Barcelona and Real Madrid’s UEFA Women’s Champions League quarterfinal will be one for the history books, with the two clubs set to face off in front of a record crowd at Camp Nou on Wednesday.

The second leg of the Champions League quarterfinal is the third El Clásico women’s rivalry game in the last month, with Barcelona holding a 2-0 record over Real Madrid and a 3-1 aggregate lead in the Champions League battle.

Tickets for Wednesday’s marquee match sold out two months ahead of time. Barcelona’s women’s team has played at the historic Camp Nou stadium just once before. That 50th-anniversary game between Barcelona and Espanyol, honoring the first women’s game ever played at the venue, was held behind closed doors without fans due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This time, over 80,000 spectators will be in attendance. If that number holds, the match will break the record for the largest attendance at a women’s domestic club game. Barcelona currently holds the domestic club record, with 60,739 showing up to the team’s 2019 game against Atletico Madrid at the Wanda Metropolitano Stadium.

Barcelona captain Alexia Putellas visited Camp Nou often as a child, but she never imagined herself playing in the stadium. The 28-year-old star is trying her best to keep a level head amid the excitement of the moment.

“I have been in Camp Nou so many times all my life. Tomorrow is me playing, but at the end of the day, it’s the same as Johan Cruyff field,” Putellas told reporters on Tuesday, referring to their usual home stadium that seats 6,000 spectators. “I think the time has come … we, the players, feel now empowered and ready to play in front of so many people, such a large audience.”

The game will also serve as a celebration of the growth of women’s soccer and a push for equity. The words “More than Empowerment” will appear on the Lateral terrace as a reminder of its significance.

“I believe that tomorrow can be the start of a new era, because at the end of the day, tomorrow’s match is going to be inspiring for so many girls, I am guessing, that will be coming tomorrow to Camp Nou or who will be seeing us from TV,” Putellas said. “They will be seeing women playing in Camp Nou, and I am sure in the future, in the mid or long run, we will be collecting the fruits of tomorrow’s match.”

Volem veure així el Camp Nou! 💙❤️#MoreThanEmpowerment pic.twitter.com/cnmxZ2V664

— FC Barcelona Femení (@FCBfemeni) March 29, 2022

The bubbling enthusiasm off the pitch will almost certainly be matched by the intensity on the pitch, with both sides eager to meet the moment.

“Of course, we are aware of the fact that players have a special feeling regarding tomorrow’s match, but when it comes to preparation and training, nothing has changed,” said Barcelona coach Jonatan Giráldez.

Barcelona, the reigning UEFA Champions League winners, are considered by many to be the most dominant club in women’s soccer. The team enters Wednesday’s second leg on a staggering 35-game win streak across all competitions. Barcelona clinched the league title for the third straight season with a 5-0 rout of Real Madrid on March 13, adding to their 25-0 Primera División record.

Putellas, the 2021 Ballon d’Or winner, leads Barcelona’s Champions League campaign with seven goals and two assists. Midfielder Jennifer Hermoso is next with four goals in five matches. Deploying a possession-minded playing style, Barcelona is one of the hardest clubs for opponents to break down.

That’s just what Real Madrid will try to do, however, in their Champions League duel. The feat, while a tall order, isn’t impossible. Real Madrid stunned Barcelona in the first leg of the quarterfinal last week when Olga Carmona put her side up 1-0 in the eighth minute, forcing the visitors to mount a second-half comeback behind a brace from Putellas.

“Of course, it’s very useful to start losing a match. We don’t like it, but it’s useful,” Giráldez siad of Barcelona’s come-from-behind win. “Mentally, we need to be ready to pull ourselves together, do things better, catch up.”

Expecting Madrid to come out pressing and attacking, Barcelona will look to maintain possession and dictate the game’s tempo from the opening whistle.

“We want more every time,” Barcelona midfielder Ingrid Syrstad Engen said. “In Barcelona, it’s not enough to win, it’s about how you play, and I think that’s in the roots of this team,”

Barcelona will advance to the Champions League semifinals if they can maintain or improve upon their 3-1 aggregate lead.

The historic game kicks off Wednesday at 12:30 p.m. ET, streaming for free in the United States on DAZN’s UEFA Women’s Champions League YouTube channel.

Clare Brennan is an associate editor at Just Women’s Sports.

The 2025 NCAA volleyball season is down to four top teams, as the Division I national championship tournament's Final Four takes the court in Kansas City on Thursday night.

No. 1 seeds Pitt and Kentucky survived a series of high-profile tournament upsets to punch their tickets to Thursday's semifinals, where No. 3 seeds Texas A&M and Wisconsin will join the Panthers and Wildcats.

"The Final Four is just so special, it is so incredible," Wisconsin head coach Kelly Sheffield said ahead of Thursday's action. "You want as many of your players that are committed, that decide to come here, you want them to experience that."

Two teams will look to make history this weekend, with Pitt and Texas A&M both in pursuit of a program-first national championship.

While the Aggies are in uncharted territory, booking their first-ever semifinals berth last weekend, the Panthers are hunting a breakthrough, hoping to claim a first-ever championship final appearance in their fifth consecutive trip to the Final Four.

As for Kentucky and Wisconsin, the Wildcats and Badgers will be looking to add a second trophy to their cases after booking their first program titles in 2020 and 2021, respectively.

How to watch the 2025 NCAA volleyball Final Four

The 2025 NCAA volleyball semifinals begin at 6:30 PM ET on Thursday, when No. 3 Texas A&M takes on No. 1 Pitt before No. 3 Wisconsin faces No. 1 Kentucky at 9 PM ET.

Both Final Four clashes will air live on ESPN.

As the 2028 LA Olympics come into focus, the FIFA Council unveiled the regional allocations for the Summer Games' first-ever 16-team women's soccer tournament this week.

According to the Council's Wednesday report, 2.5 slots will go to AFC (Asia), 2 to CAF (Africa), 3 to Concacaf (North and Central America), 2.5 to Conmebol (South America), 1 to OFC (Oceania), and 4 to UEFA (Europe), with one additional slot reserved, as always, for the host nation — the reigning Olympic gold medalist USWNT.

While the expanded competition allows for greater depth, one AFC and one Conmebol team will ostensibly have to face an inter-continental playoff to determine which region can send an additional team to the 2028 Olympics.

One the other hand, Concacaf's representation will double from 2024, growing from two to four teams given the automatic berth of the USWNT.

Similarly, after host nation France's autobid boosted UEFA'a 2024 allocation to three teams, this week's new distribution doubles the European confederation's previous non-host two-team max for the LA Games — meaning all four of the 2027 UEFA Nations League semifinalists will qualify to compete for gold in 2028.

Notably, CAF and OFC are the only confederations to not see an increase on their previous allocation from the FIFA Council.

The puck dropped on the 2025/26 PWHL Takeover Tour on Wednesday, when the No. 2 Montréal Victoire took down the No. 5 Toronto Sceptres 2-1 in an overtime shootout in front of a sold-out crowd in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Packed into Scotiabank Centre, 10,438 fans watched Team Canada and Victoire captain Marie-Philip Poulin score the shootout's lone goal, handing Montréal their third straight win.

"It was amazing to see the young girls and boys in the crowd wearing our jerseys, saying our names, and wanting our autographs," said Victoire head coach Kori Cheverie. "It's just extremely special."

The PWHL's 16-stop Takeover Tour is just beginning, with nine games planned for Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Washington DC, Denver, and more before the league pauses for the 2026 Winter Olympics.

"We hope that the impact is a positive one. Everywhere we go, that's the impression we want to leave — for little girls to know that they have a dream and that their dream can become a reality," said Sceptres captain and Nova Scotia product Blayre Turnbull following Wednesday's Tour stop.

Halifax marks the third-year league's fourth sold-out stop, joining fellow Canadian cities Edmonton, Québec City, and Vancouver.

How to attend the 2025/26 PWHL Takeover Tour

The PWHL will next pull into Chicago's Allstate Arena for a Takeover Tour stop on Sunday, when the No. 8 Ottawa Charge will take on the No. 6 Minnesota Frost on at 2 PM ET.

Tickets are currently available for purchase via Ticketmaster.

Months after Napheesa Collier set the WNBA ablaze with her viral exit interview criticizing league leadership, the Minnesota Lynx star said "nothing has changed" at the front office level as CBA negotiations stall.

"The conversation has been had now [and] people are seeing that changes need to be made," Collier said this week from Miami, where Unrivaled 3×3 is gearing up for its second campaign.

"I feel confident in the [union] and where we are internally with our players and the future," she continued.

In her October press conference, Collier publicly called the WNBA front office "the worst leadership in the world," putting commissioner Cathy Engelbert in the hot seat amid tense CBA negotiations with serious implications on next season's play.

The league and the WNBPA are currently sparring over revenue sharing, with diverging compensation expectations further distancing the two sides.

"Obviously, there's frustration in that both sides are trying to get what they want, but we still have that fire within us that we're willing to do what it takes," Collier said. "We're going to do whatever it takes to get what we think we deserve."

As talks drag on, Collier sees Unrivaled — the offseason 3×3 league she co-founded with New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart — as fueling the players' fight.

"Us being here in December and January until March, it's a crucial time in the CBA," Collier acknowledged.

"Having us all in one place is beneficial," she explained. "To have players congregate in that way, where you can have those in-person conversations and updates like that, that does help to get things moving more quickly."