Adding to their already historic season, 2024/25 WSL champions and 2025 League Cup winners Chelsea FC handed Manchester United a 3-0 defeat in Sunday's 2025 FA Cup final, completing the club's second-ever domestic treble.
Though the Blues first claimed an elusive treble in the 2020/21 season, this year's roster did so without dropping a single match in any of the three domestic competitions.
"I could not have expected this," said first-year Chelsea manager Sonia Bompastor about her debut success leading the Blues. "It is almost ideal in terms of domestic dominance."
To clinch that dominance, Chelsea upended the defending FA Cup champs Manchester United at London's iconic Wembley Stadium behind a brace from French fullback Sandy Baltimore and a header from USWNT attacker Catarina Macario.
Baltimore gave Chelsea the lead by slipping a late first-half penalty past 2024/25 WSL Golden Glove winner and USWNT goalkeeper prospect Phallon Tullis-Joyce, and the Blues never relented, with second-half sub Macario doubling their scoreline in the 84th minute before Baltimore tacked on a final goal in stoppage time.
"It's a very emotional day," an emotional Macario told the broadcast after finishing her first season following a long ACL recovery. "It's a trophy we always wanted to win."
"All the credit to my players," said Bompastor. "We showed our mentality and our values in this game so we ended the season in an almost perfect scenario – we won, we were playing at Wembley, the stadium was nearly sold out, and we had a strong performance and result against a strong opponent."
"It is an almost ideal way to finish the season."
FA Cup crowds prove sustained demand for women's soccer
Chelsea FC's undefeated treble-winning season wasn't the only notable victory on Sunday, as the FA Cup final drew a crowd of over 74,000 fans for the third straight year.
Sunday's 74,412 attendance mark was just shy of both last year's crowd of 76,082 and the 77,390 fans who watched Chelsea defeat the Red Devils in 2023 — all well beyond the tournament final's previous record of 49,094 attendees achieved in 2022.
Fueled by the football fervor following England's 2022 Euro victory — the country's first international trophy, men's or women's, since the 1966 men's World Cup — the 2023 FA Cup final still stands as the largest crowd at a domestic women's soccer match across all nations.
With Sunday's match joining the over-74,000 attendance club, it's clear the post-Euros enthusiasm wasn't a blip, but a boost to the continued growth and sustained success of the women's game.
The USA Rugby women's 15s shattered the sport's US attendance record on Friday, welcoming 10,518 fans to Kansas City's CPKC Stadium for the Eagles' matchup against Canada.
Though the world No. 9 ranked US fell short in their come-from-behind push, falling 26-14 to No. 2 Canada in the opening game of the 2025 Pacific Four Series, Friday's crowd gave the players a massive off-field victory.
"To see the crowd be over 10,500 like that was absolutely fantastic in this women's purposely built stadium, and to debut rugby here in that stadium as well," said USA captain Kate Zackary after the game.
Even Canada's athletes lauded the significance of the record-setting crowd, despite the overwhelmingly US cheers from the home fans.
"Being here in North America and having 10,000 people coming to watch women's sports was so amazing," remarked Canada's Sarah-Maude Lachance.
Rugby's rise spurs exponential growth
After the Eagles secured Olympic bronze in rugby sevens last summer, the sport gained significant momentum.
The national attention captured by 2024 Olympians like superstar Ilona Maher earned USA Rugby a multimillion-dollar investment, helped fuel a new domestic league, and minted fresh fans en route to Friday's attendance record.
In the long-term, that growth could turn the US-hosted 2033 Rugby World Cup into a marquee national event.
For the rugby faithful, however, the biggest win is seeing those new to the sport become lifelong fans.
"Everyone I talked to after [Friday's] game who didn't know what rugby was, [I hope] has fallen in love with it," said Zachary.
How to attend the next USA Rugby game
The Eagles will take aim at breaking Friday's attendance record in Washington, DC, on July 19th, when they'll face No. 16 Fiji in a send-off game before August's 2025 Rugby World Cup in England.
Tickets to the Audi Field doubleheader, which also includes the US men's side against England, are available online now.
Stanford shattered the NCAA softball attendance record this weekend, welcoming 13,207 fans inside the university’s football stadium for Saturday's "Big Swing" game against Cal.
In the most-attended non-football contest in Stanford Athletics' history, the Cardinal softball crowd surpassed the sport's previous attendance record of 12,566, set on the first day of the 2024 Women's College World Series (WCWS) in Oklahoma City.
The history-making game also blew past the NCAA softball regular-season record of 9,259 fans, a feat reached less than two weeks ago when reigning champions Oklahoma defeated local rivals Oklahoma State on April 9th.
"It was kind of like a mini College World Series experience," Stanford junior outfielder Kyra Chan said after the game.
Despite dropping the record-breaking matchup 10-8 to their new ACC rivals, No. 16 Stanford ultimately secured the three-game series against the Golden Bears with wins on Thursday and Friday.
Friday's 9-3 victory was particularly impactful, clinching the Cardinal a spot in their first-ever ACC championship tournament next month — the first postseason stop as Stanford hunts a third-straight appearance in the WCWS semifinals.
Stanford softball fuels argument for larger women's sports venues
Softball isn't the only sport leading the recent surge in record-breaking NCAA women's sports crowds.
After shifting a volleyball match into its football stadium in August 2023, Nebraska welcomed not just the sport's biggest crowd, but the largest to ever attend any women's sporting event in the US.
Shortly thereafter, Iowa's "Crossover at Kinnick" blasted through the NCAA women's basketball attendance mark by moving an exhibition game featuring the Caitlin Clark-led Hawkeyes into the university's football venue.
Though the move to massive football stadiums was intentional to snag both Nebraska's and Iowa's respective records, Stanford's venue shift was not initially an attendance-hunting move.
The Cardinal's entire 2025 softball season is being played on the gridiron as the team's new $50 million stadium and state-of-the-art training facility is under construction.
Taking advantage of that added capacity was a no-brainer, with Stanford specifically branding and marketing their rivalry "Big Swing" game to capitalize on their temporary digs — and to continue making the overall case for expanding women's sports' venues.
"I think that you see a consistent theme that there aren't big enough venues for women's sports to be able to draw the fans that they can draw," Stanford softball head coach Jessica Allister pointed out.
"Hopefully, a lot of people who showed up to Stanford for the first time to watch a softball game will come back and see us in our beautiful stadium."
The USA skated to victory on Sunday, taking down archrival Canada in a 4-3 overtime thriller to earn the team's 11th IIHF Women’s World Championship title.
The US is now closing in on Canada's record 13 World Championship wins, setting the tone in the run-up to next year’s Winter Olympics as North America’s PWHL showcased its growing influence on the international stage.
After Canada equalized the second-period goals from US defender Caroline Harvey and forward Abbey Murphy — the potential No. 1 pick in June's 2025 PWHL Draft — the game's third period saw Team USA lose starting goaltender Aerin Frankel to injury.
Backup goalie and IIHF World Championship debutant Gwyneth Philips stepped in, seeing the USA to a back-and-forth 3-3 tie at the end of regulation.
Philips's 17 saves — including 10 in overtime — allowed US forward and current Penn State junior Tessa Janecke to play hero, with the 20-year-old capitalizing on a turnover by tapping in a golden goal with three minutes left in the first overtime period.
"Just shows how strong we are as a group and how much we can persevere through anything," Janecke said afterwards. "I wouldn’t want to do it with any other group."
The tournament itself also proved to be a success, setting a new IIHF Women’s World Championship attendance record as 122,331 total fans took in the games in Czechia.
"I think this is a watershed moment for women's hockey, and it's really exciting to be a part of," said US captain Hilary Knight after earning her 10th Worlds gold medal.
In a shifting hockey landscape, the USA-Canada rivalry is only becoming more intense — and the looming 2026 Olympics will provide yet another chance to steal the sport's global spotlight.