North Carolina Courage 2 – 1 OL Reign
CARY, NC—It wasn’t just the weather that was hot in Cary Saturday afternoon. The North Carolina Courage came out of the International Break fired up to get their season back on track as they took on OL Reign.
The Courage had their full complement of players available for Saturday’s matchup while OL Reign was missing two of its marquee players in Megan Rapinoe and Rose Lavelle. But before you feel too badly for them, they debuted arguably two of the best women’s soccer players in the world in goalkeeper Sarah Bouhaddi and German midfielder Dzsenifer Maroszán. Both are on loan from OL Reign’s sister club, Olympique Lyonnais, and played the full 90 minutes in the Carolina heat.
North Carolina came out firing on all cylinders, showing more direction and intention than their previous outings. It was clear that head coach Paul Riley had his charges working on building out of the back and controlling midfield over the past two weeks. The full team effort—with Denise O’Sullivan and Havana Solaun directing traffic through midfield—helped the Courage create several promising chances in the opening 20 minutes.
But Farid Benstiti’s club had a plan to go at North Carolina and they managed to get through the Courage defense and fire four shots at Casey Murphy who held her former club off the scoreboard.
It was a simple but elegant play that got the Courage on the board just before halftime. Solaun took the ball at midfield and nudged it out to Merritt Mathias on the wing. Mathias took a few touches while she waited patiently for Jessica McDonald to set up her run through the box before serving up an absolutely picture-perfect cross right to her teammate’s head. Bouhaddi had come out to make a play but McDonald won the aerial battle, giving North Carolina the 1-0 halftime lead.
“I just read Merritt’s body language,” McDonald said of her goal after the game. “Right place, right time. She played an immaculate banger right over the goalkeeper and just gave me a nice little tap-in for my noggin.”
“Jess and Lynn were the focus, the two tens, trying to make sure that we penetrate a little bit more, break lines a little bit quicker,” Riley said in his post-match remarks to the media. “I feel we’ve been studgy in our build and slow in our build and we wanted to speed the tempo up a little bit, even switching the point of attack. All the little things we talked about we did really well.”
OL Reign wouldn’t be deterred. They came out swinging in the second half, with Bethany Balcer and Sofia Huerta teaming up to nearly level the score in the 53rd minute. The Courage answered right back with Debinha dribbling through the Reign defense and, with Bouhaddi well out of her net, slid a ground ball back to Lynn Williams at the top of the six-yard box but Williams skied the shot.
The work Paul Riley and his team put in on the training ground truly paid off in the 77th minute when centerback Kayleigh Kurtz worked the ball over to Mathias at the midfield line. Mathias lobbed the ball to the top of the 18-yard box where a Reign defender headed the ball back toward midfield. But it came to Debinha instead and she tapped it over to Sam Mewis at the top of the arc. Mewis pushed the ball out to Williams in a perfectly executed give-and-go. Williams served the ball back to her “Snacks” co-host and Mewis beat Bouhaddi and buried the ball to double the lead.
Riley noted his team’s improvement over their previous outings, “I thought the box played a lot better. Sully…for 70 minutes she got on the ball and was really, really good. Havana Solaun, another really top, top game. I just liked the fact that we weren’t playing wide too early; they were playing through lines into the tens and into the nines. I prefer that from going side-to-side for 25 minutes at a time.”
With players starting to go down with leg cramps, Benstiti brought on Quinn and Jess Fishlock who gave the Reign a much-needed burst of energy. It would be Fishlock who would ruin Murphy’s clean sheet in the 86th minute when she took advantage of a misplayed ball from O’Sullivan, who had otherwise put in a strong shift. She looked up and spotted Murphy far off of her line and went for the chippy that floated over the Courage keeper’s outstretched arms and looped just under the crossbar.
The late tally gave the over 5,000 faithful a few nervous moments, but the Courage hung on to get three of the most important points of the season.
“To take four points out of six off of Seattle is good,” said Riley of his teams two matches against their Pacific Northwest rival. “I don’t think any team’s going to take four points off Seattle, so I’m really happy with the result, happy with the performance. One of our better performances.”
Final Notes
- Lynn Williams’ helper on Sam Mewis’ goal put her on top of the all-time NWSL assist record.
- Saturday’s victory was the 75th win in head coach Paul Riley’s NWSL career. His teams have achieved more wins than any other coach in the league.
- The game in North Carolina marked the NWSL debut for Olympique Lyonnais standouts Dzsenifer Marozsán and Sarah Bouhaddi. It’s worth noting that it’s not their first time playing in the sweltering Southern heat. In August of 2019, Les Lyonnaises won the ICC Women’s Championship here at Sahlen’s Stadium, defeating the Courage 1-0 on a goal from Marozsán.
- Next up for North Carolina is a trip to Louisville to take on the Racing Louisville FC on June 23rd.
Lineups
North Carolina Courage: C. Murphy; C. Pickett, A. Erceg ©, K. Kurtz, M. Mathias; D. O’Sullivan (C. Roccaro, 89’), Debinha (H. Mace, 79’), H. Solaun (R. Williams, 89’), L. Williams, J. McDonald (B. Ratclciffe, 79’), K. Hamilton (S. Mewis, 66’)
OL Reign: S. Bouhaddi; Celia, A. Cook, S. Hiatt (M. Hammond, 81’); L. Barnes© (Quinn, 64’), D. Weatherholt (J. Fishlock, 64’), K. McNabb, D. Marozsán, S. Huerta; B. Balcer (L. Pruitt, 75’), Angelina (T. King, 75’)
Score:
North Carolina Courage: 2
OL Reign: 1
Goals:
North Carolina Courage: J. McDonald (M. Mathias, 45’); S. Mewis (L. Williams, 77’)
OL Reign: J. Fishlock (86’)
Discipline
North Carolina Courage: S. Mewis, YC 88’
OL Reign: Angelina, YC, 17’; Celia, YC, 73’
Attendance: 5,026
