If Rose Lavelle has a passion besides soccer and her English Bulldog, Wilma Jean, it’s her hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio.

The U.S. women’s national soccer team midfielder never misses a chance to talk about the “Queen City.” And on Tuesday night, she delivered on the field for the 22,515 hometown fans at TQL Stadium, notching a goal and three assists in the first 15 minutes of the USWNT’s 8-0 win over Paraguay. The result capped a two-game series of friendlies as part of the team’s fall tour.

“It was special to be able to step out there in front of all my family and friends and the city that has built me into who I am today,” Lavelle said after the game. “It was incredible.”

Lavelle opened the scoring with a header in the fourth minute, and was quite surprised by it.

“Casey [Krueger] served in a great ball,” she said. “Honestly, the three or four times I’ve had a header in the box, it’s gone the complete opposite direction I’ve intended, so I don’t know how it ended up going the way I actually wanted it to.”

There's no place like home 🏡 @roselavelle got the hometown crowd going wild EARLY! pic.twitter.com/Uo8JxfpHBu

— U.S. Soccer WNT (@USWNT) September 21, 2021

Just two minutes later Lavelle assisted Sophia Smith’s first international career goal. In the eighth minute, Lavelle found Alex Morgan in the box for a header of her own, the first goal of Morgan’s hat trick in the game.

Joining Lavelle in the center of the pitch were Catarina Macario and Andi Sullivan. All three of them led the USWNT’s playmaking with their creativity throughout the game. Head coach Vlatko Andonovski says he challenge them to go through the middle as much as possible, and he wanted the rest of the team to put the trio in situations where they had to solve different problems.

When it came to the midfield’s defending, Andonovski was glowing over Lavelle.

“Rose Lavelle is the best in defending transition in the world,” the coach said. “There’s not a player who transitions as well as she does. Because of her creativity, and because of how good she is on the ball or in possession, we don’t talk as much about how good she is out of possession. She’s not just world class, she’s the best in the world in that situation of the game.”

Lavelle was subbed off in the 70th minute to a full standing ovation. She was later awarded Insiders Woman of the Match honors with 57.9 percent of the votes.

One goal, three assists and one incredible night in Cincinnati for the one & only @roselavelle pic.twitter.com/mWqBN5skgu

— U.S. Soccer WNT (@USWNT) September 22, 2021

The USWNT scored just two more goals after Lavelle left the field. The first came from Carli Lloyd, who scored five in the first match against Paraguay to begin her farewell tour. The final score came off the foot of Macario, her second of the game and third-ever international career goal.

The USWNT now has a 60-game home unbeaten streak, including 55 wins and five draws. They are one win away from tying the longest home winning streak in team history.

When Lavelle was asked after the game whether her goal in the fourth minute was her favorite of her career, the 26-year-old laughed and said no. She added that her top choice wouldn’t even be the one she scored in the 2019 World Cup final that won her the Bronze Ball and helped the USWNT capture the title.

Her favorite goal happened in high school. As a freshman at Mount Notre Dame in Cincinnati, she scored in the last 25 seconds of a game against the second-seeded team during a time when she and her sister, a senior, were playing together.

“I got to hug my sister!” Lavelle said. “She was the first person I got to celebrate with.”

Lavelle’s answer was a fitting ending to Tuesday night’s homecoming, in which she combined the two things that matter most to her: soccer and being around her family and friends in the city she loves.

Longtime USWNT fixture Carli Lloyd took to Instagram Wednesday morning to announce that she’s pregnant with her first child. 

"Baby Hollins coming in October 2024!" she wrote. The caption framed a collaged image of baby clothes, an ultrasound photo, and syringes indicating what she described as a "rollercoaster" fertility journey.

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In a Women’s Health story published in tandem with Lloyd’s post, the Fox Sports analyst and correspondent opened up about her struggles with infertility and the lengthy IVF treatments she kept hidden from the public eye.

"Soccer taught me how to work hard, persevere, be resilient, and never give up. I would do whatever it took to prepare, and usually when I prepared, I got results," Lloyd told Women’s Health’s Amanda Lucci. "But I found out that I didn’t know much about this world. I was very naive to think that we wouldn’t have any issues getting pregnant. And so it began."

Lloyd went on to discuss her road to pregnancy in great detail, sharing the highs and lows of the process and expressing gratitude for the care and support her family and medical team provided along the way. She rounded out the piece with a nod toward others navigating the same challenges, encouraging people to share their own pregnancy journeys, painful as they may be.

"My story is currently a happy one, but I know there are other women who are facing challenges in their pregnancy journey. I see you and I understand your pain," she said. "My hope is that more and more women will speak up about this topic, because their stories helped me. I also wish for more resources, funding, and education around fertility treatments. There is much to be done, and I hope I can play a role in helping."

The 41-year-old New Jersey native retired from professional soccer in 2021, closing out her decorated career with 316 international appearances, the second-most in USWNT history, in addition to 134 international goals. A legend on the field, Lloyd walked away from the game with two World Cups, two Olympic gold medals, and two FIFA Player of the Year awards.

On Tuesday, FIFPRO announced the launch of Project ACL, a three-year research initiative designed to address a steep uptick in ACL injuries across women's professional football.

Project ACL is a joint venture between FIFPRO, England’s Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA), Nike, and Leeds Beckett University. While the central case study will focus on England’s top-flight Women's Super League, the findings will be distributed around the world.

ACL tears are between two- and six-times more likely to occur in women footballers than men, according to The Guardian. And with both domestic and international programming on the rise for the women’s game, we’ve seen some of the sport's biggest names moved to the season-ending injury list with ACL-related knocks.

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Soccer superstars like Vivianne Miedema, Beth Mead, Catarina Macario, Marta, and England captain Leah Williamson have all struggled with their ACLs in recent years, though all have since returned to the field. In January, Chelsea and Australia forward Sam Kerr was herself sidelined with the injury, kicking off a year of similar cases across women’s professional leagues. And just yesterday, the Spirit announced defender Anna Heilferty would miss the rest of the NWSL season with a torn ACL. The news comes less than two weeks after Bay FC captain Alex Loera went down with the same injury. 

Project ACL will closely study players in the WSL, monitoring travel, training, and recovery practices to look for trends that could be used to prevent the injury in the future. Availability of sports science and medical resources within individual clubs will be taken into account throughout the process.

ACL injuries in women's football have long outpaced the same injury in the men's game, but resources for specialized prevention and treatment still lag behind. Investment in achieving a deeper, more specialized understanding of the problem should hopefully alleviate the issue both on and off the field.

With recent transfers Talia von Oelhoffen and Kiki Iriafen joining first-team All-American JuJu Watkins and the nation’s No. 1 recruiting class at USC next season, the Trojans look to transition from an up-and-coming squad to a legitimate title contender. 

Former Oregon State graduate student von Oelhoffen is the latest collegiate talent to commit to the program, announcing her transfer Monday via ESPN. She follows ex-Stanford leading-scorer Iriafen in the jump to the pair’s one-time Pac-12 rival.

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The 5-foot-11 Washington native was a two-time All-Pac-12 guard during her time at Oregon State. But after the recent dissolution of the Pac-12, the Corvallis side found themselves without a permanent home conference going forward. Many big name players opted to take their skill elsewhere as a result, with von Oelhoffen’s fellow ex-Beaver Raegan Beers announcing her own departure to Oklahoma on Monday.

According to DraftKings, USC is now tied with UConn for the second-best betting odds to win the 2025 NCAA women’s tournament. Dawn Staley’s tested South Carolina side, poised for a repeat performance, holds down the number one spot.

Last year, LSU loaded up in the transfer portal after beating Iowa to win the 2023 national championship. The Tigers were clear favorites coming into the 2023-24 season, but were bounced in the Elite Eight by Caitlin Clark’s Hawkeyes. Shortly thereafter, star transfer Hailey Van Lith opted to transfer a second time, this time signing with TCU. 

Yet while history proves that an excess of star power doesn’t always translate to on-court chemistry, on paper, USC sure looks ready to hold their own — in 2025 and beyond.

The United States and Mexico have withdrawn their joint bid to host the 2027 Women’s World Cup, per a Monday afternoon release from U.S. Soccer and the Mexican Football Federation.

According to the statement, they will instead focus on developing a "more equitable" bid for the 2031 tournament, with the ultimate goal of "eliminating investment disparities" between the men’s and women’s tournaments.

The federations went on to cite the upcoming 2026 Men’s World Cup in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico as an opportunity to build support for local infrastructure, improve audience engagement, and scale up media and partnership deals in preparation to "host a record-breaking tournament in 2031."

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"Hosting a World Cup tournament is a huge undertaking — and having additional time to prepare allows us to maximize its impact across the globe," said U.S. Soccer President Cindy Parlow Cone. "Shifting our bid will enable us to host a record-breaking Women’s World Cup in 2031 that will help to grow and raise the level of the women’s game both here at home as well as across the globe."

The decision leaves just Brazil and a joint bid from Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands in the running for the 2027 host spot. Brazil — the rumored frontrunner — has never hosted a Women’s World Cup, while Germany hosted the 2011 tournament as a solo venture. 

Furthermore, this postponement doesn’t mean the U.S. is a shoo-in for 2031, as it's been previously reported that 2022 UEFA Women's EURO host England is considering their own Women's World Cup bid. FIFA is scheduled to confirm the winning bid after the FIFA Congress votes on May 17th.