Soccer Wps

If more than just a few diehards and pony-tailed hooligans paid close attention to women's soccer, Christie Rampone's story would have been considered Hollywood-worthy the moment she lifted the first Women's Professional Soccer championship trophy a few miles to the south at the Home Depot Center.

Her team, the unfortunately named Sky Blue FC (they play in central New Jersey and wear orange), was in last place and in crisis following the May dismissal of coach and GM Ian Sawyers. His replacement, assistant Kelly Lindsey, resigned two months later. So defender Rampone took over as player-coach, hoping to muster the experience earned in three Women's World Cups and three Olympics in an attempt to keep the franchise from imploding.

But then again, women's soccer didn't exactly thrive when launch conditions were ideal. With the U.S. national team and players like Mia Hamm, Brandi Chastain and Julie Foudy at the height of their popularity following the 1999 Women's World Cup and 2000 Olympics, the Women's United Soccer Association nevertheless spent itself into oblivion after just three seasons, failing to attract either the large crowds it expected or consistent television viewership.

For the next four years, former Yahoo! executive (and Foudy's former Stanford teammate) Tonya Antonucci worked quietly but diligently to reestablish the women's pro game in the U.S. The result is Women's Professional Soccer, a modest, seven-team outfit whose playoffs begin Saturday outside Washington, D.C.. Antonucci recently chatted at length with Fanhouse about the ups and downs of the league's first season and its future. The conversation is after the jump:

Here's some sad news for male fans of Boston Breakers defender Heather Mitts (who once won the coveted title of ESPN.com's "Hottest Female Athlete"). She's off the market, fellas.

Mitts revealed to the Boston Globe Thursday that Philadelphia Eagles backup quarterback A.J. Feeley popped the question to her last Christmas.

For fans of the U.S. women's national soccer team, Abby Wambach doesn't need any introduction. The 28-year-old forward from Rochester, N.Y., has scored an astounding 99 goals in 126 international games.

Wambach will also be one of the marquee faces as Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) kicks off its inaugural season this weekend, six years after the previous women's pro league in America, the WUSA, folded in 2003. Earlier this week, Wambach took time out of her busy training schedule -- she's still recovering from a broken leg suffered before last summer's Beijing Olympics -- to talk to FanHouse about the WPS on the eve of its curtain raiser.

The full interview is after the jump.