South Carolina’s 87-75 victory over Caitlin Clark and Iowa in the women’s NCAA championship game has achieved a pair of milestones.

It is the first time the women’s title game outdrew the men. It also was the second most-watched non-Olympic women’s sporting event on U.S. TV.

The Sunday afternoon game averaged 18.9 million viewers on ABC and ESPN while UConn’s 75-60 victory over Purdue in Monday night’s men’s final on TBS and TNT averaged 14.82 million.

The audience for Sunday’s game — where the Gamecocks capped an undefeated season by winning their fourth national title and denied Clark’s Hawkeyes their first — peaked at 24.1 million during the final 15 minutes. The 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup final between the U.S. and Japan averaged 25.4 million on Fox. That also was on a Sunday and in prime time on the East Coast.

“You’re seeing the growth in many places: attendance records, viewership and social media engagement surrounding March Madness,” UCLA coach Cori Close said. “I don’t think you can attribute it just to Iowa, though. A rising tide lifts all boats.”

Nielsen’s numbers include an estimate of the number of people who watched outside their homes, which wasn’t measured before 2020. Due to cord-cutting, the in-home audience has steadily declined annually.

The audience for the national title game was up 90% over last year when Clark and Iowa fell to LSU. That also was the first time since ’95 that the championship was on network TV. The audience was 289% bigger than the viewership for the Gamecocks’ title two years ago when they beat UConn on ESPN.