North Carolina Courage 2 – 0 Portland Thorns
Cary, NC—Given her production over the past week, you’d be forgiven if you thought Lynn Williams was headed to the Olympics in Tokyo as part of the 18-player roster and not as an alternate. With four goals in her last two games since being named as an alternate to the USWNT Olympic squad, Williams moved into the league scoring lead with Orlando’s Alex Morgan and Sydney Leroux.
On the strength of Williams’ second brace in two games, the North Carolina Courage notched their third win in seven days, beating their west coast rival Portland Thorns and leapfrogging over them into second place in the NWSL standings.
In the send-off game for Olympic-bound players Williams, Sam Mewis, Abby Erceg, and Debinha; the Courage withstood some early pressure from Portland and started to dominate play as the first half ticked away.
Natalia Kuikka nearly got the visitors on the scoreboard in the game’s third minute when she launched a rocket from about 28 yards out that Courage goalkeeper Casey Murphy parried away.
North Carolina’s best chance of the half came together with Denise O’Sullivan directing traffic through midfield, working the ball around to Merritt Mathias on the right side. Mathias lofted the ball perfectly into the six-yard box, tied with a bow for Jessica McDonald. But Portland’s A.D. Franch reached over McDonald and snatched Mathias’ gift right off of McDonald’s head to keep the game scoreless.
Once the second half got underway, Williams decided to take matters into her own hands, collaborating with Carson Pickett on both goals. In the 57th minute, Pickett sent a corner kick to the near post where it glanced off of a Thorns defender right to Williams, who knocked it past Franch making it 1-0 for the Courage.
Denied the assist on Wiliams’ first goal, Pickett brought the ball down the left side and launched a cross through the box that found Williams who beat Franch point blank with the header and doubled North Carolina’s lead.
With Erceg and Kaleigh Kurtz combining to lock down the back line, North Carolina was able easily see out the result, earning a confidence-building clean sheet for the second game in a row.
“The Thorns are an amazing team,” Williams said of their cross-country rival. “It’s always an intense, chippy game.”
“I’m really proud of this group of women who were on the field today,” she continued. “And anybody who didn’t get in (off) the bench. All the hard work we put in this past week—it’s been three hard games. To get three wins, I think that says something about the character on this team and how much we’re willing to work for each other.”
Courage head coach Paul Riley was extremely pleased with the way his team kept up its intensity and competitiveness through a grueling week and coming away with nine points. “It’s not very often in this league where you get nine points in a week, and I don’t remember ever doing that, to be honest, since I’ve been coaching in the NWSL. It was a fabulous week for us, to make 5 or 6 changes on Wednesday and 5 or 6 changes again tonight…we talk about a squadistic approach where people come in and I think you saw tonight the confidence in players like Haz [Angharad James] to come in the game and Havana Solaun was very good in the game.”
“Gotta give the players a lot of credit,” said Riley, “There’s been a lot of travel, plus the amount of training, it’s been an awkward week. Some players training, some just warmups or just doing ball work, some players not doing anything, some players get massages. But I give credit to the entire squad, the 25 or 26 of them worked their socks off all week to get us here.”
Final Notes
- In the 30th minute, Courage captain Abby Erceg became the 14th player in the NWSL to pass 10,000 regular season minutes played.
- Saturday’s game was the first game Crystal Dunn played in Cary since her trade to the Thorns. Merritt Mathias took on the assignment of keeping her close friend off the scoresheet.
- Lynn Williams on the team celebrating Pride Night: “We were super excited to finally wear the pride numbers. It’s been a long time coming. I, personally, and I think I can speak on behalf of the team to say we should have done this way sooner. We should have fought for Pride numbers way sooner. It means a lot to us—a lot of the girls on our team—to feel represented. I know it means a lot to a group of people who feel they are discriminated against. So, for us to finally be able to put the Pride number on our backs, we realize…it’s bigger than just a game. This whole past year, we’ve learned from our mistakes, and hopefully we can continue to rectify those mistakes and you’ll see pride numbers on our jerseys anytime it’s Pride month but even when it’s not Pride Month, we’ll continue to support the gay community.”
- NWSL Commissioner Lisa Baird spoke with the media before the match. She highlighted the league’s standing as the top women’s professional league in the world and how she is working toward building relationships with other leagues around the globe and create more opportunities for tournaments like the upcoming Women’s ICC tournament.
- On tap for the Courage is a trip to Orlando to face the Pride on Sunday, July 4th at 6 p.m.
Lineups
North Carolina Courage: C. Murphy; K. Kurtz, C. Pickett, A. Erceg©, M. Mathias (R. Williams 88’); S. Mewis (K. Hamilton 70’), D. O’Sullivan (A. James 79’), Debinha (M. Speck 88’), H. Solaun; L. Williams, J. McDonald (H. Mace 79’)
Portland Thorns: A. Franch; B. Sauerbrunn, E. Menges, M. Klingenberg (M. Pogarch 59’), N. Kuikka; R. Rodriguez, C. Dunn, A. Salem (C. Boureille 79’), C. Sinclair; S. Charley (M. Everett 79’), M. Weaver (Y. Ryan 70’)
Score:
North Carolina Courage: 2
Portland Thorns: 0
Goals:
North Carolina Courage: L. Williams (58’ unassisted); L. Williams (66’ C. Pickett)
Portland Thorns: none
Discipline
North Carolina Courage: none
Portland Thorns: Y. Ryan, YC 78’
