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Morning Edition

April 4, 2025

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Paige Bueckers is one of the stars leading the charge as the women’s Final Four takes center stage. While it may not reach the record-breaking heights of last year, the tournament continues to build momentum with rising viewership and a growing fan base.

— Colin Salao [[link removed]] and David Rumsey [[link removed]]

Women’s Hoops Keeps Climbing: Clark’s Boom to Bueckers’s Moment [[link removed]]

James Snook-Imagn Images

The 2025 women’s March Madness tournament was never going to surpass the heights of last year. The Caitlin Clark Effect is unlike anything ever seen in sports.

However, this year’s tournament has shown significant increases among key business metrics that indicate a level of retention in fan interest from last year.

Life After Caitlin Clark

The tournament has averaged 967,000 viewers so far through the Elite Eight, which is down 31% from the 1.4 million it averaged at this point last year. However, it is up 47% vs. 2023.

From the round of 32 [[link removed]] onward, each round has been the second-most-watched in history, only trailing last year. The first round was the second-most-watched since 2013.

The spikes from Clark and Iowa’s games are just too difficult to top. The 2024 Elite Eight game between Clark and Iowa against rival Angel Reese and LSU drew 12.3 million viewers—which at the time was the most-watched game in women’s college basketball history.

But this year, despite a 53% decline in viewership for the Elite Eight [[link removed]], all four games are still among the top 10 most-watched games of the round on record.

Attendance doesn’t follow the same pattern, but it’s still trending in the right direction. This year’s first two rounds had 224,972 total attendees, the third highest on record, behind 2023 (231,677) and 2024 (292,456).

The regionals had the same pattern as this year drew 84,754 total fans, just a tick under the 85,275 in 2023—the first year the women’s tournament moved to two regional sites instead of four—and 103,587 last year.

Bueckers Bump?

The Caitlin Clark Effect also allowed more fans to see certain players, who were able to build their profiles by facing the Hawkeyes guard in the tournament last year. This includes Paige Bueckers, Hailey Van Lith, and Flau’Jae Johnson.

Clark’s impact may not be replicable, but there is a chance that Final Four stars can benefit from playing Bueckers, who told ESPN last week that she will enter the 2025 WNBA draft. UConn was in the most-watched game in each of the first two rounds and would have likely been in the most-watched games of the last two if not for falling in the ESPN slot instead of ABC.

UConn faces UCLA in the Final Four, and the Bruins have two stars expected to return next season in Lauren Betts and Kiki Rice. If the Huskies advance to the national championship, they could face Texas and sophomore star Rori Harmon or also challenge a deep South Carolina roster chasing back-to-back titles.

Bueckers’s effect has already rubbed off on her teammates like returning senior Azzi Fudd [[link removed]] and rookie sensation Sarah Strong, but a championship run alongside the potential WNBA No. 1 pick should only elevate their popularity.

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UCLA’s Rise to the Final Four: Cori Close’s Blueprint for a New Era [[link removed]]

James Snook-Imagn Images

UCLA head coach Cori Close doesn’t want to claim her team is the first in school history to make the Final Four.

“In 1978, AIAW, they won the national championship and went to the Final Four,” Close said at the press conference after the Bruins defeated LSU on Sunday. She was referring to the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women, which UCLA was in before joining the NCAA in 1984.

Regardless of the history, Close has still managed to lead the Bruins to a spot they haven’t reached in decades, at least on the women’s side. Her arrival 14 years ago kick-started the upward trajectory of the program—one that’s now two wins away from a national championship.

Close started her coaching career as an assistant at UCLA from 1993 to 1995. She took assistant roles at a couple of other schools before getting her first head coaching gig with the Bruins in 2011. She said Sunday that she texted former UCLA AD Dan Guerrero to thank him for taking “a risk” on her despite the lack of experience, and it paid off as the Bruins are 287–140 (.672) under Close and have not had a losing season in more than a decade.

A Different Group

Close has had some competitive rosters in the past, notably four years with Jordin Canada, who was eventually selected No. 5 in the 2018 WNBA draft. But this year’s team was different. Aside from its Final Four berth, this is also their first time with a No. 1 seed in the tournament. And many of the team’s core returned from last year, when it secured a No. 2 seed, which, at the time, was its highest ever.

Lauren Betts is the catalyst at the center, but the No. 1 player in ESPN’s 2022 high school recruiting class [[link removed]] chose Stanford. Betts struggled with the Cardinal under Tara VanDerveer. She entered the transfer portal after her freshman year—and despite her parents reportedly planning visits to programs with historical success like Notre Dame and UConn—she chose UCLA. She wanted to be “protected,” according to SI, and Close and the Bruins helped her, even finding her a therapist to find her love again.

By securing Betts, the Bruins suddenly had the top two players of the 2022 recruiting class. The No. 2 recruit was Kiki Rice, who had offers from UConn, Stanford, Duke, and Arizona. Rice said Wednesday on Shannon Sharpe’s Nightcap podcast that one of the main reasons she chose UCLA was to bring success to a school that had yet to win a national title.

“I didn’t want to go to a program that had a bunch of national championships and been to the Final Four a bunch of times,” Rice said. “I felt like it makes it even more special to go to a place and help it become that level of program.”

UCLA also secured the No. 19 recruit of 2022, Gabriela Jaquez, an Irvine, Calif., native whose brother, Jaime Jaquez Jr., played four years for the Bruins before getting drafted to the NBA. The Bruins have also secured the commitment from the No. 2 recruit in the 2025 high school class, which just so happens to be forward Sienna Betts, Lauren’s sister.

“From the very beginning, it was obvious that we had enough talent, but we said talent was gonna be our floor,” Close said Sunday.

FRONT OFFICE SPORTS NETWORK

Manny Diaz on Rebuilding Duke Football

Duke football head coach Manny Diaz joins Adam Breneman for an in-depth conversation about his coaching journey, leadership philosophy, and the challenges of building a winning program in today’s college football landscape. From getting fired at Texas in 2013 to leading Miami and coordinating one of the nation’s top defenses at Penn State, Diaz has seen it all.

Diaz shares his approach to building a strong culture, the importance of toughness in his coaching philosophy, and what it takes to recruit and retain top talent in the transfer portal era. He also reflects on the pivotal moments in his career, the lessons he learned from Penn State coach James Franklin, and the differences between taking over at Duke versus Miami.

Watch the full Next Up episode here [[link removed]].

Jessica Pegula on Tennis: Pay, Saudi Deals, and Women’s Sports Boom [[link removed]]

Chris Smith/WTA

Professional tennis is at a pivotal juncture, with several potential major off-court changes looming—from an ATP-WTA merger [[link removed]] to significant schedule and prize money modifications.

Last month, organizers of the four Grand Slams—the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and US Open— rejected a proposal [[link removed]] from the top men’s and women’s tours that would have created a new tournament calendar and increased purses.

This week, a French outlet reported the top 20 players on the ATP and WTA tours sent a letter to the Grand Slams [[link removed]] demanding a higher share of revenue, as the majors typically pay out less than 20% to players, compared to roughly half in other major U.S. sports.

One of those top players is Jessica Pegula, the daughter of Bills owners Terry and Kim Pegula, who is currently ranked No. 4 on the WTA. Front Office Sports caught up with Pegula after her first-round victory at the Credit One Charleston Open to discuss the big changes and other off-court issues facing tennis. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What are your thoughts on the health of women’s tennis and the WTA Tour?

It’s an exciting time. Even though it may seem like there’s a lot going on, I think pivotal moments like this are what can take it to the next level. It’s good that there’s a lot of discussion and fire behind changes that are coming, whether it’s the calendar, or the Tour, or players. To me, it’s a good sign that the sport’s actually growing, and that we’re looking to keep pushing, and hopefully get paid more, which is great for our sport.

Is there one looming change at the top of your mind?

For me, it would definitely be getting a higher revenue share at the Grand Slams. I think that’s really important. Those four slams dominate our calendar, as far as exposure, revenue, and how much they’re making. They’re the four biggest for a reason. Tennis is a very fragmented sport, and I think the slams are definitely fragmented as well. They do the best out of everybody, but they also stand on their own individually. So getting that revenue share higher towards the players is a big priority of mine.

What type of trickle-down effect would getting a higher revenue share have?

It would just be huge for the sport, in general. I think players would be much happier. Not even just revenue share, but also toward player benefits. I know the ATP has a lot of money that goes into bonus pools. We have pensions and different things going on, and I think it would just give back to the sport so much more if we could get more out of that.

It’s been roughly 12 months since the WTA signed a multiyear deal with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia. How do you feel the partnership is going?

I think good. It’s kind of new for us. I know the men have already been established with them. But honestly, so far, so good. I don’t think there’s been a lot of negative backlash about that. It’s been going smoothly.

As a tennis player, what’s it been like watching the women’s sports boom in other leagues?

It’s been really cool. It’s interesting being an American and seeing college basketball really explode with Caitlin Clark, and now the WNBA. We’ve had women’s soccer getting paid more, comparatively to the men. So, there’s definitely been this building momentum. Even though tennis is, I think, the highest-paid women’s sport, it’s international. So, I feel like I don’t hear about it as much because the women’s sports in the U.S. have gotten so much traction—popular sports like basketball or soccer—and I think with tennis sometimes it gets lost that we’ve actually been leading that for a while. So, it’s amazing to see the other sports starting to catch up and just push that. But at the same time, I feel like there’s still so much room to improve on our side. And it’s cool that we’ve been able to set an example a little bit, and I feel like the WTA Tour is always trying to do that. We just did a new maternity fund, which is really, really, cool. That’s just stepping another bar up, and hopefully we can get more women’s sports to follow our lead.

Outside of tennis, what business of sports stories are you following?

The Celtics just got bought [[link removed]]. That was weird. I was at the Miami tournament for the last two weeks. I’ve been out of it, a lot of long days and late matches, but I need to follow up with what happened there. My husband keeps telling me about the Yankees, they changed all their bats [[link removed]] and they set a record, and now he’s obsessed and fascinated with what’s going on. So that’s interesting. What else is going on? LeBron James might go to the Middle East with that super league thing [[link removed]]? There’s so much going on.

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Editors’ Picks ‘Overlooked’ Big 12 Has Quietly Succeeded During Men’s March Madness [[link removed]]by Amanda Christovich [[link removed]]Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark says the conference has won big, too. Boston Beats Legal Challenge to $200 Million NWSL Stadium Renovation [[link removed]]by Margaret Fleming [[link removed]]Demolition had begun before the case went to trial. Private Equity’s Youth Sports Push Continues With MaxPreps Deal [[link removed]]by Ben Horney [[link removed]]The deal follows a string of other recent PE transactions in the youth sports space. Question of the Day

Is women’s March Madness still riding last year’s wave of popularity?

YES [[link removed]] NO [[link removed]]

Thursday’s result: Only 20% of respondents think MLB’s “torpedo” bats provide an unfair advantage.

Advertise [[link removed]] Honors [[link removed]] Learning [[link removed]] Events [[link removed]] Video [[link removed]] Shows [[link removed]] Written by Colin Salao [[link removed]], David Rumsey [[link removed]] Edited by Matthew Tabeek [[link removed]], Catherine Chen [[link removed]]

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