Thorns FC supporters group Rose City Riveters raised a tifo at the last regular season home game in JELD-WEN, which saw an NWSL record crowd of 17,619 fans. (Photo copyright Meg Linehan for The Equalizer)
This was the biggest week of the season for the NWSL. The league had six games as the season is winding down, with Portland hosting twice. Every hosting team drew more fans than they have averaged for the year. Chicago pulled off a huge crowd with their first sellout of the year. With all of the fans from this week, the league has now easily crossed the 300,000 mark.
Now onto Portland. With two home games this week, Portland drew over 30,000 fans for the week. That is more fans than six of the other teams have drawn at home all year. The Thorns saw a huge crowd for their Wednesday night game, and then broke the league record for attendance for the FOX Soccer game of the week.
There are seven games next week with the playoff picture shaping up. There should be a big crowd on Saturday to see the Flash take on the Thorns.
Here are the NWSL’s attendance numbers through Week 17 (77 games):
Average Attendance: 4,287
(Average Attendance Without Portland’s Home Games: 2,781)
Attendance Standard Deviation: 4,007
Median Attendance: 2,899
Total Attendance to date: 330,086
(Total Attendance Without Portland’s Home Games: 183,565)
Week Seventeen Attendance Numbers:
Washington Spirit @ Western New York Flash (Sahlen’s Stadium) – 3,967
Sky Blue FC @ Portland Thorns FC (JELD-WEN Field) – 13,769
Seattle Reign FC @ Chicago Red Stars (Benedictine University Sports Complex Stadium) – 3,400 (sellout)
Western New York Flash @ Boston Breakers (Dilboy Stadium) – 2,899
Washington Spirit @ Sky Blue FC (Yurcak Field) – 2,172
FC Kansas City @ Portland Thorns FC (JELD-WEN Field) – 17,619
| Average Home Attendance | |||
| Team | Games | Average | Capacity |
| Portland Thorns FC | 11 | 13,320 | 65% |
| FC Kansas City | 10 | 4,597 | 75% |
| Western New York Flash | 8 | 3,803 | 28% |
| Washington Spirit | 8 | 3,626 | 81% |
| Boston Breakers | 9 | 2,397 | 88% |
| Seattle Reign FC | 10 | 2,151 | 60% |
| Chicago Red Stars | 10 | 1,675 | 48% |
| Sky Blue FC | 11 | 1,666 | 33% |
