Third time’s the charm: the story of women’s soccer in the Bay Area

Cyberrays, FC Gold Pride, and now Bay FC. It has taken 10 years to bring a women’s professional soccer team back to the Bay Area, but on Saturday March 30, 2024, Bay FC opened a new chapter at PayPal Park.

In front of a sold out crowd of 18,000, Bay FC played their inaugural home match. Starting the season with two road games, it was the team’s third official game, but first on Bay Area soil. To understand the full weight behind those words, we have to go back in time to where so much of women’s soccer in the United States began: 1999.

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In 2001, following the success of the 1999 World Cup, the first ever Women’s Professional Soccer League in the United States began, the WUSA. The San Jose Cyberrays were the Bay Area team and featured stars like Brandi Chastain. Chastain would have a full circle night on Saturday, as one of the four founding members of Bay FC, she was instrumental in bringing Professional Women’s Soccer back to the Bay Area.

After just three seasons, the Cyberrays and the WUSA folded. It would be another six years before the next Women’s Professional League popped up. In 2009, the Women’s Professional Soccer league (WPS) launched and FC Gold Pride replaced the Cyberrays as the new women’s professional team in the Bay Area.

FC Gold Pride was coached by Albertin Montoya. Fourteen years later, Montoya found himself on the sideline in PayPal Park as the Head Coach for Bay FC.

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FC Gold Pride’s run was even shorter than the Cyberrays. Despite featuring players such as Shannon Boxx, Christine Sinclair, Kelley O’Hara, and Ali Riley, after two seasons, the team folded.

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Finally, twenty-three years after the Cyberrays were founded, Bay FC kicked off their first ever professional match on Bay Area soil. The game itself had everything that the crowd could have asked for, with the exception of a win for Bay FC. Bay FC took the lead in the first half and appeared to be dominating, only for chaos to break out in the second half. Even by NWSL standards, where fans have affectionately coined the term “NWSL after dark” in reference to the chaos that somehow inevitably ensues nighttime matches, this was chaotic. Four goals were tallied in the second half including two injury time goals, but in the end Houston prevailed with the 3-2 victory.

The result, however, won’t be the first point of discussion for fans on the ride home from the game. It was clear that everyone in PayPal Park knew something special was happening that night, and it had nothing to do with wins or losses.

“It felt like a win before the game, during the game, because of the fans. 18,000 plus, I haven’t seen that in the Bay Area ever,” said head coach Albertin Montoya in the post-game press conference.

Montoya mentioned his days coaching FC Gold Pride in the WPS, and commented, “I think probably we had 2,000 maybe 3,000 fans,” for the inaugural match. Now, over ten years later, Montoya coached Bay FC in their home debut in front of a sold out stadium.

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There was an electricity in the air, a palpable tension and excitement. Fans lined up for over half a mile to get into the stadium over two hours before kickoff, and even hours before the gates opened. The lines got so long that the stadium was forced to open the gates a few minutes early. It felt as though all of the years of waiting had culminated in one night. An explosion of joy and celebration for Bay Area women’s professional soccer. The songs played in the stadium were the soundtrack to local’s lives including local legends like E-40 and Mac Dre’s anthems. It wasn’t just a celebration of women’s soccer, it was a celebration that the Bay Area was back on the scene in professional women’s soccer.

Adults at the stadium on Saturday had grown up rooting for the Cyberrays and watched them fold; they’d seen FC Gold Pride and had faith that maybe this second league would work, but watched them fold too. Now, with Bay FC playing in San Jose, perhaps the third time in the charm. If you ask me, though, luck isn’t needed. It’s not a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention that this is the moment Professional Women’s Soccer is taking off. Children of the 1990s saw the USWNT play in sold out stadiums, they watched the WUSA and WPS, and now they are all grown up.

The third time is certainly the charm, and professional women’s soccer in the Bay Area is here to stay.