Sophia Smith makes her return to the U.S. women’s national team this week for the first time since 2022, but you wouldn’t have any sense she’s taken time off. After using the NWSL offseason to rehab a lingering foot injury, Smith has begun the 2023 NWSL season on fire, scoring and assisting on a goal in the Thorns’ opening match against the Orlando Pride, before registering her first career hat trick against the Kansas City Current the following weekend.

Winning has always come somewhat easily to the young star. Smith finished 2022 with 11 goals for the U.S. and 15 for the Portland Thorns, making a late challenge for the NWSL Golden Boot race while winning the NWSL MVP award and leading the Thorns to their third NWSL championship. Her finishing has long been clinical, but what has begun to shift for the 22-year-old is her transcendent ability to execute and take over games in the biggest moments.

In Saturday’s 2022 championship rematch, the most-watched NWSL regular-season game ever on CBS, the Thorns pulled out a 4-1 win. But in the second half, the Current made a run at an equalizer after getting a goal back and pulling closer at 2-1.

Smith put an end to the comeback herself, with a dribbling sequence that all but walked the ball into the back of the net.

Sophia Smith took on everyone for this goal 🔥

She later scored again to secure her first career NWSL hat trick. pic.twitter.com/k52Ga3kz33

— Just Women’s Sports (@justwsports) April 2, 2023

She then capped off the match with a golazo from distance, after the Kansas City defense unwisely left the striker with space and time at the top of the box.

SOPHIA SMITH HAS HER HAT-TRICK. 🎩🎩🎩

That's now four goals in her first two @NWSL matches in 2023. 🔥 pic.twitter.com/6UJ3YSOg7W

— Attacking Third (@AttackingThird) April 1, 2023

“I love coming and playing in a stadium where the crowd is against you,” Smith said after the game. “I think it gives the team a little bit of edge, a little bit of energy, and we just kind of use that to our advantage. So, it’s pretty fun to put away a few goals and hear silence.”

Smith is a low-key presence off the field, but on the field that “edge” is palpable. The league MVP has seemed to crave moments like her game-winning goal in the fourth minute of the 2022 NWSL final, when her shrugging celebration became immortalized in league iconography.

Against the Current again on Saturday, Smith gestured a shushing motion to the crowd after her first goal, a well-slotted penalty to put the Thorns up 2-0 in front of over 11,000 fans. She now has four goals and one assist in two league matches, setting the tone for a World Cup year in which she wants to take on even bigger challenges.

“I don’t know if I would refer to it as a villain era, I’m like a very sweet, happy person,” she told reporters with a smile from USWNT camp this week. “I think on the field, yeah, I don’t play games. I don’t step on a field to do anything but win, and I take a lot of pride in that.

“So, I guess this era is just winning, and doing everything I can to do that and to help my team,” she continued.

The larger sports conversation in recent weeks has been centered on the idea of athletes in women’s sports expressing their emotions on the field or the court in a way that is all too common on the men’s side. As the profile of women’s sports rises as a whole, fans are forced to confront their own biases about the passion athletes show while in the thick of competition.

Smith welcomes the ongoing shift in perspective.

“I think there’s nothing wrong with a little bit of banter between teams, and a little bit of talk here and there,” she said. “It’s never disrespectful, but it can add a little bit of fun and entertainment to the game. And I I love to put on a show, I love to try crazy things when I’m playing. I feel confident enough to do those things.”

Smith’s renewed intensity and creativity is good news for the USWNT, who will play their last two friendlies this week before final roster decisions are made for the 2023 World Cup in July. Paired on the wings with the equally-focused Mallory Swanson, Smith presents problems that opposing defenses are finding increasingly difficult to solve.

She’s also fully recovered from a grueling 2022 campaign. Staying patient in the offseason and missing the 2023 SheBelieves Cup, which the USWNT won in late February, proved critical to her physical and mental health.

“I think during that time, I learned a lot about myself,” she said. “I learned how to be patient if I put things in perspective and realized how big a year this was. So, it was important for me to take the time I needed to get healthy and to address all the things that I didn’t have time to address last year.”

A fully healthy Sophia Smith running at both NWSL and international backlines is a scary thought for her opposition, but an exciting one for fans. And now is the right time for her to begin to move into peak form.

“Especially in a World Cup year, you put things in perspective that come this summer, that’s when you need to peak, that’s when you need to be healthy. That’s when you need to be as fit as you possibly can be,” she said.

After this international break, Smith will have until the middle of June to make her mark on the NWSL before heading to New Zealand for her first major international tournament. That she’s already approaching the year like a pro is a promising sign for both of her teams’ chances.

Claire Watkins is a Staff Writer at Just Women’s Sports. Follow her on Twitter @ScoutRipley.

The biggest victors in the WNBA last weekend were the Seattle Storm, as the fifth-place contenders took down the last two league champions to record six wins in their last seven games.

The Storm first took down 2022 and 2023 champs Las Vegas 90-83 on Friday before toppling reigning title-winners New York 89-79 on Sunday.

Guard Skylar Diggins and forward Nneka Ogwumike powered Seattle's two games, putting up 44 and 51 points, respectively, over the weekend.

Forward Gabby Williams also helped fuel the Storm's weekend with two double-double performances.

Seattle is now just one game behind the similarly surging fourth-place Atlanta Dream, while trailing the red-hot No. 3 Phoenix Mercury by 1.5 games.

"Staying ready is what the group is," Storm head coach Noelle Quinn told reporters on Friday. "They're professionals, they're vets."

Teams at the top of the WNBA standings aren't the only squads that saw weekend success, as the No. 6 Golden State Valkyries snagged their second win in a row with Sunday's 87-63 thrashing of the last-place Connecticut Sun.

Despite registering Friday losses, both No. 7 Las Vegas and the No. 9 Washington Mystics finished the weekend on a high note, earning big Sunday wins over the No. 8 Indiana Fever and No. 12 Dallas Wings, respectively.

How to watch the Seattle Storm this week

The Storm will suit back up for another tricky WNBA test on Tuesday, when Seattle hosts the always-dangerous Indiana Fever at 10 PM ET.

The game will air live on NBA TV.

The reigning champion New York Liberty battled through injury and absences over the weekend, narrowly retaining their second-place spot in the WNBA standings despite seeing their losing streak extend to two games with Sunday's 89-79 stumble against the Seattle Storm.

Already missing starting guard Leonie Fiebich, who is overseas competing at the 2025 FIBA EuroBasket tournament, the Liberty also played without center Jonquel Jones and guard Sabrina Ionescu.

While Ionescu is day-to-day with a neck issue, Jones will miss four to six weeks of action due to an ankle injury, the team announced on Saturday.

Despite dropping three of their last four matchups, the champs appear to be taking their recent downturn in stride.

"This isn't going to be the hardest thing that we face all season," said forward Breanna Stewart after Sunday's loss. "We have to kind of embrace the adversity a little bit, whether it's we're down players or things happen in the middle of the game."

New York wasn't the only team in trouble this weekend, though, as the Indiana Fever followed up last Thursday's stumble against the Golden State Valkyries with an 89-81 Sunday loss to the Las Vegas Aces.

Fever guard Caitlin Clark is now one-for-17 from behind the arc in her last two games, as Indiana struggles to break out of their eighth-place standing.

How to watch the New York Liberty this week

New York will hope for added firepower in order to snap their losing streak on Wednesday, when they'll face a rising Golden State squad at 10 PM ET.

Coverage of the game will air live on WNBA League Pass.

The NWSL is officially taking a breather, with the league kicking off the 2025 extended summer break after a roller-coaster weekend slate.

With half the of the 26-match regular season in the books, the No. 1 Kansas City Current extended their lead on the NWSL table to a towering eight points after defeating No. 11 Angel City 1-0 on Friday.

Helping balloon Kansas City's lead was No. 7 Racing Louisville, who kept No. 2 Orlando from claiming any points by securing a 2-0 upset win over the Pride on Friday.

With wins in five of their last seven matches, Louisville's refreshed roster has Racing entering the 2025 summer break with a 6-5-2 NWSL record, as the 2021 expansion side zeros in on a franchise-first playoff run.

"It's all about us. We're not really focused on the other team like we did a little last year," said midfielder Taylor Flint. "What are we going to do — what's our identity? I think that's a huge part of how we've been winning all these games."

On the other end of the table, the bottom four NWSL teams — Angel City, the No. 12 Houston Dash, No. 13 Chicago Stars, and No. 14 Utah Royals — will be looking for a major midseason reboot, after none managed to register a single win in the last five matchdays.

"We go from here, we break now, recharge, and we will be a very difficult opponent for a lot of teams in the second part of the season. That is our target now," said Angel City head coach Alexander Straus after Friday's loss.

There's still a lot left in 2025 NWSL play, with skidding teams banking on fresh starts while surging squads prepare to hit the ground running as soon as the season picks back up in August.

Australian golfer Minjee Lee came out on top at the 2025 KPMG Women's PGA Championship, lifting the third major tournament trophy of her career on Sunday.

Entering the final round atop the leaderboard, Lee never relinquished the lead, finishing the tournament a solid three strokes ahead of the competition.

"I definitely was nervous starting the day," the 29-year-old acknowledged following her win. "I looked calm, but not as calm as everybody thinks."

The win earned Lee both an 18-spot rankings boost to world No. 6 and a $1.8 million cut of the event's $12 million prize pool.

Finishing the 2025 KPMG Women's PGA Championship just behind Lee in a second-place tie were 21-year-old Thai pro and new world No. 29 Chanettee Wannasaen and 24-year-old US standout and new No. 49 Auston Kim. Each took home $944,867 thanks to their four-day performances.

Kim, in particular, cobbled together a massive comeback run, chipping away at her nine-stroke deficit entering the competition's final round to claim the best finish of her young career.

"I'm very proud of what I did," the LPGA Tour sophomore said afterwards. "Obviously, the result was really good, but I'm really happy how I handled myself, my emotions, all the adversity. The course is playing really, really tough, but I feel like this week my team and I were very locked in."

Notably, the tournament's top three finishers were the only participants to finish below par, as the field struggled with a punishing week of both Texas heat and windier-than-usual conditions.