3XBA collabs with Rough & Tumble as sports leagues explore women’s sports bar partnerships

The GIST: Last week, 3XBA — a professional touring FIBA 3x3 women’s basketball league — announced a unique partnership with Seattle’s Rough & Tumble Pub, the second-ever women’s sports bar. Through their new agreement, the two entities will promote one another through activations at live events.

• The deal illustrates a trend of how brands — including women’s sports leagues — are looking to activate around local women’s sports bars to reach avid fans directly. Buzzworthy.

The details: The collab began with Rough & Tumble’s presence at Spokane Hoopfest, the world’s largest outdoor 3x3 tournament that featured a 3XBA pro tournament. As 3XBA tours, the sports bar will promote the league through storytelling, event promotion, and engagement with fans.

• Before this partnership tipped off, the two entities also worked together in March to support women’s and youth sports in Spokane, Washington.

The landscape: While the concept of a women’s sports bar has been around since 2022, brands have only begun to explore how to monetize it in the past year. VC firms are investing in nationwide franchising, Togethxr created an informational hub to document the movement, and sponsors are embracing the sports bar ethos with sponsored watch parties, trivia nights, and even DJ sets.

• While sponsors are getting creative in reaching fans, it seems like a layup for sports leagues to partner directly with bars to ensure their content is shown. For example, AUSL is the first pro women’s sports league to secure a formal partnership with women’s sports bars through its Women’s Sports Bar Alliance.

Lingering questions: It makes sense for smaller leagues looking to get footing — like 3XBA, AUSL, and Unrivaled — to look at these bars as an authentic and organic way of reaching fans. But when will bigger sports leagues like the WNBA and NWSL harness the power of these gathering places beyond informal watch parties?

• Maybe they’re waiting to see which ones they should partner with — despite the rise, not all are guaranteed to survive. Still, there’s a general increase in demand for women’s sports across the country, so leagues and teams should take a proactive approach, especially in markets that lack pro women’s sports teams. It’s a movement, not a moment.