SYRACUSE — The Women’s Athletic Network, a new division of Women TIES, LLC, promotes athletic events for women entrepreneurs to “participate in, train for, or support as spectators.”

That’s according to the website for Women TIES.

Women TIES is a company that works to support and promote New York women entrepreneurs and advance their financial position, says Tracy Higginbotham, president of Women TIES.

Higginbotham operates Women TIES from her home in Camillus, she says. She started the business in 2005.

She launched the Women’s Athletic Network in January 2014. She got the idea for the new division while attending a Women TIES networking event in Albany in late 2013.

About 80 women divided up into their different interest areas as a way to demonstrate how social-media marketing could work.

“When we talked about athletics, 80 percent of the women in that room raised their hand and went to the corner of the room that talked about athletics and fitness,” she says. 

Higginbotham recalls thinking that she just wasn’t aware that so many women entrepreneurs participated in athletic events, such as 5K running races, or even participated in yoga classes.

“It was really an A-ha moment for me,” she adds.

Higginbotham then began to wonder about how she could get women together outside of general business hours to meet each other and “create stronger economic ties.”

“Just like men have been doing on the golf course for years,” she notes.

Besides the visual from the Albany networking event, Higginbotham was also getting accustomed to her role as an “empty nester” with her sons having moved away.

“I used to watch my sons play West [Genesee] lacrosse,” she says. 

Now, she was looking for something to fill her “extra” time with athletic and fitness activities that related to her business activity. 

Higginbotham didn’t see any organization in Central New York providing such opportunities for female entrepreneurs with an interest in athletics, so she decided to create the new division.

Carrier Dome event

One of Higginbotham’s goals for the Women’s Athletic Network is to have female entrepreneurs support more women’s athletic events.

The organization sponsored the professional women’s networking night at the Carrier Dome for the Syracuse University (SU) women’s basketball matchup with North Carolina on Feb. 5.

SU had contacted Higginbotham after having heard about the Women’s Athletic Network. 

“They’re trying to get more people in the stands watching women’s games,” she says. 

The SU women’s team defeated 13th ranked North Carolina, 61-56, before a crowd of less than 600 people in the Carrier Dome. 

“It’s crazy that women’s basketball, women’s sports don’t get as much coverage as men’s,” she says.

About 40 people attended the event, including female students from the Martin J. Whitman School of Management, local female entrepreneurs, and a group of women entrepreneurs from Rochester.

The group gathered before the game in the Carrier Dome’s Club 44 for networking and for remarks from Renee Baumgartner, SU deputy athletics director and chief of staff.

In addition to supporting women’s athletic events, the website for the Women’s Athletic Network also posts monthly athletic-related podcasts and lists upcoming events, including a yoga workshop on Feb. 28 and Paige’s Butterfly Run, a 5K race set for June 6.