The group stage of the 2022 NWSL Challenge Cup has come and gone, with a few teams meeting or even exceeding expectations, leaving behind a field with quite a few things to address in their limited time before the regular season starts on April 29.

The soccer on the pitch has continued to improve every week, as squads get to know each other better after an offseason of immense turnover. So, let’s take a look in the grade book at what went well, what needs to get better and what we can expect in the future for each team.

West Division

OL Reign (4-0-2) — A

OL Reign came into the Challenge Cup with high expectations, and by all measures have met them. The team finished unbeaten in six games, with a league-leading plus-6 goal differential, and 10 different players found the back of the net in the group stage. They were just as good on the road as they were at Lumen Field, which should serve them well as they travel to Leesburg, V.A. for a semifinal matchup with the Washington Spirit they are technically hosting.

As the Reign continue to tinker with their strongest starting XI, they haven’t yet hit their ceiling, which bodes well for the regular season. They could use the depth after waning on short rest in recent games, needing a stoppage time winner to get past Angel City and settling for a draw in San Diego.

Portland Thorns FC (3-2-1) — B+

Consider this grade on a bit of a curve: Arguably one of the five best teams in the league, the Thorns suffered for having OL Reign in their Challenge Cup division. They’ve tested their depth throughout the group stage, and at times have appeared to find answers for the holes in their midfield, even if Lindsey Horan and Crystal Dunn are ultimately irreplaceable.

After a COVID-19 outbreak left Sophia Smith and others out of their final lineup, the Thorns concluded the Challenge Cup on a down note. Once they start to control the tempo of games by slowing things down, they’re built to earn points under their new manager.

San Diego Wave FC (1-3-2) — B-

There are two ways to grade the California expansion teams: against other established clubs, and against their own expectations. The Wave’s lone Challenge Cup win came against fellow expansion side Angel City, but San Diego showed flashes of potential throughout the group stage.

Their attack is as stacked as advertised, with Alex Morgan in good form, Taylor Kornieck taking steps forward and rookie Amirah Ali getting off to a strong start. The Wave’s defense hasn’t been perfect, but goalkeeper Kailen Sheridan makes up for a lot of mistakes, and the backline has also had to deal with extra pressure due to a lack of control in the middle of the pitch. Naomi Girma has held her own regardless, and if she can get some help in front of her, the Wave could become difficult to break down. Their issues, as expected, lie in the midfield. Find solutions there, and the Wave quickly become a very competitive team.

Angel City FC (1-4-1) — B-

Fitting for Hollywood, Angel City had a clear narrative arc to their preseason. After building a roster for a very specific defensive system, the club then lost two starting defenders before the group stage even began. Other lingering absences meant that fans got only a glimpse of the intended starting XI in the Challenge Cup.

As ACFC adjusted and rotated in their depth options, they suffered a few rough results early on. But they turned the lessons from those losses into a winning performance against the Thorns in their group stage finale, and the frontline of Christen Press, Jun Endo and Simone Charley — with Savannah McCaskill behind them — looks like a real winner. If Angel City can get healthy, they’re going to win some games behind their starting XI in the regular season.

Central Division

Kansas City Current (4-1-1) — A

Kansas City’s success in the Central Division should be celebrated as a massive turnaround, but those who have been watching closely had a sense the Current had these results in them. Perhaps more impressively, the Current found ways to win without two of their biggest offseason signings in Lynn Williams and Sam Mewis. They’re building a high-press system that can hurt teams on the counter-attack, and they’re winning games as a unit.

Rookie Elyse Bennett looks beyond ready for the professional level, Kristen Hamilton is comfortable leading the frontline, and the defense has held firm so that the results have matched the performances. They did have one very poor game down in Louisville, indicating that they haven’t perfected the system just yet, but it’s a style of play that will win them games.

Chicago Red Stars (2-2-2) — B

Chicago debuted a brand new three-back formation in the Challenge Cup group stage, deploying a midfield-flooding tactical philosophy with many players who did not get many minutes in 2021. That the Red Stars were in the running for the knockout stage until their final game is a testament to the new system, but they’ve also been hampered by starters’ absences, some of which are long term.

The biggest remaining questions for Chicago are who will carry the attack when Mallory Pugh isn’t available, and whether the midfield can turn numerical advantages into possession and control games. The Red Stars are capable of becoming a possession-based team, which is the complete opposite of how they lined up in 2021, but now they have to consistently turn that into points.

Racing Louisville FC (1-2-3) — B-

Racing Louisville has shown their youth and rawness at times during the group stage, which isn’t quite so dire since they are both of those things in the club’s second season. Their attack has been relatively efficient, finishing the Challenge Cup with a shots-to-shots on goal ratio that was tighter than a number of other teams. Jessica McDonald has been a welcome addition to the attack, and the continued development of second-year outside back Emily Fox and rookie midfielder Jaelin Howell into franchise cornerstones will pay dividends down the road.

Louisville doesn’t have the same talent ceiling that other flashy teams do, and they managed only one win for their efforts. But with three draws in the Challenge Cup, they showed they are able to get results when they are either outplaying their opponent or being outplayed. The next step has to be establishing a more defined style of play, while not letting themselves become a solvable puzzle.

Houston Dash (2-4-0) — B-

What differentiates Houston from the rest of the pack is the roller-coaster effect: In some stretches, they look as competitive as anyone, but in others, they get completely dominated. Recent addition Maria Sánchez is a bright spot for the club, but their defense needs work on all three lines. Their obvious gaps on the pitch have been exploitable too often (Mal Pugh alone scored four goals on the Dash in the group stage).

Since winning the 2020 Challenge Cup, the Dash have struggled with consistency, which is key to regular season success. The Dash can still do damage on the wings, but they need to bring that same intensity when the tide turns against them. They also have another level of uncertainty to overcome after head coach James Clarkson was suspended Tuesday based on initial findings in the NWSL and NWSLPA’s joint investigation.

East Division

North Carolina Courage (3-0-3) — A+

No one counted the Courage out entirely after a tumultuous offseason, but I’m not sure we anticipated just how aggressive the new-look team would be this early in the year. The Courage started a number of players on the frontline with wing experience who have handled the goal-scoring well. They’ve also found ways to maintain the high-transition attack based on waves of pressure and quick-trigger counter-attacking soccer that has served the team so well in the past.

Debinha looks as good as ever, and new additions Brianna Pinto and Kerolin Nicoli give the Courage options in the center of the pitch. They had a tendency for sloppy distribution from the goalkeeping position and the backline, but goalkeeper Casey Murphy will help settle those channels when she returns as the starter.

Washington Spirit (2-0-4) — A-

The Spirit kept their unbeaten streak alive through the Challenge Cup group stage, salvaging a few results with furious comebacks after falling behind early. They still have the core group from their 2021 championship run, but they’ve had to be strategic with which players to rest — Andi Sullivan, for example, didn’t play the team’s final two group stage matches. Trinity Rodman and Ashley Sanchez both look like they’ve taken steps forward, and the sight of Bailey Feist and Jordan Baggett points to depth the team might not have even had in 2021.

The Spirit have gotten off to slow starts, frequently having to overcome an adverse scoreline or a player advantage to earn points. They’ll want to figure out how to bring the intensity from the opening whistle as the year goes on.

NJ/NY Gotham FC (1-2-3) — B

There is no doubt Gotham has all the pieces to be a good team, but in a tough division in the Challenge Cup, they showed how much of a learning curve they still have. The team had individual moments of excellence, like Ifeoma Onumonu’s equalizer in the second game against North Carolina and Margaret Purce’s late winner over Orlando in the third game. But they’ve also conceded four goals on set pieces, indicating that the defense is still meshing with new keeper Ashlyn Harris, and the midfield doesn’t appear completely balanced, even with the addition of Kristie Mewis.

Gotham has so much going for them: dynamic strikers, veteran leaders and one of the best off-field presences in the game. In the regular season, they’ll look to take the next step as a unit on the field.

Orlando Pride (0-4-2) — C+

The Pride are the only NWSL team that have yet to win a game in 2022, but what pushes them into a passing grade are their injury circumstances and their future prospects. Orlando leaned into a full rebuild in the offseason, compounded by Marta’s season-ending ACL tear and Sydney Leroux’s lingering Achilles issue. Because of that, this Challenge Cup was more about the process than the results, and the Pride have still made gains from early-year frustration.

A low-block team defensively, Orlando has gotten better at bending but not breaking. Their final match, a 1-1 draw against Gotham, showed a team unafraid of getting stuck in, allowing them to disrupt long enough to earn a result. First-year Pride forward Darian Jenkins has been very active in her minutes, and she’ll surely be excited to see Leroux’s name back in the 18.

Claire Watkins is a contributing writer at Just Women’s Sports covering soccer and the NWSL. Follow her on Twitter @ScoutRipley.

Seven-time Olympic gold medalist Katie Ledecky will receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, at a White House ceremony this afternoon. 

The Team USA standout is the most decorated women’s swimmer in the sport’s history. In addition to her seven Olympic golds, she’s also won a total of 21 gold medals at the World Championships, the most of any swimmer regardless of gender. 

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The esteemed award recognizes those who have "made exemplary contributions to the prosperity, values, or security of the United States, world peace, or other significant societal, public or private endeavors," according to a White House press briefing. 

Ledecky is one of 19 medal recipients chosen by the Biden administration this year. She joins a class that spans the worlds of politics, sports, film, human rights, religion, and science. Her fellow 2024 awardees include Everything Everywhere All at Once actress Michelle Yeoh, pioneering Hispanic astronaut Dr. Ellen Ochoa, and former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, plus posthumous winners Jim Thorpe, the first Native American to win an Olympic gold medal for the US, and assassinated civil rights leader Medgar Evers. 

Olympic gymnast Simone Biles and USWNT legend Megan Rapinoe were among 2022’s class of Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients. Biles and Rapinoe were the fifth and sixth women athletes to be given the honor, making Ledecky the seventh.

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.