Caitlin Clark joins ownership group seeking NWSL team. Here’s what you should know about her soccer career

Caitlin Clark is returning to her soccer roots.
Clark has joined the ownership group attempting to win a bid to bring an NWSL team to Cincinnati, ESPN reported Thursday. Cincinnati is roughly a two-hour drive from Indianapolis, where Clark plays for the WNBA’s Indiana Fever.
The ownership group is led by the owners of the city’s MLS team, FC Cincinnati.
“The NWSL Cincinnati bid team is thrilled that Caitlin Clark has joined our ownership group in pursuit of bringing a women’s professional soccer team to our city,” the NWSL Cincinnati group told ESPN.
The NWSL is currently looking for the home of its next team, and the opportunity to team up with Clark could pique the league’s interest.
The league will bring its total of teams up to 16 by 2026. Boston was awarded expansion rights for the league’s 15th team earlier this year.
“(Clark’s) passion for the sport, commitment to elevating women’s sports in and around the Greater Cincinnati region, and influence as an athlete and role model for women and girls around the world, make her a vital part of our compelling bid to become the 16th team in the NWSL,” the Cincinnati group said.
ESPN reports that the 16th NWSL team will be awarded by the end of the year and that the expansion fee could near $100 million, nearly double the fee paid by Boston and Bay FC, who joined Utah Royals FC as the NWSL’s newest teams this season.
Cincinnati is considered a top contender because it already has a soccer-specific stadium. Joining forces with a superstar like Caitlin Clark, who elevated women’s basketball viewership at both the collegiate and WNBA level, could also give Cincinnati an edge.
Clark played soccer starting at age 5 on co-ed youth teams. She’d take over the game and hog the ball, prompting her dad to tell her to stop scoring so much, according to Hawk Central.
“Quite frankly, and I’m not trying to brag about it, but I think she probably could have been the same sort of talent in soccer that she is in basketball,” her father told Hawk Central. “She could have been on USA, junior-national type teams.”
Clark is famous for her long-range shots on the basketball court, and she was known for those on the soccer pitch as well.
As an 11-year-old, she scored from the midfield line after a kickoff to tie the game. Her dad remembers her scoring three years later from 40 yards out from the goal.
Clark continued playing both soccer and basketball in high school. As a freshman, she scored 26 goals in just six games. But after her sophomore season, the 2024 WNBA rookie of the year ended her soccer career to focus on basketball.
Clark discussed her decision to give up soccer to pursue basketball full time earlier this month at the ANNIKA’s Women’s Leadership Summit.
“I played soccer — I was on varsity — and I loved it, but my teammates would get mad because I would go and practice and workout and do basketball after school right before we had our soccer games,” she said. “They couldn’t believe I was doing that.”
Her love for getting better at and practicing basketball helped Clark decide which sport to focus on.
“I eventually had to give up soccer even though I loved it. But I think it was just the will I had to want to get better at it. Like I love just practicing (basketball) and I think at times that’s not something everybody really likes to do or wants to do or is passionate about something they love. And for me that’s what told me like I wanted to have a future in that,” she said.