Women's Sports Bar Coming to Clark Street Near Wrigley

A former Northwestern University basketball player plans to open Chicago’s newest women’s sports bar just blocks from Wrigley Field, marking another sign of recovery for a stretch of Clark Street hit hard by pandemic closures and CTA construction.

Level Sporting Club will occupy 3343 N. Clark St. in Lakeview, where founder and CEO Clarissa Flores aims to make women’s athletics the main attraction rather than an afterthought.

“Women’s sports will be the default,” Flores said. “For decades, women’s sports have been treated as secondary, something you have to ask for. We’re challenging that norm and making it the priority.”

Flores, a Chicago native and Whitney Young High School alumna, played basketball at Northwestern before competing overseas and for the Puerto Rican national team. She later built her hospitality resume opening Concord Hall in Logan Square and serving as director of operations for Lodge Management Group and Tao Chicago.

The sports bar represents Flores’ most personal project after years in Chicago’s nightlife scene.

“My whole life and career are indebted to the game,” she said. “When I saw what was happening with women’s sports — the momentum, the record-breaking attendance, the investment — I knew I wouldn’t be doing the game justice if I didn’t build something like this.”

Level Sporting Club will feature craft cocktails, elevated bar food and community-focused programs. While Chicago’s men’s teams will still appear on screens, women’s athletics takes priority.

“We’re a block and a half from Wrigley Field,” Flores said. “We’ll have the big games on here, but the focus will be on women’s sports.”

The ownership group includes former athletes and sports industry veterans, including Jennifer King, the first Black woman to hold a full-time NFL assistant coaching position, and Ashleen Bracey, head coach of UIC’s women’s basketball team. Retired professional basketball player Janae Smith and several former collegiate athletes working in finance, real estate and business leadership also invested.

“Athletes just get it done,” Flores said. “We work as teams. Every role matters. That mentality shapes how this place is being built.”

Amanda Barnes, executive chef at Le Colonial in the Gold Coast, will lead the kitchen with elevated bar fare. The main bar upstairs will host games, DJ sets and events, while a candlelit downstairs lounge called Next Level will operate weekends as a late-night cocktail destination.

Level joins Babe’s Sports Bar, which opened this fall in Logan Square and has drawn crowds for women’s sports programming.

“This is a market that’s been underserved,” Flores said. “When you give women’s sports access and visibility, the demand is there.”

The Clark Street location adds to signs of recovery for the area around Clark and Roscoe, where several longtime businesses closed during the CTA’s Red and Purple Line Modernization project. Restaurants, cafes and bars have begun filling vacant storefronts over the past year.

Flores said the location choice felt intentional beyond its proximity to Wrigleyville.

“Sports bars are institutions in this city,” she said. “To open something new, something inclusive, something that reflects where sports culture is going — that matters.”

Level Sporting Club expects to open in late April or early May, with renovations currently underway. The timing positions the bar ahead of the WNBA All-Star Game coming to Chicago in 2026.

“To finally do something that’s mine, and to see the support already coming in, it’s overwhelming in the best way,” Flores said. “This is about giving women’s sports the space they’ve always deserved.”