Fresh off a $100 million raise, Paul Rabil takes pro lacrosse to the basketball courts of Venice Beach
Rabil, who has previously shared his leadership playbook with Fortune, sat down with us to discuss the Street Lacrosse Pro Tour and the sport’s state in the run-up to the Olympics.
Key points
- stop, on the basketball courts at Venice Beach, with a festival vibe and a 5-on-5 format that looks more like street basketball or hockey than the field game.
- We have a major media deal with ESPN, they’ve invested in our league [in the Series E round], and we have title sponsors across the major categories that never touched lacrosse in the past.
- In June, the league closed a $100 million Series E led by Ares and Joe Tsai, with ESPN taking a minority equity stake.
Paul Rabil, widely regarded as one of the best players in the sport’s history, co-founded the PLL and its sister circuit, the Women’s Lacrosse League (WLL).
Additional details
- That was always around and available for basketball, but a sport like lacrosse, that’s not always available to you.
- Street lacrosse as a pickup-game pipeline Fortune: Lacrosse has grown quickly this century, well beyond its traditional hotbeds in New England and along the East Coast.
- Rabil: We’re in a territory where professional lacrosse has never been, and that’s exciting.
- So street lacrosse was born—basically playing a version of lacrosse on a basketball court.
- Since 2000, the number of NCAA lacrosse programs has more than doubled to 917, while high school participation has increased by more than 353%.
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