Boston Breakers, Washington Freedom, Jersey Sky Blue, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas and St. Louis United. Each team will play a 20-game season that will run from April through late August, with the top four teams making the playoffs (two semifinals and one championship game). There are talks about expanding to San Jose, Vancouver, Kansas City and Seattle.
Several teams, including Los Angeles, Chicago and Dallas, will use the soccer-specific stadiums of the MLS teams in their city. Washington is talking to D.C. United about soccer doubleheaders at RFK Stadium. Jersey Sky Blue is negotiating with Rutgers University about playing its 2009 season there with its sights set on playing on Red Bull Park in Harrison, N.J. when the facility is built.
Teams will be stocked via allocations, player drafts and college drafts.
While WPS is not a single entity -- the WUSA was -- it will have a salary cap and a maximum and minimum player salary.
The new league's focus also will be much greater than just the pony-tail brigade.
"We're not branding toward just the screaming 13-year-old girl," Antonucci said. "We're branding to everyone. It could be the 35-year-old guy who plays twice a week."
The league logo is modeled after National Soccer Hall of Famer Mia Hamm, who has been retired for three years. While there are a number of excellent U.S. players, no one has the allure or magic of Hamm, who routinely filled stadiums when she and the Freedom came to town.
So, where will the next big superstar and attraction come from?
"I think it's a challenge the entire national team program is facing as it has reshuffled and rebuilt the roster," Antonucci said. "With the retirement of a group of fantastic players you bring in the next group and you build up the stars. We'll have the same challenges. ... We're going to let the fans of our league decide the next Mia, if you will."
Perhaps big star will be 21-year-old Brazilian Marta, the star of the past Women's World Cup and two-time FIFA women's player of the year. Antonucci stated that the league or the Los Angeles franchise wasn't in any current negotiations with Marta.
When the proper FIFA transfer windows open up, the league will be interested in bringing over the best players in the world, including Marta.
"We're going to have to get creative with some of these players," Antonucci said. "Their compensation and the quality of play they're experiencing in the Swedish league, we're going to have to be competitive and creative to bring them over."
Antonucci realized the new league has had many skeptics feeling it would not get this far, let alone off the ground in 15 months time.
"The fans had a lot of questions, people had sort of: 'We'll believe it when we see it and still continue to,'" she said.
Antonucci said that now "we can say to the fans, 'Here you go. We're for real. This is a go. This league is coming.' It's the reincarnation of the WUSA, if you want to call it because it's a new business plan. You can call it something new. I don't care what you call it."
Next year, women's soccer fans hope to call it a league of their own, Part II.
Michael Lewis covers soccer for the New York Daily News and is editor of BigAppleSoccer.com. He can be reached at SoccerWriter516@aol.com. Views and opinions expressed in this column are the author's, and not necessarily those of Major League Soccer or MLSnet.com.
