- We were trying to establish the team in the '90s as kind of the first group coming through, and we started having more success, we won that first World Cup, we won the Olympics.

You know, we're gonna be hosting the first World Cup in the United States.

What we quickly realized is nothing was changing in terms of the support for us.

Like, we were literally still making $10 a day.

That was our per diem.

- Oh, my... - $10 a day.

- $10 a day?

- Yes, with really no external income outside of that.

You know, we kept nudging like, hey, yo, we can't survive on this.

We're no longer in college, like, we need to either go work, which means stop playing, or you need to start paying us more.

So we're getting more frustrated and more frustrated each year.

- [Billie] The United States hosted its first Women's World Cup in 1999.

It was the summer that changed everything for soccer in America.

The three-week-long tournament packed stadiums with newly passionate soccer fans and captivated the nation with record television ratings.

(soft music) - [Julie] I think the thing that made '99 so remarkable is that no one expected packed stadiums, 40 million people watching on TV.

They just didn't expect that.

Because everyone said, Do it in small stadiums... - Mm-hmm.

- Make sure-- maybe you just want to do it on the East Coast, you know, make it regional.

But it was a World Cup, and a World Cup is like an Olympics.

It's like, no... - Yeah.

- Why would we go small?

Let's go big.

Let's do big stadiums, national footprint.

And everyone thought we were crazy, and we ended up crushing it.

(upbeat music) The final of the 1999 Women's World Cup ends in penalties, of course.

Brandi Chastain, she's the fifth kicker.

If she makes it, the United States wins.

And she doesn't just make it -- make it -- she side-nets it.

Beautiful kick... (crowd cheering) And then, she rips off her jersey.

Flexes, sports bra, front page of every magazine across the nation.

You may remember the iconic photo.

And we won the World Cup at home in front of a lot of people watching on TV and a packed Rose Bowl stadium, and it was really cool.

And that's when soccer just... - That's insane.

- It was really the first time that people go, "Oh, this is the potential for women's sports."

There was that glimpse in '99 where we were like, oh, my gosh, this is the potential... - It had the potential, yeah.

- This is what it should be.

- [Billie] The team won that World Cup in epic fashion.

The iconic photo of Brandi Chastain did spark some controversy.

Although men have been ripping off their shirts in celebration of wins for decades, some were in an uproar over Chastain's actions, revealing that double standards for men and women were alive and well.

But despite that criticism, the World Cup win was definitive proof that women's soccer was a successful commercial enterprise.

It was the leverage this team had been waiting for.