Alex Silverman and Chris Smith at Sports Business Journal are reporting that Philadelphia is one of five cities the National Women’s Soccer League is considering for expansion. The others are Cincy, Cleveland (why?), Denver, and Nashville. Here’s the relevant Philly stuff:

Philadelphia: A group fronted by Eagles Head of Football Development and Strategy Connor Barwin, a former NFL linebacker, has made a late push in the race to nab the NWSL’s 16th team. Barwin’s group also includes local female business leaders, celebrities and U.S. women’s national team players with connections to the region.

Their plan involves building a stadium for the new team, though the group has yet to nail down its preferred site. As a result, NWSL has yet to schedule a visit to the city. While a new stadium wouldn’t be completed in time for the team’s debut in 2026, Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Eagles, could serve as a temporary home until the new facility is ready to open.

We haven’t had a women’s team in the region since 2011, when the Independence played their second WPS season before the league folded. The 2010 expansion year their games were at West Chester, then they moved to Widener the following year. I’m pretty sure attendance was something around 2,000 to 3,000 people per game. There just wasn’t a ton of buzz for the team beyond the Union fans who brought some of the MLS expansion juice over to the women’s side. And it was kind of a shame, too, because those Independence teams were really good. They went to the championship twice, but lost, so they were very much a Philly team. They had great players like Amy Rodriguez, Lianne Sanderson, Lori Lindsey, Veronica Boquete, Jo Lohman, and Natasha Kai, coached by pre-scandal Paul Riley.

Reading that second paragraph of the above blurb raises a huge red flag. “The plan involves building a stadium for the new team.” Yeah? Where? On Market Street?

Joking, but not really. If you look at the current NWSL teams, most share their stadium with the local men’s team. Angel City FC and LAFC share BMO Stadium and Bay FC and the San Jose Earthquakes share PayPal Park. There are some exceptions, like in Kansas City, where the Current play in an 11,500-seat stadium built seven months ago, but if sharing Subaru Park with the Union is not an option, then I’m skeptical of the idea of using the Linc for a little bit until something else is built. UNLESS – you can swing something with Temple perhaps, go in together with the university on a small Temple football/NWSL stadium, or partner with another local team or college and do it that way. We’ll see.

I do think there’s more momentum for women’s sport in 2024 than there was 15 years ago, when WPS expansion came to the region. We’re living in the era of Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese and talking about WNBA in Philadelphia as well, maybe at 76 Place if it’s built. It’s certainly the right time to put together a solid ownership group and take a run at NWSL expansion.