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Full Time Newsletter 
| This is The Athletic’s weekly women’s soccer newsletter. Sign up here to receive Full Time directly in your inbox.
Sophia Wilson made her first start for the Portland Thorns in over a year this weekend. We also saw a return on her GIF-worthy sideline behavior. In today’s Full Time:
Parity or panic?
Attendance record
Champions League update
Let’s start with a look at a tight-knit table …
Should the big four be worried?
The NWSL’s front office loves to use the word parity. So much so that I’ve forgotten what it actually means. Here’s a refresher from our friend Webster:
In sports, that just means that teams have equal footing to create rosters with similar talent. It’s why the NWSL says a salary cap is integral to its success, preventing situations like those in Europe, where Barcelona or Chelsea or Arsenal buy all of the top talent, leaving little for the other teams to afford.
But the start to this NWSL season has been downright bizarre. We’ve already addressed the early red card frenzy, which seemed to even out. If you look at the first three weeks of results on the surface, parity looks alive and well.
Gotham FC, Washington Spirit, KC Current and Orlando Pride were in a league of their own two seasons ago. Each team either won a trophy or made it to the final. The Current ran away with the league in 2025, and only eight points separated the second-place Spirit from eighth-place Gotham. Three weeks into this season?
Only one team, Angel City, remains unbeaten.
The previous two NWSL Championship winners aren’t even in the top five teams.
Six of the 29 games have ended in draws, and 12 have been decided by one goal.
Historically dominant teams have struggled to find their footing, outside of the Portland Thorns, who are returning to peak form. Meanwhile, others have climbed the league’s standings. While you could chalk that up to parity, a few other results have felt a little more puzzling:
Portland, down to nine players due to red cards, defeated the Seattle Reign.
The Current went from the fastest Shield winners in league history in 2025 to one win and a three-game losing streak to start 2026.
Angel City, who finished in eleventh place last season, sit atop the table.
Trinity Rodman, who signed a record deal this offseason, has yet to record a goal or an assist through four games.
Is it time to panic for the “big four” teams as others close in? Maybe not, as Melanie Anzidei writes.
In 2024 and 2025, both eventual champions — Orlando then Gotham — started their respective seasons without a win in their first three games. This year, Barbra Banda is back from injury and has three goals in four games for Orlando. Gotham has also split results, but has reinforcements coming in, especially with the pending arrival of **** Reiten from Chelsea.
As for Spirit and Current, alarm bells aren’t ringing, per se, but with the departure of key players in their midfields this offseason, it’s definitely time for other players to step up. Keeping an eye on it.
Denver welcomes 63,000
Though the Denver Summit’s first home match was a scoreless affair against the Spirit, it was still a pivotal moment as 63,004 people showed up to watch at Empower Field — surpassing the NWSL’s previous single-match attendance record by more than 20,000 tickets.
While Saturday’s game at the home of the NFL’s Denver Broncos was a huge success, the Summit is in the process of building its own 14,500-seat stadium with public funding a few miles south. They will play most of their home games at a 12,000-seat modular stadium in Centennial, a Denver suburb, in the meantime before moving to their permanent home in 2028.
The magnitude of Saturday’s game has many teams wondering if their own ambitions should be higher, especially since the league’s other expansion club, Boston Legacy, drew more than 30,000 fans to Gillette Stadium for its first game.
“It actually wasn’t really front and center on our radar that Denver would have had the ambition to do what they’ve done here,” commissioner Jessica Berman said before taking in the record crowd.
Could more games move to the big stage?
The turnout in Denver — which included U.S. soccer legends Brandi Chastain and Julie Foudy, Thorns investor and Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai — surprised even the league, given the speed at which the Summit were able to pull off such a crowd.
It has apparently brought on “a whole bunch of really fun and productive conversations among other clubs” looking to pull in similar crowds and challenge Denver’s crown.
That kind of banter is encouraging to the commissioner and even has the league contemplating shifting away from its current neutral-site championship — maybe to one that’s not usually an NWSL venue.
After all, the single-game attendance record has been broken every year for the last four years. The last three times involved NWSL expansion teams and were matches at one-off special venues:
March 28, 2026 — Empower Field, home of the NFL’s Broncos: 63,004
Aug. 23, 2025 — Oracle Park, home of MLB’s San Francisco Giants: 40,091
June 8, 2024 — Wrigley Field, home of MLB’s Chicago Cubs: 35,038
Oct. 6, 2023 — Lumen Field, home to the Seattle Reign (NWSL), Sounders (MLS) and Seahawks (NFL): 34,130
Read Tamerra Griffin’s full report from Denver to get goosebumps vicariously. And click the GIF to watch her further explain the attendance trend.
Actually, Tamerra had quite the weekend. Before she witnessed history in Denver, she was in Southern California chatting with the league’s newest addition …
USWNT forward ready to ‘have fun’ again
There’s plenty of healing power in sunshine and salty air. Just ask U.S. forward Catarina Macario, who traded Chelsea blue for blue skies in San Diego.
The USWNT’s top goal scorer last year has been plagued by injuries since 2022. Even now, she won’t feature for a few weeks for the Wave, who just signed her through 2030, as she’s dealing with a heel injury that has kept her sidelined since December.
While Macario told Tamerra on Saturday that injuries are just part of the risk of playing, she also joked that London’s gray skies might have stalled her healing.
“With the sunshine, I think it’ll help heal me a little bit quicker,” the 26-year-old added.
While Macario maintains she “still had a good time” at Chelsea after Emma Hayes left the club to coach the U.S. in 2024, she said “at some point I kind of learned that I wasn’t necessarily having as much fun anymore, and of course that impacts your performance, your mental well-being, everything.”
Now, she’ll see if her first foray into NWSL action brings about change.
Uncertain future: The confirmation of the U.S.-led bid for the 2031 Women’s World Cup has been delayed partly because FIFA has not received crucial government guarantees from the White House. Potential host cities, many of which will stage games this summer during the men’s World Cup, are also holding out as they seek a better deal than the one they’re getting this year. This could complicate things for the all-but-guaranteed bid. Adam Crafton has more.
Champions return: The Women’s Champions League returns this week with the second leg of the quarterfinals set for Wednesday and Thursday, streaming on Paramount+.
The first matches featured 18 goals, including Arsenal’s 3-1 win over Chelsea and Barcelona dismantling Liga F foe Real Madrid 6-2. Eight-time winners OL Lyonnes have a small hole to dig out of with a 1-0 deficit to Wolfsburg, while Manchester United’s Champions League dream hinges on an away trip to Bayern Munich, down 3-2. Get caught up on the first round here before settling in for what could be an exciting conclusion to the quarterfinals.
NWSL interest in the desert: The league has said its 18th team will likely be announced this year. If it were up to entrepreneur Vicki Mayo, that team would land in Mesa, Ariz. Mayo has already made significant progress putting together an infrastructure plan. Interest from the community is there, too.
Welcome to Wrexham, home of winners: It’s not just the men who have benefited from celebrity investment at the Welsh club. Wrexham’s women’s team has won Wales’ Adran Premier League for the first time. They have their sights set on more.
Love Full Time? These stories can also be found on Yahoo’s women’s sports hub, in partnership with The Athletic. Also, check out our other newsletters.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
NWSL, Full Time Newsletter
2026 The Athletic Media Company
Continue reading...
| This is The Athletic’s weekly women’s soccer newsletter. Sign up here to receive Full Time directly in your inbox.Sophia Wilson made her first start for the Portland Thorns in over a year this weekend. We also saw a return on her GIF-worthy sideline behavior. In today’s Full Time:
Parity or panic?
Attendance recordChampions League update
Let’s start with a look at a tight-knit table …
NWSL Reset
Should the big four be worried?
The NWSL’s front office loves to use the word parity. So much so that I’ve forgotten what it actually means. Here’s a refresher from our friend Webster:
In sports, that just means that teams have equal footing to create rosters with similar talent. It’s why the NWSL says a salary cap is integral to its success, preventing situations like those in Europe, where Barcelona or Chelsea or Arsenal buy all of the top talent, leaving little for the other teams to afford.
But the start to this NWSL season has been downright bizarre. We’ve already addressed the early red card frenzy, which seemed to even out. If you look at the first three weeks of results on the surface, parity looks alive and well.
Gotham FC, Washington Spirit, KC Current and Orlando Pride were in a league of their own two seasons ago. Each team either won a trophy or made it to the final. The Current ran away with the league in 2025, and only eight points separated the second-place Spirit from eighth-place Gotham. Three weeks into this season?
Only one team, Angel City, remains unbeaten.
The previous two NWSL Championship winners aren’t even in the top five teams.
Six of the 29 games have ended in draws, and 12 have been decided by one goal.
Historically dominant teams have struggled to find their footing, outside of the Portland Thorns, who are returning to peak form. Meanwhile, others have climbed the league’s standings. While you could chalk that up to parity, a few other results have felt a little more puzzling:
Portland, down to nine players due to red cards, defeated the Seattle Reign.
The Current went from the fastest Shield winners in league history in 2025 to one win and a three-game losing streak to start 2026.
Angel City, who finished in eleventh place last season, sit atop the table.
Trinity Rodman, who signed a record deal this offseason, has yet to record a goal or an assist through four games.
Is it time to panic for the “big four” teams as others close in? Maybe not, as Melanie Anzidei writes.
In 2024 and 2025, both eventual champions — Orlando then Gotham — started their respective seasons without a win in their first three games. This year, Barbra Banda is back from injury and has three goals in four games for Orlando. Gotham has also split results, but has reinforcements coming in, especially with the pending arrival of **** Reiten from Chelsea.
As for Spirit and Current, alarm bells aren’t ringing, per se, but with the departure of key players in their midfields this offseason, it’s definitely time for other players to step up. Keeping an eye on it.
Notables
Denver welcomes 63,000
Though the Denver Summit’s first home match was a scoreless affair against the Spirit, it was still a pivotal moment as 63,004 people showed up to watch at Empower Field — surpassing the NWSL’s previous single-match attendance record by more than 20,000 tickets.
While Saturday’s game at the home of the NFL’s Denver Broncos was a huge success, the Summit is in the process of building its own 14,500-seat stadium with public funding a few miles south. They will play most of their home games at a 12,000-seat modular stadium in Centennial, a Denver suburb, in the meantime before moving to their permanent home in 2028.
The magnitude of Saturday’s game has many teams wondering if their own ambitions should be higher, especially since the league’s other expansion club, Boston Legacy, drew more than 30,000 fans to Gillette Stadium for its first game.
“It actually wasn’t really front and center on our radar that Denver would have had the ambition to do what they’ve done here,” commissioner Jessica Berman said before taking in the record crowd.
Could more games move to the big stage?
The turnout in Denver — which included U.S. soccer legends Brandi Chastain and Julie Foudy, Thorns investor and Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai — surprised even the league, given the speed at which the Summit were able to pull off such a crowd.
It has apparently brought on “a whole bunch of really fun and productive conversations among other clubs” looking to pull in similar crowds and challenge Denver’s crown.
That kind of banter is encouraging to the commissioner and even has the league contemplating shifting away from its current neutral-site championship — maybe to one that’s not usually an NWSL venue.
After all, the single-game attendance record has been broken every year for the last four years. The last three times involved NWSL expansion teams and were matches at one-off special venues:
March 28, 2026 — Empower Field, home of the NFL’s Broncos: 63,004
Aug. 23, 2025 — Oracle Park, home of MLB’s San Francisco Giants: 40,091
June 8, 2024 — Wrigley Field, home of MLB’s Chicago Cubs: 35,038
Oct. 6, 2023 — Lumen Field, home to the Seattle Reign (NWSL), Sounders (MLS) and Seahawks (NFL): 34,130
Read Tamerra Griffin’s full report from Denver to get goosebumps vicariously. And click the GIF to watch her further explain the attendance trend.
Actually, Tamerra had quite the weekend. Before she witnessed history in Denver, she was in Southern California chatting with the league’s newest addition …
USWNT forward ready to ‘have fun’ again
There’s plenty of healing power in sunshine and salty air. Just ask U.S. forward Catarina Macario, who traded Chelsea blue for blue skies in San Diego.
The USWNT’s top goal scorer last year has been plagued by injuries since 2022. Even now, she won’t feature for a few weeks for the Wave, who just signed her through 2030, as she’s dealing with a heel injury that has kept her sidelined since December.
While Macario told Tamerra on Saturday that injuries are just part of the risk of playing, she also joked that London’s gray skies might have stalled her healing.
“With the sunshine, I think it’ll help heal me a little bit quicker,” the 26-year-old added.
While Macario maintains she “still had a good time” at Chelsea after Emma Hayes left the club to coach the U.S. in 2024, she said “at some point I kind of learned that I wasn’t necessarily having as much fun anymore, and of course that impacts your performance, your mental well-being, everything.”
Now, she’ll see if her first foray into NWSL action brings about change.
First Looks
Uncertain future: The confirmation of the U.S.-led bid for the 2031 Women’s World Cup has been delayed partly because FIFA has not received crucial government guarantees from the White House. Potential host cities, many of which will stage games this summer during the men’s World Cup, are also holding out as they seek a better deal than the one they’re getting this year. This could complicate things for the all-but-guaranteed bid. Adam Crafton has more.
Champions return: The Women’s Champions League returns this week with the second leg of the quarterfinals set for Wednesday and Thursday, streaming on Paramount+.
The first matches featured 18 goals, including Arsenal’s 3-1 win over Chelsea and Barcelona dismantling Liga F foe Real Madrid 6-2. Eight-time winners OL Lyonnes have a small hole to dig out of with a 1-0 deficit to Wolfsburg, while Manchester United’s Champions League dream hinges on an away trip to Bayern Munich, down 3-2. Get caught up on the first round here before settling in for what could be an exciting conclusion to the quarterfinals.
NWSL interest in the desert: The league has said its 18th team will likely be announced this year. If it were up to entrepreneur Vicki Mayo, that team would land in Mesa, Ariz. Mayo has already made significant progress putting together an infrastructure plan. Interest from the community is there, too.
Welcome to Wrexham, home of winners: It’s not just the men who have benefited from celebrity investment at the Welsh club. Wrexham’s women’s team has won Wales’ Adran Premier League for the first time. They have their sights set on more.
Love Full Time? These stories can also be found on Yahoo’s women’s sports hub, in partnership with The Athletic. Also, check out our other newsletters.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
NWSL, Full Time Newsletter
2026 The Athletic Media Company
Continue reading...
