A historic season in women’s college basketball ended with one more record-breaking telecast. Sunday’s victory by South Carolina over Iowa for the national championship set a viewership record for women’s basketball with 18.7 million viewers, making it the most-watched women’s basketball game ever.
Sunday’s game surpassed the Final Four matchup between Iowa and Connecticut (14.2 million viewers). The Elite Eight game between Iowa and LSU averaged 12.3 million viewers, a then-record that lasted less than a week. (Changes in how Nielsen counts out of home viewing in bars in restaurants has caused total viewership to increase in all sports in recent years.)
The entire season was a watershed for the women’s game just three years after the NCAA tournament drew headlines for the disparities in the facilities between the men’s tournament and the women’s.
The women’s tournament now uses “March Madness” branding like the men’s tournament. Earlier this year, the NCAA signed a new TV deal with ESPN that valued the women’s tournament at $65 million, around a 10-fold increase over the previous deal. The NCAA may soon start awarding financial bonuses for advancing in the women’s tournament, as it has done for years on the men’s side. (The deal takes effect next year.)
