Tag: Portland

4 Winners and 2 Losers from the 2018 NWSL Final

Posted on by RJ Allen

This was a fitting end to an unbelievable season for North Carolina, in a city that has set the gold standard for the future of the game. North Carolina came away 3-0 winners, but there was plenty more to this game than just the final result. Here are four winners and two losers from the game.

Winner: North Carolina Courage

This was a fitting end to an outrageous year from the Courage. After a regular season which destroyed the record books, if anything North Carolina did better in the postseason. Two resounding victories over their closest competition staked their claim as not merely the best team in 2018, but arguably as the best in the history of US women’s professional soccer. This is a squad without weaknesses, who can threaten from any angle, who will close down every play, win every second, third, and fourth ball, and simply make it impossible for the opposition to do anything according to plan. On a day when the Courage didn’t get any particularly outstanding performances from their ‘stars’ (Dunn, Williams, and Mewis—all of whom played well, but did not show anything out of the normal), it made no difference. Because they could rely on Denise O’Sullivan, Jaelene Hinkle, and Jess McDonald to blow off the doors. This is a team with no weaknesses and dozens of strengths, and if there were ever any doubts, they were put permanently to rest today.

Loser: Portland Thorns

This one is relative. Portland lost the game, but not because they played especially poorly. They came in with a game plan, and while it wasn’t executed flawlessly, neither was it badly botched. They looked to move the ball quickly forward, forcing North Carolina to collapse on the point of attack, thus creating space above that line for their more creative players to work. The problem is that they just couldn’t do enough to make the pinpoint long passes that were necessary to instigate the plan. As a result, they struggled to create scoring opportunities. And given the relentless Carolina assault, a few half chances were never going to be enough.  All that said, this really wasn’t a bad performance from Portland. They played well. Just not well enough.

Winner: Jess McDonald

I will admit that I voted for a different Courage player as my MVP, but could not possibly argue with McDonald getting the nod. She scored twice, helped create plenty more chances, and was virtually unplayable for much of the day. With better finishing, she might have had four or five. Her dribbling was exceptional, including several moves in Portland’s box where her dance through a sea of Portland tackles almost seemed choreographed. And her contributions weren’t limited to the offensive side, with some of high pressure doing plenty to disrupt Portland’s possession. McDonald has long been one of the league’s most underrated players, and this game is merely one more in a sea of outstanding performances.

Loser: The Portland fullbacks

Ellie Carpenter will have many big games ahead of her, but this is one that she’ll probably want to forget. She struggled to get involved in the attack, sending plenty of errant passes that resulted in Carolina interceptions, and similarly struggled to contain the Courage left-sided attack. Meanwhile, on the far side, Megan Klingenberg was more involved in the attack, and helped keep Carolina slightly more contained down that flank, but also had something well below her best game. Given the range of their possible attack, Portland desperately needed its wide players to bring their A game. Without consistent threats from their fullbacks, they were stretched too thin, and unable to cover the vacancies into which the Courage players pounced.

Winner: Jaelene Hinkle

Every time she touched the ball, the stadium filled with a chorus of boos, but none of that seemed to phase Jaelene Hinkle, who turned in an inch-perfect performance, sending in crosses on a dime, and bottling up Portland’s right-side attack with ease. Hinkle is one of the keys to North Carolina’s dominance—being able to slot in one of the league’s best creative players at left back exponentially increases the defensive obligations of the opposing side, and that was on clear display today. Without anyone forcing her back, she effectively deputized as a left winger, running rampant up and down the sidelines. I voted for her as player of the match. I have no interest in supporting Hinkle’s politics, but she played a whale of a game.

Winner: The City of Portland

At this point, we’ve run out of superlatives to describe the experience in Portland, and everything feels like a cliché. But when language isn’t up to the task, clichés are all we have left. This game gave me goosebumps, and left me more than a little choked up. The atmosphere at this game was electric—the sort of thing you expect from sports with decades, or centuries, of history. The seats were packed with a sea of red. The crowd was engaged, passionate, and ready to watch a game for the ages. While they didn’t get the result they wanted, the support never wavered. And as the Thorns players circled the stadium clapping their fans after the final whistle, they were greeted with thunderous cheers. It was one of the most powerful moments I’ve ever witnessed in sports. This the future, and it’s up to the rest of us to live up to standards that Portland has set.

The Scouting Report: Math Nerds United

Posted on by RJ Allen

TSR takes a look at Portland, North Carolina and Sky Blue as the season heads toward the start.

Plus and interview with Sky Blue’s Mandy Freeman

You can also find us on iTunes.

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Winning the Preseason: A How-To From Portland

Posted on by RJ Allen

Recently, I had the opportunity to attend the Tillamook Preseason Invitational hosted by the Portland Thorns. I will admit that I was going because, as a Houston Dash fan who lives in California, my opportunities to see my favorite team play in person are usually non-existent. And, I have to say, the tournament that Portland has put together was very enjoyable.

 

How It Usually Works

Preseason in the NWSL is usually a pretty chill affair. The teams get together for camps, post a lot of Snapchat and Instagram stories about all their training sessions, and play a few matches against college teams that often end in uneven score lines. There is excitement, there are promos galore, and there are chances to see all those new players the teams picked up … or are there?

Most of the teams travel to the colleges where they have scheduled matches. Besides making it difficult for a lot of fans to travel to see them, there is almost no marketing done around the games. There are no broadcasts, audio or visual, and at best, there are updates from the team’s intern on Twitter. Even highlights posted by the teams after the fact often look like they were taken on a cell phone.

Also, there is the issue of level of play. No offense to the NCAA game, because of course we rely on those teams to develop our league and National Team pool, but sometimes the scores of the games resemble the USWNT playing one of their smaller CONCACAF neighbors. For the league to grow, they need to start playing NWSL competition during the preseason. While it might be nice for the forwards of the NWSL teams to get a taste for goal, it doesn’t actually do that much to showcase what the teams will look like throughout the season.

 

Enter Portland’s Tournament

In 2016, Portland announced that it was doing something new with their preseason routine: they were going to hold a full tournament at Providence Park with four teams. Two of their opponents were NWSL teams (the Reign and the Dash), and one was a college team.

This caused a huge stir because up until then, playing NWSL competition in the preseason wasn’t considered an option. Who would come? But Portland, as Portland often does, pulled something off that would seem impossible to other teams. They held the tournament. They streamed the matches (at least the ones they played in). People came and watched.

After the tournament, the NWSL teams who participated gave rave reviews. The Thorns started the season without a loss until July. The Dash credited the tournament for a quick start, even though they later slowed up a bit. Even with the one match against the college team, the NWSL teams had a chance to play some of their real competition, and it benefited everyone involved.

 

Tillamook Spring Invitational, 2017

This year, Portland held their tournament again and in a way that only Portland can manage, it was even better. Instead of a college team, they got the United States U-23 team to sign up, bringing a whole other level to the competition. Now not only would fans get to see the three NWSL teams – this year the Dash and the Red Stars joined in – but they would also get to see up and coming players for the United States, getting a glimpse into the possible future of the National Team.

The level of play in the tournament was astounding. While it was clear that the three NWSL teams were trying out lineups throughout, all the matches remained competitive. When it came to finding a fourth, non-NWSL side to round out the tournament, the U-23s were a perfect pick. They provided an opponent that was the match, or more than the match of the NWSL teams. The only team to hold them scoreless were the Red Stars in Saturday’s 0-0 draw. Both the Dash and the Thorns conceded goals to the U-23s talented forwards, with the Dash coming back to win 2-1 in the last seconds of stoppage time on Sunday, and the Thorns losing 2-1 off of two scrappy late-match goals from Michelle Xiao and Sophia Smith on Wednesday. It was clear that the U-23s were not there to be out-played by professional teams, they were they to sharpen them. It was incredibly fun to watch, and it gave many the chance to see some of the bright young talent coming up through the Youth National Team system.

The games between the NWSL teams were equally competitive. The Dash and the Red Stars both had their spectacular moments and somewhat painful preseason mistakes through the week, but the games they played against the U-23s and each other felt like regular season play. The intensity was there and the focus was there. This went double for the Thorns, boosted by their home crowd. All of their matches were intense, but the last match of the tournament, against the Dash felt as intense as any playoff match (especially compared to your average preseason match). The Thorns played high-energy soccer every minute of the tournament, and it was clear that Mark Parson’s side is ready to pick up where they left off with their regular season dominance… after they fix some of the defensive miscues that led to their own mixed record. In fact, the record of every team at the tournament was 1-1-1, showing how evenly matched each of the sides were.

Then there was the crowd. Say what you will about the Thorns and their team, but no one can deny that their fans are dedicated. People showed up for these matches, even the one on Wednesday. The Thorns used the schedule to their advantage, as was their right, playing the second match of every double-header. The crowd for the non-Thorns matches was light – to the point where I listened to the video highlights from the first Dash match and picked my cheering out of the background. But for the Thorns matches, it was electric. Not sellouts like the regular season, but still more people than most NWSL teams have seating capacity for.

The announced numbers were around 6,000 for the first two matches, and 8,000 for the final one which was on a Saturday night. At each Thorns match, I could have sworn there were a few thousand more from sound alone. The Rose City Riveters, for one, made no distinction between preseason and regular season.

 

Takeaways

When it comes to making the most of your preseason, I fully believe that the Thorns have found a winning solution. Not only was the level of play far above what you get in your average match against a college side – allowing for more organic looks at players battling for roster spots – but the side-benefits are significant. Portland got the chance to promote their team on their home turf well before the season started, which from the conversations I heard around me, included a lot of people who were new to the league and the game. They also got the chance to sell extra merchandise. They got a chance to show why they consistently pull attendance numbers in the regular season that screw with the curve.

If this tournament was expanded, or similar tournaments held throughout the league, it could turn into a step towards being a more professional league. As more teams join in the next few years and the variety of competition and level of play continues to rise, they will need to find a better preseason solution that playing the local colleges.

The marketing benefits are not to be overlooked as well. I’ve written before about how the NWSL as a whole, and especially specific teams, need to step up their marketing game; this is a very useful strategy to do that. There are plenty of teams that could benefit from an extra opportunity to reach out to their local fan-base and sell the experience. If the matches are streamed to increase accessibility, this also helps. It gives media plenty to write about, it gives fans a glimpse of new rosters and a chance to get excited.

Even as a visitor to the city, the stadium, and a loud fan of one of the opposing teams, I could see how Portland is one of the premier soccer cities. It was the highlight of my year so far, and not just because I finally got to see the Dash from the stands instead of a screen. The whole experience was a treat. It’s far past time for other NWSL teams to start working up to that level.