Two major women’s sports outlets are joining forces to ensure women’s sports gets the attention it’s long deserved.
As sports organizations from the NCAA to USA soccer grapple with a gender equity reckoning — and make strides, even if it’s not enough — media coverage for women’s sports still lags behind.
That’s not going to change overnight, but last week marked a step in the right direction.
The Next, a women’s college and professional basketball platform powered by The IX, and The Equalizer, which covers women’s soccer in North America, announced that they are joining forces to elevate their coverage and create a comprehensive network of coverage that women’s sports have lacked.
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The partnership entails a cooperation agreement between all sides and the merging of some editorial functions, according to Howard Megdal, founder of The IX and editor-in-chief of The Next. The goal, ultimately, is to make it easier for readers to access the full breadth of coverage across sports.
“The goal of this partnership is to spotlight the vital, shoe leather reporting being done at both The Next and The Equalizer,” he said. “We consistently break news and go in-depth on these subjects, while over at The IX we bring readers the macro view on six different women’s sports every week. By teaming up, we can scale how we do all of that.”
The partnership will amplify the three entities that already hold a prominent stake in the women’s sports conversation and create an even greater force. As Megdal points out, the three have combined for over 2,000 original, reported pieces this year alone. And that doesn’t include The Next’s Locked on WBB podcast, which runs six days per week, and game broadcasts via Playback that the staff runs to watch games in real time with their followers.
The most important part, as Megdal says, is that their model is subscriber based, meaning it’s backed by people who value women’s sports — and there are plenty.
“At a time when media jobs everywhere are in peril, and women’s sports is always first on the chopping block, our subscriber-based model means we can survive, and thrive, because our readers will always care about women’s sports as much as we do. And that is our sole focus, always.”
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