“KC Baby on three! One … Two … Three!”
“KC BABY!” the CPKC Stadium crowd rings back in unison.
The venue is an ocean of teal and red on a Saturday morning in October, with fans from toddlers to grandparents all on their feet watching the players run from one side of the pitch to the other. CPKC Stadium is located in Kansas City, Mo., on the picturesque Missouri River with a view of the downtown skyline in the background. The stadium is sold out once again, as it was in all of its home matches this season, marking the first time a club has done so in NWSL history. This means 11,500 fans packed in the stadium for each home game in 2024.
Fans from around the world, and especially those local to Kansas City, flocked to the grounds this year, and not just because the Current had a successful season on the pitch (they posted a 16–7–3 record, but fell in the semifinals of the NWSL playoffs). CPKC Stadium is the first NWSL stadium built solely for a women’s professional sports team. Loyal soccer fans and new supporters of the sport wanted to witness and experience history this season.
“We are the first, we certainly will not be the last,” Current president Raven Jemison says.
“I can’t believe it took this long for these world-class athletes to get the platform and the facilities that they deserve. What makes this project unique is that it’s history, of course, but it is setting the table for what is possible in the example of what happens when you invest in women the way that our ownership group has.”
Majority owners and co-founders Chris and Angie Long echo this sentiment. Along with Brittany Mahomes, the wife of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, the trio founded the Current in 2020, and from there, the planning and execution of CPKC Stadium began.
Angie Long explained why it was so important to prioritize building a stadium specifically for the Current when they established the team.
HALF A YEAR OF CPKC STADIUM 🏟️
— KC Current (@thekccurrent) September 17, 2024
Happy 6 month anniversary of the opening of the first professional women’s sports stadium in the world - @cpkcstadium📍#KCBABY pic.twitter.com/Hm79afyNjG
“Women’s soccer in this country has been so strong for so long, but facilities matter. Experiences matter,” she says. “Sports are entertainment, so having the right environment to showcase the amazing product that we have, the product of these players, of this game. If you put them in an environment like our stadium, it’s just like shining a light. You can really see them.”
And, when at CPKC Stadium, onlookers really feel involved in the game. The furthest seat from the pitch is 94 feet away, while the closest seats are right on the field in the pitch club on the west side of the stadium.
It may not appear to be the biggest stadium when inside or looking at it from the exterior, especially compared to some of the other stadiums NWSL teams play in, but CPKC Stadium’s electric environment is palpable.
“It’s just so cool to walk around that stadium and see [the crowd],” says Ben Aken, the Current’s vice president of community relations. “The one thing about that stadium size, it’s big enough it feels loud, it has great energy to provide for this team, but it’s small enough that you’re able to interact with people and small enough where our players still sign autographs after games.”
The Longs wanted the stadium to feel “intimate” when fans arrived. However, they still wanted supporters to be in a passionate sports environment in order to give them the opportunity to connect with fellow fans. So far they seem to have successfully emulated this feeling.
“That sense of connectivity I think is really important,” Angie Long says. “It’s incredibly loud, too, and powerful. You have that totally sold out, entire community behind you. I think size is not everything that defines a stadium. I think some of the best experiences in the world, it’s about how that atmosphere comes together.”
On game days, this close-knit environment is prevalent. The south bleachers in the stadium are filled with the team’s loyal fan base deemed the “Blue Crew.” The group sings, cheers and recites chants throughout the game, similar to other fan groups across the NWSL. They also have a drum line called “Surface Tension” performing the backbeats to these chants.
So, what’s it like sitting with the Blue Crew members during a KC Current game?
“It is loud,” Blue Crew president Trina Hawkins says. “It’s exhilarating, you can’t help but want to cheer and be loud and get into it.”
The original fan group began in 2012 when the former local soccer club, FC Kansas City, was established. That inaugural year saw around four members. Over the years, and even more so when the Current started in ’20, this number has grown exponentially. Last year, there were around 200 members, but the Blue Crew has grown to over 400 members this season.
Coach Vlatko Andonovski, who also led FC Kansas City from 2013 to ’17, remembers what it was like playing in front of those small crowds and fan clubs at high school stadiums in the area. He says it’s “two different worlds” compared to where they play now, in front of a packed stadium made specifically for the Current.
“You can’t even compare. You can’t even talk about the first season at the same time when you talk about this season,” Andonovski says. “Even though we had some fans there, the people that came there were more about the ones that heard about the team that were curious to see it. Where now, there’s a true love for the team, true love for the players, true love for the game. The fans are different, more educated and love the product.”
Those loyal fans from the early days trickled into CPKC Stadium this season. Hawkins admits how surreal it is to walk into the stadium for each game as she, a longtime soccer player and fan, never thought a venue like this would exist.
“This is a dream come true for someone like me to have a stadium that is dedicated to a professional women’s soccer team,” Hawkins says. “I never would have imagined that I would be here.”
The Blue Crew consists of passionate fans who live throughout the Kansas City community, a group the Longs really wanted to accurately portray throughout the grounds. The stadium would be historic in many ways, but it also would represent the KC community to the rest of the world.
One thing about Kansas City is that their fans are extremely loyal. They show up and show out to all of their sporting events, and the community proved that to be true during the Current’s first year in the new stadium with record sell-out crowds.
“This city is incredibly proud of anything that has Kansas City tied to it,” Jemison says. “The Current have just been put right on that pedestal that is a sports town that loves their sports. Anything the Kansas City community rallies around is going to be a success because there’s a level of pride here. People want to say ‘Yes, I was there,’ but two, ‘I support the hometown team.’”
The Kansas City community is also highlighted best through all the food vendors inside CPKC Stadium, ranging from local barbeque restaurants to juice stores. The artwork seen around and inside the stadium was all done by local artists. Jemison says their goal with including vendors from the community is that fans from out of town who may only be visiting for the game will have a chance to experience all of Kansas City within the stadium.
But the one historical aspect of the stadium that may be overlooked is the Current’s home locker room. The space is completely tailored to the team, with the squad’s logo plastered from the ceiling to the lockers, which is a first for the NWSL.
“When you walk into a locker room that’s yours with your branding, all your recovery, all of your hydration, everything in one place, I think it’s a special thing about the stadium is any team that comes in there, they know that that’s the Kansas City Current locker room,” Chris Long says.
Jocelyn Monroe, the Current’s vice president of marketing, argues that the venue’s personalization can even impact on-pitch performance. She posits that playing in a stadium filled with your logo, your colors and your gear everywhere in sight, from the locker room to the exterior of the stadium might give the Current players an added incentive to perform well on their home turf.
“To be a part of that and have our athletes be able to walk into a building and know that this building was designed with you in mind is absolutely amazing,” Monroe says. “I hope they go out, not that I think they wouldn’t give their all if we were in another shared space, but there’s that little extra like ‘This is my house. I have to really and truly play to protect my house.’”
These “firsts” led by the KC Current and CPKC Stadium influenced other NWSL teams and owners to tour the stadium this year to see the developments firsthand. And now fans from all around the country will have a chance to experience the magic from CPKC Stadium on Saturday when Kansas City hosts the NWSL Championship game. Soccer fans from all over will see what it’s like to have a women’s team at the forefront of a sports venue, even though the Current won’t be playing in the game.
“What we are doing can’t be unseen. Because it can’t be unseen, people are seeing what is possible,” Jamison says. “To be able to have that platform to again showcase what it means to invest in women’s sports and have our own stadium and be able to host events like this, to me it’s just the beginning. We are thrilled that we are here for the NWSL Championship.”
This is unreal 🤯@thekccurrent revealed plans today for an $800 MILLION mixed-use development right next to CPKC Stadium on the river - and it looks amazing.
— ⚽️ Kyle Sheldon (@kylesheldon) April 23, 2024
That club is changing the game right before our eyes. pic.twitter.com/yK9LXAu2VH
CPKC Stadium will be thrust onto a global stage Saturday, and the Longs think bringing fans and players physically to the stadium, along with fans watching from home, will give the public a new perspective on sports venues and how important they can be to a women’s sports team. They believe more NWSL teams, and other women’s sports teams, will soon adopt the path they’ve created in building a state-of-the-art stadium.
“I think along with one of the reasons it won’t be the last is because you can’t unsee what we’ve done and the impact it has,” Angie Long says. “Once players have been in that environment, they understand what a top-class environment is like and they feel they should have it. And, same with fans. Once you get to that level, everyone goes ‘Well, of course you’re supposed to be here in this room, in this conversation and not relegated to an inferior stadium or second or third on the list of who gets to dictate their calendar and their schedule.’”
”The moment you raise the bar and show the world it’s possible and it’s tangible and they see it, you have to then react, otherwise you will not be competitive in a ‘go for it’ environment,” Chris Long adds. “That changes the dynamic in women’s sports super quickly because now it’s been done. There’s the model, you’ve got to now emulate it.”
The domino effect begins now.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Current’s CPKC Stadium Takes Center Stage at NWSL Championship.
