USA - InstagramSoccer and streaming seem to go well together.

ESPN announced today that Sunday’s thrilling roller-coaster World Cup match between the U.S. and Portugal set a new record with 1.37 million viewers who streamed the event online via WatchESPN.

That broke a record which was previously set just nine days earlier, when 1.1 million viewers streamed the opening match of the World Cup between Brazil and Croatia.

Streaming aside, the U.S. vs. Portugal match was also the most-watched soccer match ever in the U.S., drawing in 18.2 million viewers to ESPN’s telecast. Not counting NFL and college football games, the match was ESPN’s most-viewed program ever.

ESPN is streaming all 64 matches at WatchESPN.com and via the WatchESPN mobile apps (AndroidiOSWindows 8Kindle FireFire TV,ChromecastRokuXbox OneXbox 360). You’ll need a cable subscription that includes ESPN from one of these providers to access the ESPN feeds.

The WatchESPN records signify a pattern of more and more people opting to stream live sporting events. The Super Bowl this year was most-watched live stream of a single sports event in history with an average of 528,000 viewers accessing FOX’s free stream of the game.

However, there are still existing issues with streaming a live sports event versus watching through cable. For example, we watched the U.S. vs. Portugal match with the WatchESPN app on our Amazon Fire TV and noticed some big delays. Our neighbors, who were watching on their TV, would scream when the Americans scored — and we’d finally see the play two minutes later on our screen because of the streaming delay.

Editor’s note: Love soccer? Make sure to join the fun in the GeekWire World Cup Challenge.

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