Built for Her: Funding, Designing & Constructing Women’s Sports Venues

Wednesday, January 24 | 12:30 PM ET

Built for Her: Funding, Designing & Constructing Women’s Sports Venues

What we will cover:

A look at the year that was and the year that will be in construction of sports venues designed specifically for women’s sports, including:

• Funding strategies and challenges
• Architectural design strategies and challenges
• The unique opportunities for women-focused sports facilities, from community engagement to sponsorship activations

Who should attend:

• Representatives from sports teams and leagues
• Architecture and design firms
• Companies involved in the construction of large-scale facilities, including sports and entertainment facilities
• Technology companies involved in sports facilities
• Real estate firms and consultancies, and banks and other financial entities involved in funding sports facilities or interested in learning more

Featured speakers (Additional to be announced)

Jennifer Epstein is the Controlling Partner of Boston Unity Soccer Partners, LLC. She was born and raised in Boston and has spent her life an avid sports fan of her home teams. The Epstein family have been co-owners and managing partners of the Boston Celtics basketball franchise since 2002. As an owner of the team, Epstein has seen first-hand how sports fuel the excitement, energy and passion of a city, as well as how it can be a powerful vehicle for positive community impact.

Believing in the power of woman-led, diverse leadership teams to drive greater returns, Epstein founded Juno Equity in 2018. Her firm champions opportunities for women, addressing the gender-weighted venture capital funding gap and making seed round investments in female founded companies, predominantly in the consumer, tech and sports industries. She is also a co-founder of Wildlife Hospitality, the creator of three award-winning restaurant concepts in the Boston area. Epstein has invested in her family’s real estate company The Abbey Group’s development projects for over 20 years and continues to act as a major shareholder in its current developments. Epstein holds a BA from University of Pennsylvania and a JD from Boston College.

Nikki Fargas was hired as the Las Vegas Ace's president on May 11, 2021, and she was quoted as saying “We are going to do everything in our power to make our front office the best in the business, and provide our players with all the tools they need to bring a championship to Las Vegas.” 

Mission accomplished! 

Under Fargas’ leadership the Las Vegas Aces won the WNBA Championship in 2022—the first title in franchise history, as well as the first major professional sports championship in Las Vegas’ history. For an encore the following year, they became the first WNBA team in more than two decades to repeat as champions. 

Several high-profile front office additions helped the Aces reach the top of the mountain, but none was bigger than the hiring of Becky Hammon as the team’s head coach on December 31, 2021. The 16-year pro and Aces franchise alumna was named WNBA Coach of the Year in 2022 while leading Las Vegas to the best record in the league in each of the last two seasons. 

The Aces not only have back-to-back championships on their résumé, but they led the WNBA in attendance in 2023. Over the past two years, they have recorded their top 10 attendance figures since moving to Las Vegas, including a sell-out (17,406) of T-Mobile Arena on September 10, 2023. 

In April of 2023 the Aces moved into their brand-new home—a 64,000 square foot, practice facility and team headquarters located next door to the Raiders Headquarters and Intermountain Health Performance Center in Henderson, Nevada. 

This marks the first time in the 28-year history of the WNBA that a facility of this kind has been built solely for use by a WNBA team. 

Prior to joining the Aces, Fargas served as the head coach of the LSU and UCLA Women’s Basketball teams, compiling an overall record of 249-155, including seven 20-win seasons and eight NCAA Tournament appearances. 

The Oak Ridge, Tennessee native got her start in coaching in 1998 as an assistant with her alma mater, the Tennessee Lady Vols, working alongside the legendary Pat Summitt as a graduate assistant that year, before joining Debbie Ryan’s staff at Virginia as a full-time assistant. Summitt brought her back to Knoxville in 2002, where Fargas was a part of two NCAA Championship Teams in 2007 and 2008. 

Fargas was known as a tenacious defender and a tremendous three-point threat during her playing career as she helped the Lady Vols to a 118-13 record while winning the 1991 NCAA Championship. 

Ginny Gilder is the managing member of Force 10 Enterprises, which owns Force 10 Hoops; the Storm; Force 10 Sports Management, which provides marketing and management expertise to sports organizations; and Force 10 Performance, an affordable multi-sport training center for all athletes and abilities.

Early in her business career, Gilder established Washington Works, a local non-profit dedicated to assisting welfare recipients to obtain and retain livable-wage employment, and served as its first Executive Director.

A rower, Gilder earned four varsity letters at Yale University, and was an All-Ivy Champion three times. As a freshman, she helped usher in the post-Title IX era at Yale by participating in the now-famous women’s crew strip-in protesting the lack of equal facilities. Gilder represented the United States on four national teams, including two Olympic teams. She was named to the U.S. team which boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games and won a silver medal as the stroke of the women’s quadruples sculls with coxswain at the LA Olympic Games in 1984. She also has two World Championship medals including a 1983 bronze.

Gilder has since helped launch community rowing programs in Boston, Mass., and Derby, Conn. She received an NCAA Silver Anniversary Award for community service in 2004. She is also the recipient of the 2015 US Rowing Association Jack Kelly Award and the 2015 Yale University George H.W. Bush ’48 Lifetime of Leadership Award. The author of the memoir, Course Correction: A Story of Rowing and Resilience in the Wake of Title IX, Ginny is also a mother of three children, step-mother of two, and grandmother of two. Ginny lives with her wife, Lynn, and their two poodles in Seattle.

Registration is free. All registrants will receive a link to watch the recording once the session concludes.

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