When Caitlin Clark suffered an injury that sidelined her for much of the 2025 season after a transformative 2024 rookie year, concerns emerged about the WNBA's trajectory. But the league proved resilient, with viewership recovering to 2024 levels by season's end despite an initial 55% drop in the two weeks following her injury, according to USA Today.

"I think it affected the league not at all, which is good news in the short term," said our analyst Ethan Cramer-Flood on a recent episode of "In The Game." "And the answer to your second part of your question is also positive, inasmuch as because she's back now, there will be even more of a surge."

Clark's economic footprint remains unprecedented. Dr. Ryan Brewer, an associate professor of finance at Indiana University Columbus, calculated that her economic impact accounted for 26.5% of all WNBA economic activity in her 2024 rookie season, including revenues from merchandise, ticket sales, and TV. But the WNBA's momentum has picked up speed during Clark's recovery.

Major investments in women's basketball

The WNBA and Players Association signed a landmark collective bargaining agreement in March 2025 that fundamentally reshapes the league's economics and accessibility.

• A total of 216 games will air on national TV this year across eight media partners including NBC, Amazon, Peacock, ABC, ESPN, USA, and ION. That represents well over half of all WNBA games, a far higher percentage than the NBA broadcasts nationally.

"They're not paying for what the WNBA is, but they're paying for what it is becoming," said our analyst Paola Flores-Marquez. "And so it's not guaranteed."

The financial transformation for players is substantial. Average salaries will reach approximately $600,000, up from $120,000 last year.

The league is expanding rapidly

Toronto Tempo and Portland Fire joined the league for the 2026 season, with franchises planned for Cleveland (2028), Detroit (2029), and Philadelphia (2030), bringing the total to 18 teams.

"The expansion teams also just get absolutely banger attendance. The energy is real," Cramer-Flood said.

The number of women's live sports viewers grew from 2.7 million in 2023 to 4.5 million in 2024, according to EMARKETER forecasts. While growth is expected to moderate, the trajectory remains upward as additional women's leagues gain traction.

"I think we're seeing the level of investment that it requires to help more stars flourish," said Flores-Marquez. "I absolutely think it's replicable. I just think they haven't had the resources to do so."

Other women's sports are experiencing similar growth

The Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) launched in 2024 with six teams and has already expanded to eight. The league surpassed one million single-season attendees for the first time, with average attendance growing from 5,500 to over 9,000 per game in just three years.

Women's soccer also continues expanding with new media deals and expansion teams, though it faces challenges with top talent leaving for European leagues.

Younger generations consume sports differently than previous generations, favoring bite-sized highlights over full games. Clark's playing style, which produces spectacular highlight-reel moments, lends itself particularly well to social media distribution.

"People keep repeating and saying that younger generations don't wanna watch sports. There's less interest, blah, blah, blah. That's not true," Flores-Marquez said. "People have the same amount of interest in sports, but they're not consuming it in the same way."

The opportunity for brands is significant but time-sensitive. Women's sports represent new or newly popular content where advertisers can establish relationships at relatively accessible price points before costs escalate further. Clark has four times as many Instagram followers as the Indiana Fever's team account, and would nearly crack the top 25 NBA players in Instagram followers if she played in that league.

"This is new content. It's either new content or newly popular content where there's an opportunity to get in either at the ground floor or relatively close to the ground floor on a ship that is rising incredibly quickly," Cramer-Flood said. "It seems to me that now is the time to form those relationships while you can, before you can't afford it anymore."

Listen to the full episode.