Amid one women’s soccer league folding and frustration over the direction of another, the United Women’s Soccer league formed in 2015. A Second Division women’s league, it was created to address the gap in player development from college to the professional leagues.

Starting with only a few teams, the UWS now has twenty four clubs and has grown into a strong women’s soccer league. Live streaming every match through their website, their teams span from coast to coast. In their mission to develop female soccer players, they have sent over 70 athletes to professional leagues around the world in just the last two years.

Acting league commissioner Joe Ferrara Jr, took the time to talk with me about the UWS, its mission and how he believes the league pushes women’s soccer even higher.

- Megan Cleary

To start off, we know the UWS and other Tier 2 leagues really don’t get that much coverage, so a lot of people might not know who you are. I’d love just a brief introduction into you, how you ended up being head of this league and your background in soccer.

I originally started off as a franchise owner in 1999 of a W-League team and then I had become associate commissioner in the WPSL and brought the team over there. I served as associate commissioner for several years. Then in 2016, with a couple of other owners from the defunct W-league and some disenchanted owners from the WPSL, we decided to create the UWS.

Did you yourself play soccer in the past?

Yes. I played in various amateur leagues here and just played semi-professional here in Lobo, Massachusetts out of Lusitano Stadium, so I’ve been involved in the game from high school to college to adult.

Looking at the past I know that there was a little bit of a fall out between you and the WPSL? Is that correct?

Correct, now I wouldn’t really term it as a fall out, you know Jerry Zanelli was my mentor. He was the one that first brought me into the WPSL and we worked hand and hand together. I have tremendous respect for what he did for women’s soccer and the league. So it was really more of a philosophical difference.

Jerry was content with being the largest women’s league and bringing in teams. Geographically made lots of sense but the quality for us, my team in general and others, we want our teams at a “professional level” - quote unquote. So we do all the fan care, with building fan attendance and standards and building media attention. It was difficult for us when we were in a division with four other area Boston teams. It was difficult to market. The level of competition of many of the teams was poor and we’re winning games eight, nine, nothing and it was just not akin to what we were trying to accomplish with our franchise, so it was just really a different philosophy.

By no means saying there are no capable teams in the WPSL, but that variance in level was hurting us locally. We just felt this direction would raise women’s standards and organizations that want to operate a franchise like this, it was a better way to go for us. I wouldn’t really characterize it as a falling out, just a different philosophy that Jerry and I had.

One of the things that was mentioned, as far as differences between the WPSL and UWS, was that the WPSL can offer prize money and other incentives to be a part of it. What sets the UWS apart from the other second division leagues?

First and foremost, one of the issues that I had when I left the WPSL was that our team was pretty consistently in the playoff picture but we were never really given a subsidy to travel. That put a major hit on our travel budget. Every other season, or every two out of three years, it’s a big expense. So our founding principle, when we started, was to first and foremost ensure there was a sizeable subsidy for our playoff teams. All of our teams, through our [league] history who have legitimately qualified for their playoff position, have been able to go and attend and make the playoffs, which was not the case in the WPSL. It was basically the teams who could afford to go, who basically ended up being the representatives.

We just felt that was a poor look. It penalized teams for having a good product on the field. That was one of the major focuses that we wanted to have, was to make sure those monies were there for the teams who were going all the way.

If I’m doing the math right there are 23 teams in the UWS?

Yes, currently.

That is huge. Where are you pulling from? Where are these athletes coming from?

The athletes are actually far-reaching. The majority I would say are division one college players, you know, current student athletes. We have several post collegiate and former professionals, a great deal of internationals and some tremendous high school players.

What’s been great with our league, in the last two offseason alone, I’ve processed over 75 international clearances for players in the UWS to go overseas and play-up in various professional leagues in other countries. Some of them come back and return to us during our season. We’ve been hitting it pretty hard globally and we’ve had tremendous success in being able to place players in the professional leagues. And you know here and there some really high caliber high school players, but for the most part, division one college players, post collegiate players and international is our pool.

Does that limit your season, since they are coming from college? Is it may to August?

Current model, yes.

Division 1 college players aren’t allowed to join us until May 1st, and depending on the institution, we could have players stretching it to the end of the July. So it’s a short season. We have been discussing in-house what we can do to make a longer season. Now obviously, under current NCAA rules, that would forgo some teams utilizing collegiate players but that’s the model we’re in right now.

What makes you the most excited about this upcoming season? What are you looking forward to? What changes are you potentially making for the UWS?

The level of competition is what’s been exciting, along with the crowds that some of our teams have been getting. Austin played out of Bold stadium and they had over 1,200 people there. The new England Mutiny had a 1000 people at their opener. The national championship had nearly a 1000 fans in Calgary. The LA Galaxy are always the league leaders in attendance, they are in a tremendous facility out in Orange County. Our championship in Grand Rapids two years ago had nearly 2,000 spectators. That’s really the exciting part.

We just accepted Detroit City in the league. They’re one of the preeminent organizations on the men’s side out there and we fully expect them to have their women’s side with the same type of electricity in their stadium and fanfare. We’re excited to have them on board. That’s what truly exciting about the league, not only our main standard of operation, but having an organization that has fans in the seats as well and showcases women’s soccer.

There really is limited coverage when it comes to Tier 2 women’s soccer; in what ways would you like to see that change?

It’s something I’ve really had to deal with for over 20 years, not only my own franchise but in various leagues. We’re out there asking for coverage, looking for coverage, it’s why interviews like we’re having right now are tremendous to get the word out. Anything we can do to be media friendly as a league we’re always accessible. I’ve seen the challenges over the years between layoffs and print media cuts and all that, so I get it, I understand it. It’s rare that resources from some media outlets are used to cover second division women’s soccer in general, but whatever we can do to make it as easy as possible to get the word out is what we’ve tried to accomplish.

Do you have a relationship with US Soccer?

US Soccer provides us sanctioning. We have all the insurances and have the ability to play international games, register professional players and have our Canadian teams sanctioned through them. So, we have a working relationship with US Soccer. Obviously, I’d like to see more matters accomplished, whether that’s more funds allocated to second division or a different tier, but those conversations are ongoing.

Do they provide any marketing assistance or is that all pretty much you?

No they do not, pretty much the league operates part and parcel. They affiliate with US Soccer, but it’s really incumbent on them to how they want to operate and how they market themselves.

Do you have a relationship with the NWSL since some collegiate athletes and some semi-professionals might be coming from them?

Yes we know all the teams and communicate with them regularly for players. We have affiliate teams, “reserve teams” - quote unquote, so there is a relationship there in each individual market. We have been able to accomplish anything on a league-wide basis. Hopefully, the time will come but they’re still trying to gain a solid footing as well. But the communication there has always been great.

I also want to ask if you have a relationship with the MLS because the LA Galaxy were the champions last year, is that correct? I wondered if that was associated with the MLS team?

It’s an affiliate. There are a few affiliates out in the southern California region. There is some synergy, but basically the teams are independent operations of each other currently. The relationships with MLS teams are basically market to market from a league standpoint.

Is there anything else that you would like the public to know about the UWS?

Well you know we are very proud of the number of professional contracts in the last two off seasons that have been signed from players in our league. I’m getting international clearance requests on a daily basis. Like I said, we’ve processed over 80 clearances in the last two years for players to go overseas. That’s been exciting, to see players being recognized. At the end of the day that’s why we do this. Most of our teams aren’t making money, so to see them promote their female players and have them promoted has been tremendous.

Which countries have they been going to?

We have them in teams in: Sweden, Germany, Mexico, Spain, England of course. Then in France, the W-League in Australia. There’s a few others here and there processed, you know just looking at the list: Portugal, Denmark, Italy, Greece, Iceland. But the majority are the more established leagues: England, Spain, Sweden, Australia.

Was there anything else that you wanted to say?

By no means do we want to be the largest league in the world. Our focus is on the quality of our organization and we’ve done a tremendous job with that. Like I said, our attendance figures are up this year once again and now we have a live streaming platform where all of our matches are livestreamed. We’re out providing a professional atmosphere for the players and developing their ability to get them moved on to higher leagues. We’re proud of what we’re doing – we’re just going to maintain course.

Where are they now?

UWS has a great track record of getting players into international leagues. At this time, 78 former UWS players are playing professionally around the world in other leagues.

Livestreams of all United Women’s Soccer League games can be found at https://www.uwssoccer.com/home.

Editor’s Note: The introduction contained some inaccurate information about the UWS. It has been corrected.