The NWSL schedule for the 2023 season finally has arrived.

The league released the long-awaited schedule on Wednesday afternoon, 45 days before the first games kicks off on March 25. The season runs through the championship match on Nov. 11, two weeks later than in 2022.

Why the longer season? Thank the 2023 World Cup, which will run from July 20 through Aug. 20 in Australia and New Zealand.

While the NWSL will not break for the full tournament, the league will take two separate weeks off during the World Cup. The league will not play any matches from July 10-20 and from Aug. 7-17, which will leave two weekends free of competition.

Also to accommodate the World Cup, the NWSL will avoid regular-season matches from July 10 through Aug. 17. Instead, the league will concentrate on the in-season edition of its Challenge Cup tournament during that timeframe.

“For me personally, I don’t want to miss a lot of games with San Diego,” Wave and U.S. women’s national team forward Alex Morgan told CBS Sports. “I also don’t think that fans should have to choose between watching an NWSL game and a World Cup game.”

It's a new season!

Let's gooooooo 🏆

— National Women’s Soccer League (@NWSL) February 8, 2023

USWNT players also were concerned about when exactly the league would release them for international duty.

While the NWSL only is required to do so during established FIFA international windows, the league agreed to release players to their national teams on June 26, two weeks before the FIFA window opens on July 10. The move came only after pushback from players, The Equalizer reported.

Each of the league’s 12 teams will play 22 games in the regular season, the same number as they played in 2022, for a total of 132 games. For the first time in NWSL history, all 12 teams will compete on the final day of the regular season as clubs jockey for final playoff positioning. Casey Stoney, San Diego Wave manager and the 2022 NWSL Coach of the Year, had advocated for this format last season.

Each team will also play six Challenge Cup matches, either played on Wednesdays across April, May and June or during the World Cup window in July and August. The tournament will culminate in the semifinals on Sept. 6 and the final on Sept. 9.

Five NWSL matches to watch in 2023

March 25 (2 p.m.): North Carolina Courage vs. Kansas City Current

The first day of matches brings a barn burner, as 2022 MVP finalist Debinha returns with her new team to face the new-look Courage.

April 1 (12:50 p.m.): Kansas City Current vs. Portland Thorns

The Thorns visit Kansas City for a rematch of the 2022 NWSL Championship. Portland claimed a 2-0 victory and the crown in October, but the Current look ready to challenge for the title again.

April 23 (8 p.m.): Angel City FC vs. San Diego Wave

The two California expansion teams made quite the impression in their inaugural seasons, and they’ll aim to keep that momentum in their sophomore campaigns.

May 28 (5 p.m.): Washington Spirit vs. Gotham FC

Kelley O’Hara made the biggest splash of NWSL free agency when she joined Gotham FC. This match will mark her first return to Washington, the club with which she won a title in 2021.

Sept. 16 (10:30 p.m.): Portland Thorns vs. OL Reign

The top two finishers from the 2022 season meet in this late-season contest, which could hold significant playoff implications.

*All times ET

The 2025 WNBA season ended on a high note for Connecticut Sun star Tina Charles on Wednesday night, as the veteran center took home this year's Dawn Staley Community Leadership Award, an annual honor recognizing the WNBA player "who best exemplifies the characteristics of a leader in the community where they work or live."

Known for her career-long consistency on the court — where Charles leads the WNBA in all-time rebounds and sits second only to retired legend Diana Taurasi in career points — the 36-year-old standout is also deeply active with her nonprofit organization, the Hopey's Heart Foundation.

Founded in memory of Charles's late aunt Maureen "Hopey" Vaz in 2013, the family-run organization works to provide life-saving Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) to schools and rec centers. Hopey's Heart celebrated their 500th AED distribution this year.

Due to these efforts — as well as her other team- and community-based initiative work — the WNBA chose to recognize Charles for "her extraordinary commitment to service, social justice, and creating lasting impact in the communities she serves."

Notably, this isn't Charles's first time earning the Dawn Staley Community Leadership Award, with the WNBA star first receiving the honor for personally funding the building of a school for hundreds of children in Mali in 2012.

"Through my mother at a young age, I learned the importance of being a servant unto others, and receiving the Dawn Staley Community Leadership Award is truly special for me — especially for Hopey's Heart Foundation to receive this honor through its work in raising awareness for sudden cardiac arrest," Charles said in her acceptance speech on Wednesday night.

Along with her award, the WNBA is donating $10,000 to Charles's foundation alongside $20,000 from Connecticut's Yale New Haven Health.

Congress members are speaking up for the WNBPA amid the union's ongoing collective bargaining agreement (CBA) negotiations, with 85 lawmakers from the Democratic Women's Caucus and the House Democratic Caucus sending an open letter to WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert on Tuesday demanding that the league "bargain in good faith to reach a fair CBA in a timely manner before the October 31 deadline."

Citing concerns "about the WNBA's delayed response, the differing accounts on the status of negotiations, and.. the needs of players," the letter vehemently voices support for the Players Association as temperatures rise in the tense CBA negotiations.

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The league and the WNBPA have struggled to find common ground, with both parties forced to consider filing an extension in the coming weeks.

"WNBA players receive no shared revenue under the current CBA," the Congress members explained in their letter. "This is drastic in comparison with other major professional sports leagues: National Basketball Association players receive 49 to 51%, National Football League players receive at least 48.8%, and National Hockey League players receive 50% of their respective shared revenues."

Players are also speaking out, with Seattle Storm star Gabby Williams recently telling CBS Sports, "The WNBA isn't enticing enough as far as money goes in order to keep us out of the other leagues."

Unrivaled Basketball is on the up and up, with the 3×3 league announcing expansion plans for its second season on Wednesday, growing from six to eight teams in 2026 following the venture's successful round of funding earlier this week.

Joining the offseason upstart in Miami next year will be Breeze Basketball Club and Hive Basketball Club.

The two new teams create 12 more roster spots, while another six will comprise the league's development pool — raising the total athletes on Unrivaled's payroll from 36 in its inaugural season to 54 in 2026.

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Unrivaled is also adding a fourth night of games each week to accommodate the incoming clubs, a move that will eliminate back-to-back matchups though each team will still play two games per week.

After nearly breaking even in their debut season, co-founders Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier are growing Unrivaled ahead of schedule, moving expansion to 2026 from the league's original 2027 target.

"We outperformed every goal we set for the league in year one, and with the incredible talent we have returning paired with the influx of new stars, it was a no brainer to add two more clubs this season," Unrivaled president of basketball Luke Cooper said in the league's Wednesday announcement.

Unrivaled currently has more than 90% of its 2026 roster confirmed — including Dallas Wings rookie superstar Paige Bueckers — with plans to release the full second-season lineup by the end of September.

The NWSL salary cap has become a hot topic in recent weeks, with big-name — and big-money — transfers like Angel City forward Alyssa Thompson's overseas move to Chelsea and North Carolina Courage striker Jaedyn Shaw's reportedly imminent trade to Gotham raising concerns about the league's financial edge.

While Shaw's reported league-record $1.25 million trade proves that US teams are willing to pay a premium for top talent, the disparity between flashy transfer fees and salary limitations could be holding the NWSL back.

"I know that in the NWSL there are ambitious clubs that want to be able to compete with the likes of a Chelsea, with the likes of a Barcelona," retired USWNT star Tobin Heath said on last week's episode of The RE—CAP Show. "These teams are capped out, they can't compete. They're going to lose their best players."

The league's most recent collective bargaining agreement sets each NWSL club's current salary cap at $3.3 million, which will titrate up to $5.1 million by 2030 while also adding potential revenue sharing options.

In 2024, the average league salary was $117,000. However, with 22- to 26-player rosters, teams often low-ball some athletes in order to afford to pay out for superstars.

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Soft salary cap overseas lures soccer's top players

In comparison, the UK's WSL and second-tier WSL2 operate with soft caps, recently shifting to a framework that allows teams to spend up to 80% of their revenue plus a capped contribution from club owners on player salaries.

"We have no intent to kind of 'cap' any players' earnings," WSL Football COO Holly Murdoch told The Guardian earlier this month. "We're at the investment stage of women's football, so we don't want to deter investment. We don't want to put in rules that don't make us an attractive investment."

With NWSL top earners Sophia Wilson and Trinity Rodman becoming free agents in 2026, the US league might need to rethink its model to stay competitive in an increasingly aggressive global market.