Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we spent our Saturday singing the Mariah Carey part of One Sweet Day with Boys to Men and belting out mister Brightside with the Killers. Now we're headed to cheer on the US women's national soccer team.
And that she believes Cup. Godspeed, Vocal Courts, Godspeed.
It's Monday, February twenty fourth, and on today's show you'll hear from chief branded communications officer for Stagwell the Women behind Sport Beach in can France.
Beth Sadu.
We talked about how the perception of women athletes and women's leagues has changed over the years. On the business side, why female athletes make great brand ambassadors and partners, and which big names will be seaside in France this summer. Plus Like Fatherlike Daughter, tempo moves are speeding up, and Alpine Skiing inducts its first member of the one hundred club. It's all coming up right after this. Welcome back, Slaicys.
Here's what you need to know today. Let's start with alpine Skiing, where American Mikaela Schiffren recorded her one hundredth word Old Cup win on Sunday morning, winning the slalom at a World Cup stop in Italy. The twenty nine year old Chiffrin, already considered among the greatest of all time, is the first alpine skier to ever reach one hundred wins. Now, you'd think they've given all that success, she'd have a pretty good idea of where to look when she crosses
the finish line. Not so much after the win. She told reporters, quote, I didn't know if it said fourth or first. One hundred times later and I still can't find the darn scoreboard end quote. In honor for one hundred win, Chiffrin is partnering with the scher Winter Foundation to raise one hundred thousand dollars for kids who might not otherwise have access to enroll in ski and snowboard programs. Oh, by the way, google Mikayla Schiffrin and enjoy what happens next.
Two unrivaled Over the weekend, the Lunar Owls recorded their first loss of the season, falling to Rose BC seventy two sixty three. Rose's Angel Reese recorded the first twenty twenty and unrivaled history in that win, finishing with twenty two points and twenty one rebounds and helping her team
to its fourth straight win. And because we all know a jel loove's a little trash talk, she exited the court with the classic selly mimicking the lunar owls hoody who Call and flapping her arms as fans cheered her on. And if you like that, check out the rosebc Instagram account for plenty more post win braggery.
They went deep.
It wasn't all bad news for the Owls this weekend, though. Twenty four hours later, they became the first team to clinch a playoff berth after defeating the Laces eighty eight to sixty.
A total of four.
Teams will qualify for the unrivaled playoffs, with the Laces, Rose and Vinyl currently occupying the other spots. The regular season concludes on March tenth, so the Phantom and the miss better get a move on if they want in to the WNBA. The Toronto Tempo have announced Monica Wright Rogers as their general manager. Wright Rogers, a former two time WNBA champ with the Minnesota Links as a player, most recently spent two seasons as an.
Assistant GM with the Phoenix Mercury.
The Canadian expansion team is set to make its debut in twenty twenty six. More WNBA Katie Lou Samuelson is headed to the Seattle Storm. The sharp shooting Samuelson, who's played for five different WNBA teams in her five seasons, returns to Seattle, where she spent her twenty twenty one season. The one year deal comes after parting ways with the Indiana Fever earlier this month. Her Fever contract was protected,
so Indiana offered her a buyout. The twenty seven year old is currently hooping it up and unrivaled on the Phantom BC squad to the NWSL. Well, we've got another questionable hiring decision. BFC announced last week that the club has hired Graham Abel as its new head of domestic scouting.
The announcement was met with immediate pushback.
Is able as previously faced allegations of abuse. A twenty twenty four investigative report from The Oregonian examined Abel's tenure as head coach at the University of Oregon. After the team went winless in twenty twenty three and twelve players departed the program. The Oregonian spoke to fourteen players who alleged that Abel used harsh language, threw objects at players,
and threatened to revoke scholarships. Players told The Oregonian that minor mistakes during practice or a game would result in long, expletive filled diatribes of how they weren't good enough to play college soccer, didn't deserve a spot on the team, and that his comments frequently veered into personal attacks. Abel denied the allegations to the Oregonians, saying in a written statement, quote, at no point have I used threatening statements or financial
repercussions as a part of coaching end quote. The university also issued a statement to the outlet saying a postseason review by the athletic department found no evidence of verbal abuse. In a press conference to announce the new hires, BAFC general manager Matt Potter said there were numerous steps in the hiring process, but when asked whether that process included speaking to any of Abel's former Oregon players, Porter said
he wasn't sure. The athletics Meglenahan wrote an extensive story on Abeles hiring, which gets into way more detail about the different tiers of NWSL roles and the type of background checks that go into each one. Heerlenahan's reporting as a Tier two hire ables hiring wouldn't have mandated media vetting or speaking to references outside of what the candidate provided.
We'll link to Meg's full story in the show notes, as well as the Oregonians twenty te twenty four investigative report to college Swimming, Virginia's women's swim team had a record setting outing at the ACC Championships. Led by Olympian sisters Gretchen and Alex Walsh. The Cavaliers now own every ACC women's swimming record, along with all five NCUBA relay records.
Talk about dominance.
The NCBLEA Swimming Championships are next month, and Virginia will be aiming to win a fifth straight national team title. To college hoops, Paige Becker's point watch continues. The Yukon Star had twenty three points, ten assists, and three steals in the huskies eighty six forty seven rout up the Butler Bulldogs on Saturday, moving up to the number six
spot on Yukon's all time scoring list. And while Page is chasing records, teammate Caroline ducharm was simply seeking a return to the court and after four hundred and sixty one days.
She got it. The Yukon guard has been out for fifteen months working.
Her way back from head and neck injuries, so it was quite an emotional scene when she checked into the game on Saturday. The injuries have plagued Ducharm throughout her time at UKA. She sat out five times during the team's national runner up finish in twenty one twenty two, made just twenty three appearances the following season, and after winning the starting job last year, had to be shut
down for the season after just four games. Said Becker's after the game about duchar making her return, quote, it brings you to tears because of everything she's been through and everything she's overcome and how much work she's put into it.
End quote.
Some book news South Carolina Gamecock said coach and former WNBA All Star Dawn Staley has announced an upcoming book, Uncommon Favor, Basketball, North Philly, My Mother, and the Life Lessons I Learned from All Three. It's set to be published in May and is available for pre order now. Speaking of books, you remember Fred. At the show, Jane McManus came on to talk about her new book, The
Fast Track Inside the surging business of women's sports. Well, she celebrated published day last Friday, so go order it online or grab it at a local bookstore. Oh and my first book, Runs in the Family, an incredible true story of football, fatherhood and belonging, comes out in June, and it's also available for pre order now. Shameless Plug number two. I think that is. You can expect plenty more.
In soccer news, the US women's national team defeated Columbia two nil in their first match of the She Believes Cup behind goals by Chelsea's Katerina Macario and the Utah Royals Alli Centiner. Macario's goal was her first international tally in three years as she works her way back from
a twenty twenty two ACL injury. Centener's goal and absolute banger, was her first at the senior level, and seventeen year old Lillly Johannes was impressive in the win as well, adding to what are already very high expectations for the much hyped teen. We're recording this episode early on Sunday so I can head out to Glendale and watch USA versus Australia stories from that one later in the week.
We're going to take a quick break.
When we come back, we dive more into the business of women's sports with Best to Do. I caught up with her earlier this month to talk about the women athletes scoring big on Sport Beach That's next us And now she's spearheads Sport Beach in con one of the year's biggest sports industry events, and leads all brand and communications efforts for Staguell, a top ten global marketing services firm. She did previous stops at K Street, Capital, Politico and
PSB Insights. She got her masters at Cambridge, it did undergrad at George Washington. She knows all the hot spots in the south of France.
It's Beth to do. Beth, thanks for joining us.
Thank you so much for having me. Sarah. It's nice to be here.
It is a wintry day here in Chicago, so to get to talk about all things France in the summer. That trip can't come fast enough. Not just Sport Beach on the docket today, but just how folks like you are running major sports events and seeing women athletes and women's leagues differently when planning than maybe even just a couple of years ago. I want to start with the basics for those who don't know, So, what exactly is sport Beach.
Yeah, well, thank you again for having me and for bringing these topics to life. So Sport Beach is the premiere mix of athletes and marketers in can France every summer.
It started with a really simple idea, which is that individual athletes are the key narrators of so much of sport, and sport is culture, sport is innovation, sport is fashion, sport is technology, and we really felt like individual athletes, women athletes in particular, but really all individual athletes needed an opportunity to be on the same level, on the same field as brand marketers. And that's what we do.
We bring together individual athletes with the world's best brand marketers and help them do business together.
I want to dive into that in a second, but we need to have an important pronunciation debate. I say con because I don't know I took French, and then once you learn it, it's like stuck in there.
But America says can.
It's sort of like the Brushetta versus Brusquetta argument. It's a Biza versus abitha.
Yes, these are the key issues of our day.
Yeah, like, where do you stand on that?
Because it's like, okay, I went to Africa, it's Tanzania, not Tanzania. But then when I say Tanzania, I sound kind of crazy.
Where do you stand on speaking the.
Way they do where you're going versus the way it's pronounce where you're from.
So I took Spanish and therefore have no good French accent, so I over rotate towards the American. It's a soda can, and I just embraced that in my life and I look for, you know, cultural appropriateness in other places.
Perfect good answer, good answer. Okay, I'm gonna stick with Khan.
But also then I say can lions, So there's no it just it changes with every sentence.
For me, I just go with a can.
So yeah, this, we all have heard of the Can Film Festival, right, and so that's what we think of as the space. So when I first started hearing about
Sport Beach, I wasn't sure how it fit in. But to your point, I would rather hear an athlete alongside a market talking about how they made a campaign, an activation and event, a fashion moment happened, versus just the Marketer, And so why do you think it took so long to realize that the influencer, the person that moves the needle, the one that we all know the face and name of, might be useful to including those conversations.
So the amazing thing about sport Beach, or one of the amazing things is the number of people who say, oh, I had that idea, or that's such an obvious idea, or I can't believe nobody did that before. Sure, like all good points, I heard the idea. It was a single slide from a colleague who had never been to Can before, went for the first time in two thousand and I guess two thousand and two, and he came back and he said, why is there no sport in can?
We should make a sport beach And that was the idea. And I thought, that is such a great idea because sport is this, I mean, you know, global influential, diverse evolved,
financially incredibly motivating. Also only appointment viewing left in the world right course, and it was really not being dealt with in any serious way at cam Lions, and we felt like that was such a clear opportunity for us to come in as marketers and say hey, we can build something cool, and we can build it in the same way you would approach a client, Like you would never go to a client and say, let's do what everybody else is doing. So we said, let's do sport well.
And it's also interesting because there are so many examples of things that get siloed and then they've always been done that way, so then we just keep doing them that way in the same language that people were using with you of like, I thought about that a long time ago. I haven't we always done that? That's the
conversation happening around women's sports. Yes, that's the conversation. Why aren't you know the sports bra opens in portlandch makes over a million dollars in the first year, and people like, oh, why haven't we had years where you can watch women's sports. Sport beat happens and we see these incredible female athletes up on stage right alongside the men, eloquently intelligently speaking about their sport, their brand, whatever they're talking about, and
you ask, why haven't we always done this? So it's both the microcosm in terms of like the specific people involved, but the larger idea that you said, which is like, if we're going to have a festival of creativity, we're.
Going to honor marketing and advertising and all these people.
Sports is a huge part of that. So this year's lineup, tell us a little bit about it. Tell us about some of the women athletes that'll be on stage and participating in the Sport Beach events.
Yeah. Absolutely so, sitting here in February, we can give you a sneak peek of some of the people who are coming. Two big names, in fact, names I've hung up with at the Sports Bra Subird Wnba Great came to the first Sport Beach. She really took a chance on the idea she'll be with us. So will Megan Rappino, and she came last year. The reason that I think the event appeal to them is because of what they are building as business people, both individually and with their podcast.
A touch more. Last year they did a live pod with Juju Watkins the USC I guess the freshman at that stage and Sue and Megan are these incredible business people who often really get spoken to as if there's some exotic animal like female athletes who have created a business. And I think that does a disservice to the scale
and the power of what they have built. So are intent with having them for a third year, and they will be I guess one of only a couple athletes come back for a third year is to talk about what they're building and how it's changed. We will also have Flage Johnson with us talking about fashion, which is something that she's really passionate about. Candice Parker will be with us for the first time this year, which I'm
I mean, she's just an icon for me. I grew up watching her and she's really going to talk about investing and how she approaches building businesses as an investor, which is a totally different conversation than some of the other people we have. And then we have the amazing sprinter Tera Davis Woodhall who's joining us and she's going to talk about what life looks like her for her post Olympics.
Yeah, and I feel like if you have Tara Davis wood All, you have to have Hunter, right.
He is coming, Yes, Steal.
We all want to see them together.
I do want to see them together, and I think this is important. We also want to take them seriously as individual athletes. For sure, they are building together and they're building separately, and I think marketers were all like, oh, yes, let's see them together. Yeah, and let's give them a chance to talk about where they're going individually.
Sure, same with Sue and Meghan, right, Like, we love a power couple, but they're also other power couple, their own people. You know, the examples you gave are so perfect though, because in the women's sports space for years, decades, we have talked about how, yes, there are some incredible, interesting, smart, compelling male athletes, but on the average, the female athletes have to diversify earlier. They need to continue to get their degree, they need to pursue interests outside of sport.
They need to identify ways to make money that isn't just their paycheck, because they aren't getting paid millions and millions the way that men are, and they aren't being enabled at embolden from a very young age to believe that if they just play sports, that'll be enough and everybody around them will help organize and then benefit from
the money that they're going to make. Instead, they have to kind of, you know, identify these other qualities that they can make money off of and pursue and you know, flage. She's a rapper, she's a basketball player, she's into fashion, she's a multi conglomerate, sort of multi hyphen it even while she's still in college. Candice Parker's, you know, president of Adidas Basketball, just wrote a book, is you know, helping launch this WNBA bit in Nashville?
And of course this legendary player and media personality.
When you're trying to talk to those who aren't maybe familiar with the women's sports space, have you seen pushback when you recommend them for panels or events? Are there people who just don't get it that still think let's just use the big name men that everybody have heard of.
Sarah, I would love to tell you, no, everybody gets it, and that would just be some of you know what I think I get commentary in three categories. Who is that I've never heard of them? Unfortunately, I don't really think that that's totally different than men's game.
You know, the.
Superstars are superstars. There's just fewer female superstars. The other thing, and this is the thing we get most, is great, Well, let's have them for the women's sports conversation. Let's have them for that.
Let's silo it again.
Let's silo it again. Let's other that stuff. Let's put it over there. One of the things we've been incredibly intentional about, and I want to say that Sport Beach is run by women. My co pilot and all of these things as a former Olympic rower, and we feel really passionately that we're not going to have a women's track. We're going to have women in all the tracks. So that has been you know, the second thing I usually get, and then the third comment I get is amazing love
her doesn't get enough play. I want to put my brand there. That is something that has changed over the last twenty four months that we've been doing this. Year one, it was very performative. Year two much more I get it. I want to be there. And if I think about the arc of another athlete that we've gotten to work with, Maria Sharapova, the tennis great, she took a chance on sport each year one told her story. You know, people
don't know this. She was one of the original investors in super Gup before it you know, got its huge investment.
My favorite I should be getting paid them for the pr.
But that's just one of her amazing investments. Super Goop, Sarah Body Bala, all things that she invested in early you know, three years ago, people really didn't quite know what to make of that. Now she's starting podcast, she is working on a whole group of wellness and performance mindset activations with brands, and I think people are taking her seriously as an investor and as an entrepreneur in a way that we didn't like. People didn't ask me about that when we started three years ago.
Yeah, and I think the proof is in the pudding too.
I imagine that you probably have some anecdotes of folks who came to the first year the second year saw some incredible content from these women and started to rethink their expectations for how to include or how to platform women in sports space.
I mean, our promise to any athlete is come to can with us, or come to one of the sport each club house which we're rolling out this year, and we will yes, put you on stage, but we will also put you in meetings and in roundtables and in conversations with people who can be good partners for you and your business. You know, that could be somewhere you
are today. It could be somewhere you're going, and we've had people get amazing brand deals men and women year long partnership with a telecom company Super Bowl commercial, which is timely for when we're talking. But our promise has been born out, and I think that's why the athletes come back. It's not just because they want to go to the south of.
France, yeah, which is decent. It's a decent reason, but there's more to place to go.
It's only a couple of years old, but you have been in the live event space for a long time. How have you seen the perception of women athletes and women's leagues change over the years, both in terms of the events, not just Sport Beach but all events, but also just the marketing space and how to use them.
So I don't know if this will shock you or not. Sport Beach is actually the first sport activity that I've ever really done. Yeah, I've been in the live events space in different capacities. I started as a television producer doing politics, and then I actually went to Politico and did live events for them and started what is called the Women Rule series that was more than a decade ago,
still going strong. I think what I see is many more voices in the conversation, faces around the table in terms of deciding what kind of content we're going to make and what kind of content we're going to support. I also see much more serious media rights and that changes the whole conversation. But it's a chicken and egg one. Without the media rights, you don't have the audience. Without
the audience, you don't have the media rights. When we really have more of a tipping point there and I think we're in it, that's when the women's track sort of goes away and it's just the who are the amazing athletes to invest in?
Yeah, you mentioned the sport beach clubhouses. Maria Sharpova, you had just mentioned she was a guest at the clubhouse at the World Economic Forum in Davos. What's the concept there and tell us a little bit about that one.
Yep. The concept is that we have these amazing athletes who need and deserve opportunities to meet with marketers and decision makers all year long. Works amazingly well on the beach in France. But that's not the only sort of sport and non sport endemic moments, and so we are looking to build sport beach clubhouses. In places where marketers and decision makers gather. We were at Consumer Electronics Show at Allegiance Stadium, which was a great kickoff for the year.
At World Economic Forum with Marian Sharapova. We will be at Super Bowl. We will be at south By Southwest actually with Kansas Park talking about her book. We'll be on the Sand in France, and then a couple more places later in the year like US Open and Web Summits.
Amazing.
The theory is the same individual athletes with great marketers on the same playing field.
Are there folks that you have in your head dream women's sports coaches, athletes, anyone in the industry that you've been trying to get to that you haven't wrangled yet.
Oh, for sure. I would love to have Don Staley join us, the South Carolina women's coach. Yep, I think any list that doesn't include Simone Biles and Serena Williams is just not that well thought out. We do have a gymnast who I can't announce yet and a coach who I can't announce yet, but some amazing people. We'd love to have Alona mar the rugby player and one
of our key commitments at sport beach. In addition to equity, every athlete gets the same package, whether or not it's you know, Travis Kelce who everybody knows of, or you know a less well known sprinter, same package. Our other commitment is to diversity in all its forms, so that means big sports football, basketball, but also smaller sports, Olympic sports, you know, the personal sport I do in my basement on my peloton every morning. Yeah, so for example, we've
had some peloton instructors. Yeah.
I was running round Ken with Robin our Zone last year.
Yep, it was. It was great to have them. And people have such a different relationship with someone who's in there, you know, their basement or their living room every day than they do with someone who they see primarily in like a big game setting. I mean, there's so many people I'd love to have. I can't wait to be able to share more of them.
Well, some of those wish list is out there publicly now, so you know, hopefully they'll get back to them. I would I like to see don Staley running around the South of France. I'm not gonna lie, and she would do some damage at the shop in stores that they've got down there.
You know, one of the one of the conversations that we're interested in having with a coach STALEI er really with any coach is about teamwork and perseverance and grits, and those are all conversations that are not best suited for an after game interview. They're not just best suited for how do we do that with in her case, you know, young women who are college age. But that's
something any marketer, any CEO can learn from. And so having those coaches I think brings a really important voice to the conversation.
For sure.
Well, I am not sure if I'll be there this year. I would love to head back, So I'm just gonna put that out there in the universe.
It's worked before.
But the South of France is always lovely in June, so everybody who's listening, you know. But also the clubhouses sound like a blast too, so we'll keep an eye out for those before we let you go. We need the top secret or just top place in Calm that you like to go to when you're.
Down there, besides Sport Beach. Of course, that is such a great question. So this is pro tip. There is never any line for the Chanel boutique in can any other place in the world you were gonna wait in line. You're going to walk your little self in there and do some damage.
Interesting, Okay, good to know. And is it the Carlton Hotel? What's the one?
Carlton is great. The Carlton and the JW are the big ones. Sport Beach is conveniently located in between the two of.
Them, very close. Yeah, the Carlton patio. We did some damage there.
That's a good time to.
Beat a Carlton patiomeal with some rose. You know. There are also a lot of great little family run beach clubs fifteen twenty minutes off the coast. Can't remember any of their names, but that's usually where you will find me on a Friday.
After Love it, love it well. Thanks so much for the time.
We're looking forward to seeing all the great content that comes out of this year.
Thank you, Sarah, appreciate it, and I'm excited to see you in friends.
Thanks to Beth for joining us.
We have to take another break when we come back, Like father, like daughter, stick around.
Welcome back slices.
You know, we always love to hear from you, so hit us up on email Good Game at wondermedianetwork dot com or leave us a voicemail at eight seven two two oh four fifty seventy and don't forget to subscribe.
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Watch breaking your dad's high school scoring record rating forty nine out of forty nine points. Review the number two ranked high school hoops player in the class of twenty twenty six by ESPN, Kate Harpring of Mary's School in Atlanta, dropped forty nine points to help her team to to a region title, breaking the thirty year old Merist school record set by her dad, Matt, who went on to play in the NBA. Kate has already secured offers from Yukon, LSU,
South Carolina, and Iowa. Now I'm wondering if you break dad's record, do you take him for ice cream after the game?
Now it's your turn. Rate and Review. Thanks for listening, See you tomorrow. Good game, Beth, Good game, Kate.
You not talking to victims, aggrieved parties and former players before hiring problematic coaches. Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network. Our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz, Jenny Kaplan
and Emily Rudder. Our editors are Emily Rudder, Britney Martinez, and Grace Lynch. Our associate producer is Lucy Jones and I'm Your Host Sarah Spain