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For far too long, Portland wasn’t known for its women’s sports. The Portland Fire played just three seasons in the WNBA. The Portland Rain, a drizzly offshoot of the Timbers, played for just two seasons before folding. It reemerged briefly in 2009, but generated little excitement.
The breakout moment came one balmy April night in 2013 at Jeld-Wen Stadium. The Portland Thorns, buoyed by a crowd of 16,000 in the stands—the largest attendance yet in the league—beat the Seattle Reign 2-1.
With that victory, the Thorns had changed everything for Portland.
Over the following decade, the team would field some of the best players in modern history, among them Christine Sinclair, Alex Morgan and Tobin Heath, clinching several championships along the way. Most recently, the Thorns scored the best player in the league for a two-year contract: Sophia Smith.
Mark Parsons, head coach from 2015 to 2020, says he’s never seen such a strong connection between a city and a soccer team.
“It’s the most magical piece of this city, that it’s wrapped around the Thorns. There’s a bond I’ve never seen anywhere else,” Parsons says. “I’ve coached in front of a stadium of 60,000, but I’ve never seen anything quite like Providence Park.”
The Thorns have also been a bastion of resilience. Supporters formed the Rose City Riveters, a group of fanatics who unfailingly hoot and holler at every single game. In 2020, several former players alleged that former Thorns coach Paul Riley had sexually coerced them. Owner Merritt Paulson, aware of the allegations years before, agreed to sell the team to new owners. The deal was finalized in January 2024: The Bhathal family, which owns the Sacramento Kings, purchased the Thorns for $63 million.
The new ownership ushered in a new wave of hope for the Thorns and their fans. Adding to the momentum, chef Jenny Nyugen opened The Sports Bra, a bar focused solely on women’s sports. And just this fall, the Bhathals announced they had secured the purchase of a new WNBA team for Portland, which if all goes well, will begin playing in 2026.
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