Peoria’s pre-professional soccer club adds a women’s team to their brand next year.
Peoria City Soccer president and managing partner Jim DeRose made the announcement Thursday. The team will play under the Peoria City name in the Women’s Premier Soccer League (WPSL).
The WPSL is the longest-running women’s soccer league in the U.S., with more than 140 teams across the country. DeRose says the league is primarily composed of players under 23 years old, although teams are allowed to have older players.
“Our goal first is getting out, getting the women in the program identified, getting them out to our community,” said DeRose. “Then from there, it’ll be to get on the field and hopefully put out a competitive side that will compete.”
Rose says coaching, staffing and schedule decisions will be announced in early 2025. Though the WPSL is structured very similarly to the men’s USL2, DeRose says the women’s team will have a slightly shorter season. He anticipates four to five home games next summer.
The women’s team will also play at Bradley University’s Shea Stadium.
“We’d love to see, at some point, from the youth level perhaps, young people graduating into playing for these teams,” said DeRose. “And we’d like to see some of the other ways we can move outside of soccer and into other events.”
The Peoria City Soccer men’s club started in 2020, though competition was delayed by two years due to the pandemic. In three seasons, Peoria City qualified for postseason playoffs twice.
