vegas Aces, Phoenix Mercury, and Los Angeles Sparks are investing heavily in new facilities and infrastructure to support their players.  

In soccer, the newest NWSL team kicked off in Denver this year. Fans packed Mile High Stadium earlier this spring for Denver Summit FC’s inaugural match against the Washington Spirit. The game smashed the league’s single-game attendance record with a total of 63,004 fans in attendance.  

The franchise is now moving forward with plans to bring a 14,500-seat stadium to Santa Fe Yards in Denver, which is scheduled to open in 2028.  

In hockey, the PWHL announced this week that it will expand to 11 teams for the 2026-27 season, with Las Vegas set to be the next city to join. The expansion follows quickly from the last additions to the league, when Seattle and Vancouver received teams in 2025.  

Don't miss the best-of-five PWHL Cup Finals between Montreal and Ottawa, which started on May 14!

Super magnet comes to WY: the University of Wyoming in Laramie recently installed a rare “super magnet” that will help elevate the university’s work in critical minerals, rare-earth magnetics, advanced materials, and quantum technologies. The Wyoming Pulsed High Magnetic Field Facility (WYPulse) is one of only three such devices in the country, with the other two located at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and Clark University in Massachusetts.  

The system can generate an extremely powerful magnetic field, which can manipulate certain materials and help scientists work at the cutting edge of physics and materials research.  

Given its extreme power, WYPulse is being housed in a heavily reinforced room in the basement of the Physics and Astronomy department.  

Healing on the gridiron: in the years following the 2018 Camp Fire in Northern California, the community of Paradise rallied around its local high school football team like never before. Now, the Paradise High School football team is raising funds to travel to Lahaina, Hawai‘i, to help another community heal after fire.  

On September 5, Paradise High School will square off against Lahainaluna High School in the inaugural Unity Bowl. The game is designed to bring the communities of Lahaina and Paradise together to heal from their shared experiences with wildfire. The two teams are also scheduled for a rematch in California next year.  

For more on the ongoing recovery effort in Lahaina, watch WGA’s Policy Forum on Maui last month. 

Teacher apprenticeships: Western Governors continue to leverage apprenticeship programs to build the teaching workforce and strengthen education. In South Dakota this week, Governor Larry Rhoden announced an additional 31 apprenticeship slots in the state’s Teacher Apprenticeship Pathway program.  

In Montana, Governor Greg Gianforte announced the launch of Montana’s Teacher Registered Apprenticeship Program. A $1 million grant awarded through the US Department of Labor’s State Apprenticeship Expansion Formula (SAEF) program will help Western Governors University partner with 26 Montana school districts to prepare 78 new teacher apprentices across the state.  

New quantum lab: this week, Colorado Governor Jared Polis celebrated the opening of a new research and development lab from world-leading quantum company IonQ in Boulder. IonQ specializes in trapped-ion quantum computers, and the new facility will allow the company to design and test its state-of-the-art chips.  

“Colorado is a quantum hub, and we are only growing,” said Governor Polis. “The selection of Boulder as IonQ’s North American expansion, is proof of Colorado’s strong and growing quantum economy, and will bring more high-paying skilled jobs to the region, and attract more businesses to Colorado.” 

To hear directly from Governor Polis about the growing quantum industry, listen to the latest episode of WGA’s Out West Podcast.