The US Olympic and Paralympic Hall of Fame announced their Class of 2025 on Tuesday, with this year's iconic cohort headlined by tennis titan Serena Williams and track legend Allyson Felix.
Alongside four-time Olympic gold medalist Williams and seven-time gold medalist Felix — the most decorated woman in Olympic track and field history with 11 total medals — four other women and one women's team snagged spots in the 2025 class.
Joining the pair are gymnastics icon Gabby Douglas, a two-time team gold medalist and the first Black woman to take individual all-around gold in Olympic history, and three-time beach volleyball gold medalist Kerri Walsh Jennings.
Additional inductees include the gold medal-winning 2004 USA women's wheelchair basketball Paralympic team, five-time Paralympic gold medalist in track Marla Runyan — the only US athlete to have competed in both the Paralympic and Olympic Games — and multi-sport specialist Susan Hagel.
Hagel competed in six Paralympic Games across three different sports — archery, track and field, and wheelchair basketball — picking up four gold and two bronze medals along the way.
Barrier-breakers honored as Class of 2025 Legends
Also earning Hall of Fame honors are two trailblazing Black women, named as the Legends of the Class of 2025.
Renowned volleyball player and 1984 silver medalist Flo Hyman — whose work to bolster Title IX as well as her role helping Team USA to their first-ever Olympic medal in women's volleyball were crucial to growing the sport in the US — will be posthumously celebrated.
Honored alongside Hyman will be 1976 Olympic bronze medalist Anita DeFrantz, the first and only Black woman to medal in rowing.
DeFrantz, the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) first-ever woman member, is still helping to make Olympic history, casting the deciding vote to elect the IOC's first woman president this past March.
The Class of 2025 is the 18th overall group and first since 2022 to enter the Hall of Fame.
Following their July 12th induction, the US Olympic and Paralympic Hall of Fame will bloom to 210 individual and team members.
On the heels of Unrivaled 3x3 Basketball's successful debut season, TIME honored league founders Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart as two of the year’s most influential people, with the WNBA superstars earning space on Wednesday's 2025 TIME100 List.
"Unrivaled makes female athletes think about everything differently," retired US soccer legend and Unrivaled investor Alex Morgan wrote in the pair's tribute. "It's not always just take the salary and sign on the dotted line and be happy. Sometimes you can just do it yourself better."
Other big names in women's sports also made the cut, including the most decorated gymnast in history, Simone Biles, and retired tennis superstar Serena Williams.
"She is both deeply human and undeniably superhuman — a combination that makes her impact profound," Biles's former USA teammate Aly Raisman wrote of the seven-time Olympic gold medalist. "She inspires us to believe that we, too, can persevere. That we, too, can shatter limits."
Citing Williams's extensive post-tennis resume, which includes significant investments into women's sports, retired US Olympic track star Allyson Felix sang the 23-time Grand Slam singles champion's praises in the 2025 TIME100 List.
"She continues to show that we, as athletes, are so far from one-dimensional," Felix wrote. "She could take a break from being in the public eye and raise her family. Instead, she continues to pave the way."
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) approved a proposal to expand the women’s soccer tournament from 12 to 16 teams for the 2028 LA Olympics on Wednesday, solidifying the event’s international importance as the women's game continues to see skyrocketing growth.
"We wanted to do something to reflect that growth, and equally with the United States being the home of the highest level of popularity of women's football," IOC sports director Kit McConnell said on Wednesday.
IOC balloons multiple 2028 LA Olympics women's events
Soccer isn't the only women's event expanding, with additional IOC decisions pushing the total number of women athletes participating in the 2028 LA Games over the 50% line.
The women’s water polo field will grow from 10 to 12 teams to align with the men’s competition, while 3×3 basketball will expand its field from eight teams to 12.
Even more, women’s boxing will gain an additional weight category, and the IOC will incorporate new mixed events across several other Olympic sports.
Ultimately, increased parity will only intensify competition, with the IOC making moves to keep the Olympics in line with the continued demand for and rise of women's sports.
"The message of gender equality is a really important one for us," added McConnell.
Zimbabwean swimming legend Kirsty Coventry made history on Thursday, when she became both the first woman and first African ever elected president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
At 41-years-old, Coventry will also be the youngest president in the organization's 131-year history and the 10th individual to ever hold the office.
"As an nine-year-old girl, I never thought I would be standing up here one day getting to give back to this incredible movement of ours," the five-time Olympian said in her remarks.
An extensive Olympic resume, in and out of the pool
The Auburn University grad and seven-time Olympic medal-winner — including back-to-back golds in the 200-meter backstroke at the 2004 Athens and 2008 Beijing Games — retired from competition after the 2016 Rio Olympics.
At that time, Coventry was already three years into her IOC membership, after initially joining as part of the governing body's Athletes' Commission. She joined the Executive Committee in 2023.
"I will make all of you very, very proud and hopefully extremely confident in the decision you have taken," Coventry said to her fellow members in her acceptance speech. "Now we have got some work together."
That work that awaits Coventry in her eight-year mandate will include navigating the 2028 LA Games and selecting a host for the 2036 Summer Games.
Her first Olympic Games at the helm, however, will be the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy, giving her less than a year to prepare before the Opening Ceremony kicks off.
Coventry to continue IOC efforts to promote gender equity
Coventry will have a few months to adjust before assuming her new office on June 23rd, when she will succeed her mentor, 71-year-old Thomas Bach.
Bach will have served the IOC's maximum 12-year tenure in the role when he steps down, having led the governing body to stage the first-ever Olympic Games with equal numbers of women and men competing — a mark captured at the 2024 Summer Games in Paris.
With gender equity as a driving force in his leadership, Bach also increased the number women serving as both IOC members and in the organization's leadership roles, with women comprising seven of the body's 15-person executive board.
Coventry is one of those seven women, and Bach specifically hand-picked her as his successor.
The legacy she inherits isn't lost on Coventry, both in the efforts of Bach and in the women who paved the way — perhaps none more directly than IOC member Anita DeFrantz, a 1976 Olympic bronze medal-winning rower for Team USA and the only other woman to ever run for IOC president.
Recognizing the election's historic significance, 72-year-old DeFrantz overcame significant health issues to travel to Greece in order to vote for Coventry — with her ballot securing the exact number of votes Coventry needed to win.
"I was really proud that I could make her proud," an emotional Coventry said.
Toy titan Mattel is celebrating March 8th's International Women’s Day by launching a new Barbie Role Model line that features two famous athlete duos.
Highlighting the importance of female friendships, the brand has focused this year's campaign on 2024 Olympic gold medal-winning gymnasts Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey as well as Australian tennis icons Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Ash Barty.
Chiles and Carey also repped Team USA at the 2021 Tokyo Games, where Chiles helped the US take silver in the team competition, while Carey earned individual gold in the floor exercise.
"I’ve always been passionate about empowering the next generation of female athletes and I couldn’t be more grateful to be recognized as a Barbie as a Role Model this International Women’s Day with Jordan," said Carey.
"Together, we are so excited to showcase the limitless power of friendship to girls everywhere. I wouldn’t be here today without support and encouragement from great friends like Jordan."
Barbie honors First Nations Australian tennis stars
Former world No. 1 tennis stars and First Nations Australians Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Ash Barty also feature in the Barbie collection.
Barty retired in 2022 with wins in three of the four Grand Slams. Aboriginal sports legend Goolagong Cawley exited the sport in 1985 with 86 WTA Tour singles titles, including seven Grand Slam trophies.
"Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that I would be a Barbie myself," Barty told reporters. "I think it's just such an incredible experience to be a part of."
Another women's sports crossover for Barbie
This isn’t Barbie’s first foray into women’s sports. Past collections gave athletes like WNBA legend Sue Bird, Canadian soccer superstar Christine Sinclair, and tennis trailblazer Venus Williams the iconic doll's treatment.
Barbie also released lines in connection with the 2011 Women's World Cup. Additionally, the toy brand spotlighted women's sports with its 2023 Career of the Year collection. And late last year, Barbie partnered with the PWHL to release branded accessories representing the pro hockey league's teams.
"There’s no power or peace quite like knowing you have a support system of women behind you," remarked Chiles. "I hope that partnering with Barbie to celebrate the power of female friendship reminds the next generation of champions that we are stronger together."
Gymnastics superstar Simone Biles is Sports Illustrated's newest Sportsperson of the Year, the magazine announced Thursday. The win follows Biles's historic career comeback and gold medal-winning performance at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
"I don't think the reality has set in of what I've exactly done in the sport," Biles told the magazine. "I can see it, and I hear it from people, and I see a glimpse of it, but the full magnitude I don't think I've realized just yet."
Biles is the first Olympian to earn the honor since LeBron James in 2012.
Biles subsequently returned to the top of the world stage in 2024, bouncing back after a bout of "the twisties" derailed her 2021 Tokyo Olympics run.
In Paris, Biles became the first gymnast to win two All-Around titles in non-consecutive Olympic Games (2016, 2024). She also took gold in the team and vault events as well as silver in the floor event.
With 11 Olympic and 30 World Championship medals, Biles is the most decorated gymnast in history.
Sportsperson of the Year builds an Olympic legacy
While Biles hasn't fully ruled out another trip to the mat, the 27-year-old isn't interested in discussing a potential LA 2028 campaign just yet.
"Because I've accomplished so much, there's almost nothing left to do. Rather than to just be snobby and to try again, and for what?" she said. "I'm at a point in my career where I'm humble enough to know when to be done."
In the latest episode of 1v1 With Kelley O'Hara presented by RBC Wealth Management, O'Hara sits down with US track legend and Real Housewives of Atlanta star Sanya Richards-Ross to discuss all things retirement.
To open the conversation, the four-time Olympic gold medalist delves into how a broken toe helped her decide to retire. She later explains how she began manifesting her future, from becoming a parent to writing books to starting her own business.
Seeing other athletes struggle with the transition, Richards-Ross sought help from a sports psychologist and shifted her perspective on retirement into something positive.
"What is it that I think will help to set me up, help me feel like this transition is not a failure?" the world champion sprinter recalled asking herself. "I'm actually moving on to something where I can be equally as great and find equal fulfillment in it."
Later, Richards-Ross shares her definition of success, the pros and cons of starring in a reality TV show, and more.
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In this week's episode of The Late Sub, Claire talks through the final few days of the 2024 Olympics, a gold medal basketball game that went the distance in ways nobody expected, big winners and losers from the Olympic soccer tournament, and more.
Then, Claire has a lovely chat with Arsenal and Lionesses star forward Alessia Russo — who spent her college days playing for Chapel Hill, North Carolina — about returning to the US for her club’s upcoming friendly series with the NWSL's Washington Spirit and London rivals Chelsea FC.
The Late Sub with Claire Watkins brings you the latest news and freshest takes in women’s sports. This is the weekly rundown you’ve been missing, covering the USWNT, NWSL, WNBA, college hoops, and whatever else is popping off in women’s sports each week. Special guest appearances with the biggest names in women’s sports make The Late Sub a must-listen for every fan. Follow Claire on X/Twitter @ScoutRipley and subscribe to the Just Women’s Sports newsletter for more.
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Welcome to the The Gold Standard, hosted by WNBA and Team USA basketball legend Lisa Leslie and NWSL and USWNT great Kelley O'Hara.
In today's final episode, our hosts recap their trip to Paris to see the Summer Games in person! Kelley and Lisa discuss what it was like seeing both the USWNT and USA Basketball win their gold medal matches — plus how it felt to celebrate with the teams at their epic after parties. Later, they wrap up by talking about their favorite Olympic memories from years past.
Watch along for expert insight from gold medalists, exclusive behind-the-scenes stories, and pure enjoyment of the Summer Games.
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One of the largest storylines of the Olympics' final week actually stemmed from the first week of competition, as USA Gymnastics battles to retain the Olympic bronze medal won by Jordan Chiles in the individual floor final.
Chiles was awarded bronze after an inquiry from her coaches successfully challenged her original difficulty score, adding a crucial 0.1 to her tally to place her third over Romanian gymnast Ana Barbosu.
How did Jordan Chiles lose her bronze medal?
After the final, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled that the initial inquiry — the one that resulted in the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) changing Chiles's score — was submitted four seconds after the one-minute deadline. The ruling dictated that Chiles's original score of 13.666 be reinstated, elevating Barbosu to third place and stripping Chiles of her bronze medal.
Truth be told, the move is a drastic measure usually reserved for doping or cheating allegations. It's incredibly rare to force an athlete to return an Olympic medal due to a scoring mistake.
USA Gymnastics submits evidence to refute Romanian appeal
USA Gymnastics is not backing down, stating on Sunday that they had submitted photo and video evidence proving that the team made the inquiry within the allotted time period.
"The video footage provided was not available to USA Gymnastics prior to the tribunal’s decision and thus USAG did not have the opportunity to previously submit it," the Federation wrote.
"The initial error occurred in the scoring by FIG, and the second error was during the CAS appeal process, where the USOPC was not given adequate time or notice to effectively challenge the decision."
While both athletes might be happy to share a bronze, USA Gymnastics is now engaged in an appeal battle with a number of governing nations to preserve Chiles's accomplishment.
"We remain dedicated to supporting her as an Olympic champion and will continue to work diligently to resolve this matter swiftly and fairly," concluded USAG.