The 2021 NWSL season has officially come to a close, with the Washington Spirit crowned as league champions.

In an unprecedented year, NWSL players overcame extraordinary circumstances off the field to continue delivering incredible moments on it, from stunning debut goals to record-breaking accomplishments.

In honor of the thrilling season that was, and in homage to the NWSL’s Best XI, we are counting down the 11 most priceless moments from the season, presented by MasterCard. Let’s get to it.

11. Trinity Rodman’s first goal

Trinity Rodman announced herself to the league on April 10 when she scored her first NWSL goal in a Challenge Cup match against the North Carolina Courage, beating her defender and drilling a long ball past the keeper. The finish foreshadowed the Spirit attacker’s seven goals during the regular season and playoffs, as Rodman stretched opponents’ backlines all season long.

In a momentous rookie season, Rodman led her team to an NWSL Championship, won Rookie of the Year and was named to the Best IX First Team. Not bad for someone who is still just 19 years old.

First touch 🥵 https://t.co/3IHNV73z0D

— Just Women’s Sports (@justwsports) April 10, 2021

10. Ashlyn Harris’ PK streak

Ashlyn Harris went on a tear over the summer, stopping a staggering five straight penalty kicks for the Orlando Pride. Harris also surpassed the NWSL all-time save record this year, notching her 469th save in Orlando’s 1-0 win over NJ/NY Gotham FC in August.

FIVE. STRAIGHT. PK. SAVES. 🤯#ORLvRGN | https://t.co/iecT7II54a | #NWSL21 pic.twitter.com/aBEyhMjrqj

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) July 25, 2021

9. Ebony Salmon’s electric debut

Ebony Salmon broke onto the NWSL scene in historic fashion, scoring mere seconds after entering her first Racing Louisville game. The English attacker’s highlight-reel goal earned her the top play on that evening’s “SportsCenter Top 10.”

Salmon went on to notch six goals and three assists in 20 matches and 14 starts with the team, finishing the season as Racing Louisville’s leading scorer.

Knows how to make an entrance 😌@ebony_salmon taking the top play on the @SportsCenter Top 10 ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/4gNNmE6qyo

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) June 21, 2021

8. Racing Louisville wins Women’s Cup

Racing Louisville put an exclamation mark on their debut season, winning the inaugural Women’s Cup title in front of a home crowd at Lynn Family Stadium in August. The championship match was epic, with Louisville outlasting FC Bayern Munich in sudden-death penalty kicks to take home the Cup.

The win raised Louisville’s profile on the international women’s soccer scene in its first year as a club.

ABSOLUTE SCENES 😱

Congratulations to @RacingLouFC on winning the inaugural @thewomenscup final over @FCBfrauen 👏👏👏 pic.twitter.com/KHVGjn5k5j

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) August 22, 2021

7. Kansas City nabs club’s first win

Kansas City captured their first win in August after a slow start to their inaugural season. Defeating OL Reign 2-1 at home, the expansion club notched the most significant of its three wins against the eventual No. 2 playoff seed. Kansas City ended its first season with a new name, the Kansas City Current, debuting the crest during the club’s final game of the year.

Pick that one out, @hellopickett‼️#KCvRGN | https://t.co/0LtSAUK1Jw | #NWSL21 pic.twitter.com/QsLO7K1Zql

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) August 15, 2021

6. Angel City makes a splash with Christen Press signing

Angel City FC made headlines before even taking the pitch when the expansion club announced the acquisition of superstar Christen Press in August. The U.S. women’s national team forward had long hoped to play professional soccer in her hometown of Los Angeles and finally got the opportunity when she inked a two-year contract with ACFC.

Press told the Los Angeles Times after her signing: “For it to really be happening, to be able to bring professional soccer back to Los Angeles and to be a part of that team, is nothing but a dream come true.”

It’s really, really, really happening 🥺

We’re beyond excited to have you back home, @ChristenPress! pic.twitter.com/2wrAfdlSQl

— Angel City FC (@weareangelcity) August 23, 2021

5. Eugénie Le Sommer’s stunning first goal 

After leading Lyon to three-straight Division 1 Féminine titles from 2017-20, Eugénie Le Sommer brought her world-class attacking talents to OL Reign. The French star scored her first NWSL goal in July, putting her defender on skates before delivering a skillful, must-see finish.

In her 17 regular-season appearances with OL Reign, Le Sommer notched seven goals and three assists, guiding the club to a semifinal berth.

It's goal No. 1 in a Reign uniform for Eugenie Le Sommer!

The home team takes the lead! #RGNvLOU | https://t.co/iecT7II54a | #NWSL pic.twitter.com/goMjG1rnU1

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) August 1, 2021

4. NWSL players make a statement

The NWSL underwent a reckoning midway through the 2021 season after Mana Shim and Sinead Farrelly went public with their accusations of sexual coercion and abuse against former North Carolina Courage coach Paul Riley. The report in The Athletic spurred turnover at the top of the NWSL, with commissioner Lisa Baird resigning the day after the allegations were revealed.

Games were postponed the following weekend, and players demanded the NWSL institute sweeping changes with regards to player safety and transparency. When clubs returned to the pitch the following Wednesday, players across the league made a collective statement, pausing at the six-minute mark to stand at the center of the field in solidarity with Shim and Farrelly, who had been pressured into staying silent for six years.

The move reverberated around the women’s soccer world, with teams in foreign leagues showing their support. The NWSL’s stand instigated an overdue — and ongoing — conversation around power and silence in women’s soccer.

pic.twitter.com/mlzE5Q8q8F

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) October 6, 2021

3. Carli Lloyd’s Philly send-off

Carli Lloyd received a send-off befitting her historic and unprecedented career, after the soccer legend announced her retirement at the age of 39. Gotham FC honored Lloyd’s contribution to the sport and the league by hosting a farewell game in Philadelphia, near her hometown of Delran, N.J., in October.

Playing in front of fans at Subaru Park, Lloyd expressed her gratitude after the match, calling it “the most special evening of my career.”

Thank you all for the most special evening of my career. A memory I will never forget. I will miss all of this. I will miss all of you! ❤️ https://t.co/f0Bx7LsYtB

— Carli Lloyd (@CarliLloyd) October 7, 2021

2. Ashley Sanchez’s ridiculous chip

Ashley Sanchez scored one of the most consequential goals of her career when she delivered the go-ahead finish to send the Washington Spirit past OL Reign and to the NWSL Championship.

The 22-year-old did it in style, too, chipping Sarah Bouhaddi, one of the most league’s most seasoned goalkeepers, to clinch the 2-1 semifinal victory. The poise Sanchez showed to find the back of the net from a ridiculous angle — and when the stakes were highest — made it one of the best goals of the season.

The @WashSpirit are headed to the NWSL Championship 🏆

The goal that sealed their comeback win vs. OL Reign 💥

(via @NWSL)pic.twitter.com/Nx8UiOJwTz

— B/R Football (@brfootball) November 14, 2021

1. Kelley O’Hara heads home NWSL championship game-winner

The Washington Spirit took home the club’s first-ever NWSL championship after beating the Chicago Red Stars 2-1 in an extra-time thriller. Heading home the final goal was Kelley O’Hara, the seasoned USWNT veteran who has long called Washington D.C. her adopted “home.”

In her first season with the club, O’Hara provided the NWSL’s youngest team invaluable leadership and motivation. So, it was only fitting that she scored the deciding goal, her first of the season.

Kelley O’Hara in extra-time to give @WashSpirit the lead in the NWSL final 🔥

(via @NWSL)pic.twitter.com/2JlQ3RiO2q

— B/R Football (@brfootball) November 20, 2021

Overcoming Richie Burke’s firing, ownership infighting and a breach in COVID-19 protocols which resulted in two forfeits, the Spirit miraculously finished the season on a nine-game undefeated streak. With NWSL Golden Boot winner Ashley Hatch, Rookie of the Year Trinity Rodman and Goalkeeper of the Year Aubrey Bledsoe, the Spirit had championship-level talent, and O’Hara’s header capped one of the most exciting and dominant runs in NWSL history.

After an illustrious career for both club and country, Gotham FC and U.S. Women’s National Team defender Kelley O’Hara announced today via Kelley on the Street that she will be retiring from professional soccer at the end of this year, making the 2024 NWSL season her last.

"I have always said I would play under two conditions: that I still love playing soccer, and if my body would let me do it the way I wanted to," O’Hara told Just Women’s Sports in the lead-up to her retirement announcement. "I realized a while back that I was always going to love it, so it was the physical piece that was going to be the deciding factor."

The 35-year-old will retire as a two-time World Cup champion, an Olympic gold medalist, and at least a two-time NWSL champion, depending on where Gotham finishes this season. Her legacy as a player is hard to fully encapsulate, and will forever run through some of the biggest snapshots in USWNT and NWSL history. 

In 2012, O’Hara played every minute of the USWNT’s Olympic gold medal run, after having recently converted into a defender. Her soaring goal off the bench in the 2015 World Cup semifinal is the stuff of legend. And her return from lingering injury to play in every knockout match of the national team’s 2019 World Cup win cemented a storybook international career. 

It was O’Hara who scored the overtime goal in 2021 to earn the Washington Spirit their first-ever NWSL championship, and O’Hara who returned to help see Gotham earn a title in 2023 after years spent in the trenches with the club’s previous iteration, Sky Blue. Her 15-year career spanned two professional women’s soccer leagues in the U.S. (she earned her first professional title in 2010 with WPS’s FC Gold Pride), as well as sweeping changes to the sport both on and off the pitch.

On the field, O’Hara has always been known for a motor that never quits, making the right flank her domain in attacking possession and defensive transition. In recent years, she’s also been celebrated for a competitive fire that raises the level of her teammates, whether she’s in the starting XI or supporting from the bench.

But injuries take a toll, a reality not always seen by the fans watching from home. "I've never taken anything for granted, and I feel like I've never coasted either," O’Hara said of her late-career success in the NWSL despite battling injuries. "I've always been like, 'I gotta put my best foot forward every single day I step on this field' — which is honestly probably half the reason why I'm having to retire now as opposed to getting a couple more years out of it. I've just grinded hard."

Recently, O’Hara has been sidelined at Gotham with ankle and knee injuries, and the situation motivated her to really prioritize listening to her body. "To get injured and come back, and get injured and come back, and just keep doing it, it really takes a toll on you.

"People don't see the doubt that's associated with injury,” she continued. "As athletes we feel a certain way, we perform a certain way, our body feels a certain way, we're very in tune with our bodies. And there's always so much doubt surrounding injury. It’s like, 'Can I feel the way I felt before?' The reality is sometimes you don't."

O’Hara didn’t arrive at the decision to move on from her playing career lightly. But once she began seriously considering making 2024 her final year during the last NWSL offseason, it felt right. "Once I was like, 'Alright, you know what, this will be my last year,' I have had a lot of peace with it," she said. "Truly the only thing I felt was gratitude for everything that my career has been, all the things I've been able to do and the people I've been able to do it with."

She said she’ll miss daily interactions with her teammates and all the amazing memories they’ve created, though she feels lucky to have formed relationships that go beyond sharing a locker room. "You're basically getting to hang out and just shoot the shit with your best friends every day," she reflected. "Which is so unheard of, and I just feel very lucky to do it for so long."

The Stanford graduate also mentioned that the NWSL’s suspension of regular season play in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic made her realize how much playing allowed her the space to simply be creative every day. The tactical elements of soccer provided O’Hara an outlet for problem solving and made use of her naturally competitive edge.

She’s now gearing up to channel her on-field intensity into her post-playing career full time, which is a new chapter she’s excited to begin. "I don't know if the world's ready for it, like the fact that I'm not going to be putting all of my energy into football all the time," she said with a laugh. 

O’Hara said she would like to stay connected to the game in some fashion, whether it be as an owner, coach, or member of a front office. She’s also interested in the growing media space surrounding women’s sports, having provided on-camera analysis for broadcasters like CBS Sports in addition to starting a production company with her fiancée.

"I just feel like I have a lot of passions, and things that excite me," she says. "And I do want to stay as close as I can to the game, because I feel a responsibility — and I'm not sure in what capacity — to continue to grow it."

A sense of responsibility to grow the game has been a consistent refrain for the USWNT and NWSL players of O’Hara’s era, who ushered in a new age of equal pay for the national team and collectively bargained protections for those in the league. The landscape for new players looks different than it did 14 years ago, in large part due to this pivotal generation.

"I feel an immense sense of pride around that, because I don't know if any of us knew that was gonna happen," she said. "We kind of, as things unfolded, took the next step towards changing what women's football looks like in this country and around the world.

"I'm really grateful to have been part of this era with the players that I was [with], not backing down and pushing and knowing that was the right thing to do."

Whatever the future holds, O’Hara is going ahead full throttle. It’s a piece of advice she’d also give to the next generation of professionals looking to make their own impact.

"Whatever you do in life, do it because you love it, and the chips will fall in place," she said. "If you love something, you're willing to do what it takes. You're willing to make the sacrifices, you're willing to handle the roller coaster.

"To me, it's simple. Don't do it for any other reason but that, and I think you'll be alright."

The Phoenix Mercury center spoke with Robin Roberts about her 10-month incarceration, reflecting on her poor living conditions and shaky mental state ahead of her May 7th memoir.

"The mattress had a huge blood stain on it. I had no soap, no toilet paper," Griner told the ABC News anchor in last night’s 20/20 special. "That was the moment where I just felt less than a human." 

She also detailed some of her lowest moments during that time, saying with tears in her eyes that she went so far as to consider taking her own life on more than one occasion. However, the thought of Russian officials not releasing her body back to her family made her reconsider.

"I just didn't think I could get through what I needed to get through," said Griner.

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In February 2022, Griner was arrested and charged with drug possession and smuggling by a Russian court after Sheremetyevo International Airport police found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. The cartridges were prescribed by Griner’s doctor for chronic pain back in Arizona, where medical marijuana is legal. In the interview, the two-time Olympic gold medalist said she had a "mental lapse" while packing, and never intended to bring the cannabis products with her when she returned to play for UMMC Ekaterinburg.

"It's just so easy to have a mental lapse," Griner said. "Granted, my mental lapse was on a more grand scale. But it doesn't take away from how that can happen." 

She was later sentenced to nine years behind bars after her Russian attorneys advised her to plead guilty the following July. Griner was then sent to a remote penal colony where she was forced to spend her days cutting cloth to make military uniforms. From there, it only got worse.

"Honestly, it just had to happen," she said when asked about her decision to cut off her signature long locks. "We had spiders above my bed making nests.

"My dreads started to freeze," she added. "They would just stay wet and cold and I was getting sick. You've gotta do what you've gotta do to survive."

Shortly after Griner’s initial arrest, the U.S. State Department classified her case as wrongfully detained, escalating its urgency within the government and calling even more attention to the situation. On December 8th, she was freed in a prisoner exchange negotiated by the Biden administration.

While she told Roberts she was "thrilled" when she got the news, she was also very upset about having to leave fellow wrongful detainee Paul Whelan behind. She also continues to carry guilt about her arrest, saying "At the end of the day, it's my fault. And I let everybody down."

Griner’s memoir, Coming Home, hits shelves on May 7th.

"Coming Home begins in a land where my roots developed and is the diary of my heartaches and regrets," Griner told ABC News in an exclusive statement. "But, ultimately, the book is also a story of how my family, my faith, and the support of millions who rallied for my rescue helped me endure a nightmare."

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.