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The Caitlin Clark effect: Indiana Fever led WNBA searches in 42 states

The WNBA and NWSL are both toward the business end of their respective seasons.

In the WNBA, the Atlanta Dream and Golden State Valkyries are facing off in the best-of-seven Finals. In the NWSL, the regular season is winding down, with Decision Day slated for Nov. 1.

With both leagues at key decision points, USA TODAY wanted to know which teams are the most popular in every state. We used historical Google Trends data, which allowed us to track the search interest for teams across every state.

Because both leagues are dealing with expansion, we only looked back at the last year of data. While it’s not a one-to-one representation of popularity within each state, search data does provide one indicator because it tracks which teams fans most frequently Google.

The two maps are starkly different: In the WNBA, Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever wound up as the most frequently searched team in 42 different states. The NWSL, meanwhile, saw 14 of its 16 clubs lead at least one state.

USA TODAY also investigated PWHL data. However, that league only had four U.S.-based teams during the 2025-26 season, and several states lacked enough search data to have a most popular team. As such, we decided against drawing up a PWHL map.

Most-searched WNBA teams by state

In total, nine different WNBA teams ranked as the No. 1 most searched team in a state over the past 12 months. However, much of the map is dominated by the Fever, which, as mentioned above, led 42 different states.

Here’s the full map:

The most-searched WNBA team in each state, 2025–26

Most-searched NWSL teams by state

The NWSL is more geographically varied, with nearly the entire league ranked atop at least one state. The only two clubs that didn’t? Bay FC and the San Diego Wave, which lost California to Angel City.

Every state with a single NWSL club ranked that club No. 1 in searches.

Here’s the full NWSL map:

The most-searched NWSL team in each state, 2025–26

Which teams have the widest reach?

When it comes to cross-state dominance, 10 different teams ranked No. 1 across multiple states.

None more so than the Fever’s 42-state dominance. In fact, Indiana is the only WNBA team to rank atop multiple states.

The other nine multi-state leaders include the Washington Spirit – who have a superstar of their own in Trinity Rodman – and the Kansas City Current, led by single-season assist-record holder Croix Bethune.

WNBA and NWSL teams leading Google searches in multiple states, 2025–26

Which WNBA and NWSL teams lead in your state?

Curious how the two leagues vary across the same states? Use the interactive map below to switch between the WNBA and NWSL, then tap or hover over a state to see which team leads in search volume.

The rankings were calculated separately for each league.

Most-searched WNBA and NWSL teams by state

Below is the most-searched team in every state for both leagues. We've listed the WNBA team first, followed by the NWSL club.

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