Tag: Kansas City Current

What are my NWSL team’s playoff chances? Your guide to the stretch run

We stared at the NWSL standings for 10 hours so you don’t have to

The NWSL is officially in the home stretch, with the season down to its final three weekends. Most teams have just four games left to play, and we have an incredible five teams all within two points of one another at the top of the table, along with a potentially wild race for the last playoff spot.

Here, then, is Pro Soccer Wire‘s breakdown of every team’s situation heading into these final, critical games of the season.

Mal Pugh scores two wonder goals vs. KC Current, sets new land-speed record

Pugh’s solo goal has to be seen to be believed

Mal Pugh scored a potential NWSL Goal of the Year candidate on Wednesday night in a way that effectively underlined all of her best traits as a player…and then tacked on another just for emphasis.

Just minutes after the Chicago Red Stars took an early lead over the visiting Kansas City Current, with Tatumn Milazzo mopping up a loose ball resulting from Pugh’s corner kick, the U.S. women’s national team attacker received a pass out of the Chicago box.

The field dimensions at SeatGeek Stadium are listed as 120 yards by 75 yards, and based on where Pugh received the ball, she was roughly about 95 yards from the Current goal, facing the Chicago goal and with Kristen Edmonds racing over to pressure. No problem, right?

Well, it turns out, Pugh is a problem anywhere on the field. Pugh turned as she took her first touch, nutmegging Edmonds. Pugh’s vision may not be talked about as much as some other qualities, but it might be her most vital advantage over opponents. In this situation, having dispatched with Edmonds, she needed just the tiniest amount of time to scan the field and piece together that even being that far from goal, she had a huge opportunity in front of her.

The quick read of the situation was followed by something that gets talked about more when it comes to Pugh: she is fast. Pugh turned on the jets immediately, entering the Current half in a flash and leaving the scrambling defense no time to get a good angle that might force her to slow down. Desiree Scott gave it everything she had to get there, but as she was not moving at the speed of sound, it didn’t work.

Pugh bore down on Elizabeth Ball, and unfortunately for Ball, Pugh is also an elite dribbler. Ball couldn’t afford to retreat any longer and tried to challenge Pugh, but the USWNT winger notched another nutmeg without even really having to slow down.

Still, Pugh wasn’t done. Defender Taylor Leach and goalkeeper Cassie Miller both approached, driving Pugh away from goal. Still, Pugh kept her composure, moving to her left to buy space from Leach and change her angle on Miller, opening up just enough room to calmly tuck the ball into the back of the net, a nice and easy end to one of the most spectacular moments of the NWSL season.

Perhaps understandably, Pugh didn’t even break out much of a celebration, as running that far that fast is tiring. Sometimes you’ve done too much work to throw in an NWSL Celebration of the Year entrant, and when the goal looks like this, it’s not a problem.

Then, with the Current throwing numbers forward in the second half in an attempt to overcome a two-goal deficit, Pugh struck again. Ella Stevens tried to touch a long ball into Pugh’s path, but ended up having to battle two KC players after getting her pass wrong.

Stevens did just enough to prevent the Current from winning the ball back, and then out of nowhere, Pugh was off and running, again with just one defender between her and goal. Edmonds moved in, hoping to try to drive Pugh wide, but the Colorado native just dipped her shoulder to go inside before driving a low 19-yard shot past Miller to make it 3-0.

And then, before Chicago mercifully took her out of the game to spare KC any more punishment, another Pugh corner became a goal, with Amanda Kowalski nodding her service in at the back post in the 72nd minute.

The huge win was surely fun for Red Stars fans, but it’s got potentially huge implications for the NWSL playoff picture. Chicago moved up into a tie for fourth place with the Houston Dash (who they host in three days’ time), opening up a four-point gap between them and seventh-placed Angel City FC.

Enjoy Pugh’s two-goal masterclass

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Hailie Mace earns USWNT recall as injury replacement for Kelley O’Hara

The 25-year-old is back with the USWNT for the first time in nearly three years

Hailie Mace has been added to the U.S. women’s national team roster for its upcoming friendlies against Nigeria, replacing the injured Kelley O’Hara.

O’Hara was forced to withdraw from the squad due to what U.S. Soccer called a “lingering hip injury that needs some extended rest.”

Mace, 25. has earned her first USWNT call since the team’s identification training camp in December 2019. Prior to that her most recent call was the 2018 CONCACAF Women’s Championship, which served as qualifying for the 2019 World Cup.

Overall, Mace has earned three USWNT caps.

Mace is listed on the roster as a defender, though she has played mostly as a midfielder for the Kansas City Current this season. The ex-UCLA star is known for her versatility, which will increase her value to USWNT head coach Vlatko Andonovski.

The USWNT will face Nigeria on September 3 at Children’s Mercy Park in Kansas City, and then on September 6 at Audi Field in Washington, D.C.

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Lo’eau LaBonta offers up an NWSL Celebration of the Year frontrunner

We’re making up a very important award

Lo’eau LaBonta is in good form, on the soccer side and the entertainment side.

The Kansas City Current midfielder bagged a late equalizer for her side in a 1-1 draw with Angel City FC Friday night. Just moments after the visitors had taken the lead, LaBonta drew a foul in the box, and then got up to fire home the penalty kick, preserving a Current unbeaten run that is now 11 games long.

LaBonta is having a career year for Kansas City, with the goal taking her total up to five in the regular season, along with four assists, and made NWSL’s Team of the Month for August.

She also seems ready to push the league forward on the celebration front. After firing a typically powerful penalty kick into the upper corner, LaBonta gave the home fans a brief scare, feigning a glute injury before…well, let’s say she made it clear she had no such injury.

It’s equal parts twerking and Willy Wonka. Just tremendous work from LaBonta, and worthy of further consideration.

LaBonta said after the game that celebrations in women’s soccer tend to be more like what Angel City offered up when Cari Roccaro gave them the lead: the scorer raises their arms, teammates rush in for a group hug, and that’s that.

“Female soccer players tend to just all go to each other and ‘Kumbaya,’ and we love that,” LaBonta told reporters after the game. “I think we really want to start making it a little more fun and having individual celebration. So, that was sent to me on Twitter, and I said ‘bet.'”

LaBonta does have some challengers to best when it comes to the NWSL Celebration of the Year, an award that should exist in reality but is currently just contained within this article.

Washington Spirit and U.S. women’s national team forward Trinity Rodman may be her strongest competition. Rodman and teammate Ashley Sanchez have had a few Tiktok-inspired celebrations throughout 2022, and have shown no signs of turning towards a more conventional celebration.

Rodman most recently offered up an iconic pose after powering through the North Carolina Courage defense to score.

Portland Thorns striker Morgan Weaver offered up another, more obscure celebration earlier this month, offering up some kind of high-stepping, hand-swinging puzzler.

A rare Becky Sauerbrunn goal earlier this year brought up another candidate, with Sauerbrunn recently explaining that it was a tribute to her partner doing the same pose before—you guessed it—a keg stand in college. There are few times college keg stand behavior should be replicated, but this was indisputably one of them.

https://www.instagram.com/p/ChaJGe2FKpW/

Pro Soccer Wire will of course keep you up to date on all NWSL Celebration of the Year candidates, and hopefully more players will take up LaBonta’s challenge to really push the limits.

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Kansas City Current place Sam Mewis on season-ending injury list

An ongoing knee injury has ended Mewis’ 2022 season

The Kansas City Current have announced that USWNT midfielder Sam Mewis has been added to the season-ending injury list, effectively ending her 2022 season.

Mewis has been battling a knee injury for some time, and while she had been able to travel with the Current on several road trips, the issue was apparently not improving enough for Kansas City to risk holding the roster spot open amid a tight NWSL playoff race.

“We are understandably disappointed, not just for the club, but for Sam. She has been a valuable leader for this organization since she joined us,” said Current GM Camille Levin Ashton in a team statement. “Although she won’t be able to contribute on the field for the balance of this season, she is an invaluable asset to this team and contributes daily to our success. We will continue to support her in every way possible.”

Mewis will join her USWNT teammate Lynn Williams and veteran wingback Mallory Weber on Kansas City’s season-ending injury list. Williams tore a tendon in her hamstring before the season got underway, while Weber tore her ACL back in early May.

The move allows Kansas City one more open roster spot, which may come in handy. The NWSL transfer window ends on August 24, and the Current at the moment are in the sixth and final playoff spot. With just 14 goals scored (tied for eighth-best in the 12-team league), it stands to reason that the ambitious club will move for reinforcements.

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