How the KC Current’s CPKC Stadium became a catalyst for growth in women’s sports
When Kathy Nelson travels internationally, promoting Kansas City and seeking to bring events here, she inevitably is asked if she knows Patrick Mahomes and if she’s met Taylor Swift.
People often bring up Ted Lasso, aka Our Own Jason Sudeikis. Lately, she even is questioned about old Route 66, since the so-called Mother Road that passes elsewhere through Missouri will have its 100th anniversary celebrated next year.
More and more, though, Nelson is apt to hear this:
“‘Wait, Kansas City: you’re the women’s sports city,’” said Nelson, who leads both Visit KC and the Kansas City Sports Commission. “So we’re not saying it. People are mentioning it.”
You could see a fresh snapshot of just why on Friday night at CPKC Stadium, the epicenter of the movement still gaining momentum here.
Before what was expected to be a record-breaking crowd at the 11,500-seat stadium that is the world’s first purpose-built for a women’s pro sports team, the USA Rugby women’s national played Canada in an unprecedented quality of venue that seemed overwhelming to Sally Horrox — the director of women’s rugby for World Rugby.
Gazing Wednesday out over the stadium and backdrop, anticipating the thousands who’d be here Friday night to shatter the USA Rugby attendance record of around 2,000, Horrox called the surroundings and vibe “spine-tingling.”
“I haven’t walked into an environment like this, ever,” she said. “I haven’t walked into (seeing the words of) Title IX on a wall in a social space, in a cafeteria or a bar where people are mingling. And I haven’t seen a pitch of this quality in a stadium.”
While perhaps we’ve become used to this through the impact the Kansas City Current’s endeavor has had on the city and the NWSL, it’s telling of the enterprise in another sort of way to see and hear the awe and appreciation of women in other sports.
“This is absolutely incredible,” Team USA rugby player Hallie Taufoou said Wednesday.
Even with international experience, the 30-year-old from Idaho considered how life in women’s sports so often means being told “you can’t go here” or having to ask permission.
“Here,” she said, “it feels way more open.”
That feeling and the dedication that informs it help explain why Kansas City figures to be a favorite potential site for the 2033 Women’s Rugby World Cup — as well as a contender for the 2031 Men’s Rugby World Cup.
Not to mention the city would seem to have a fine chance at being a 2031 FIFA Women’s World Cup location, if the United States indeed is the host. As of April, the U.S. was the only nation to submit a bid to FIFA, which is expected to name the host country in the second quarter of 2026 — perhaps around the time KC is one of the hosts of the FIFA Men’s World Cup.
Meanwhile, Kansas City later this year will host the Division I women’s volleyball championships at T-Mobile Center, and CPKC Stadium also will be the site of this year’s NCAA Division I women’s Final Four.
And then some.
Much of this energy for women’s sports emanates from the vision and investment of Angie and Chris Long.
Along with KC Current co-founder Brittany Mahomes, in December 2020 they were awarded an expansion soccer franchise (that Patrick Mahomes since has joined as a co-owner) that has grown at an absurdly rapid rate.
In a flash, they built a practice facility and stadium to set an entirely new standard not just in women’s soccer, but in women’s sports overall.
All at a time, Angie Long remembered thinking, “there was not another model of a women’s team we could look at.”
So all they knew was that they would insist on absolute best practices and deep financial commitment.
It’s resonated.
“Their ambition is bold, and … it’s infectious,” Horrox said. “You can feel it. … They’re not sort of shaping around the edges. They’re pacing the chain.”
As Angie Long considered the links and ripples, she thought about what’s happening now in Portland: Ground in Oregon was just broken for a $150 million training facility that will be shared by Portland’s WNBA and NWSL teams.
Reiterated by what Reuters documented as a widespread surge in the popularity of women’s sports, Long said “the world has changed” in its receptiveness, even in the relatively brief span since they created the team.
That includes, Long believes, achieving a “turning point” of people “less and less seeing gender in sport” and emerging appreciation of women’s competitions.
Much because the investments have been so much stronger.
“I think it is becoming an absolute must to have a best-in-class training facility,” Long said. “And, in my opinion, having control over your facilities makes or breaks the financial implications.”
In this case, those implications are part of something else big:
In conjunction with Port KC, the Current has been a catalyst for the planned $800 million development on the once-neglected Berkley Riverfront — where Long envisions at some point potentially “activating” the Missouri River for entertainment and access.
“When you think about infrastructure, you can build bridges, you can build highways, you can build roads,” she said. “We have a natural one, right there. And I think it does a lot for the state and the region to build connectivity.”
Certainly, their work has been building connectivity for Kansas City through women’s sports — including in ways that are emotional this week for Long.
In the 1990s, she earned All-America recognition as a member of two national championship rugby teams at Princeton — where players had to beg alums to help fund the program and didn’t even have an athletic trainer to attend to injuries.
Back then, she would never have dreamed of women’s rugby being played in a stadium of this caliber.
Now, Horrox said, “We’re anticipating the fastest growing part of the game for us at World Rugby is girls rugby. It’s outstripping the boys. It’s outstripping the men.
“So if we can stay on that trajectory, for us, it’s the biggest single driver of growth in the sport around the world.”
With a boost now from the women’s sports city.