With the NWSL season off to a sizzling (if not hectic start), we wanted to give a nod to ten of the league’s most underrated players — those who don’t always get the headlines, but who still deserve the credit.

In no particular order… 

Jennifer Cudjoe, NJ/NY Gotham FC

Cudjoe proved herself a standout defensive player for Sky Blue FC (now NJ/NY Gotham FC) during the 2020 Challenge Cup, appearing in six matches, four in which she was a starter, and logging 368 minutes of playing time. 

Throughout the Challenge Cup, she maintained an 80% success rate in tackles and a 66.7% success rate in aerial duels. When paired with her impressive passing accuracy, speed, and ability on the ball, the 27-year-old will look to continue to be a menacing presence on the Gotham FC backline.

Tziarra King, OL Reign

After concluding her college campaign with NC State, Tziarra King was selected eighth overall by the Utah Royals (who have since relocated to Kansas City) in the 2020 NWSL Draft. During the Challenge Cup, she made her professional debut against the Houston Dash, scoring a mere 20 minutes after entering the game as a substitute. Her performance in that Challenge Cup earned her a starting spot in each match of the subsequent Fall Series, during which she scored her second professional goal.

In January of 2021, she was traded to the OL Reign — and if her short-lived career with the Royals was any indication of what kind of player she will be for the Reign, the league should be on notice.

Shea Groom, Houston Dash

Also emerging as a force during the 2020 Challenge Cup was Dash midfielder Shea Groom. Appearing in seven matches throughout the tournament, Groom notched three goals and an assist, leading the Dash to their first-ever title.

During the Fall Series, Groom added her name to the scoresheet in three of four matches played and notched two assists in the sole match she did not score in. Furthermore, the young star has signed a three-year contract extension with the Dash, keeping her in Houston for the foreseeable future. If Groom continues on her current trajectory, it is almost certain she will become one of the Dash’s most valuable players, even if she has yet to receive her full due.

Denise O’Sullivan, North Carolina Courage

A quiet but valuable presence in the Courage attacking third, Denise O’Sullivan is as reliable as they come. In 2,158 minutes of playing time during the 2019 regular season, O’Sullivan maintained an 84.3% passing success rate, completing 1,039 of 1,233 attempted passes and averaging 51.4 passes per 90 minutes. In 2020, the Irish international spent time on loan in the FA Women’s Super League, playing a total of 761 minutes in 11 matches for Brighton & Hove Albion.

Of O’Sullivan’s ability in the midfield, Courage head coach Paul Riley called her “the engine room, the architect, the inspiration and the leader of a very good midfield unit” — frankly, we couldn’t agree more. 

Kealia Watt, Chicago Red Stars

After being traded from the Houston Dash to the Chicago Red Stars last year, Kealia Watt debuted with her new team during the 2020 Challenge Cup, but really found her footing with the Red Stars during the Fall Series, creating thirteen scoring chances, netting two goals, and assisting on two more.

Her Fall Series performance caught the attention of Vlatko Andonovski, earning the forward a call up to an 11-day USWNT training camp that took place in October. As the 2021 season approaches, Watt will look to continue to assert her value in the Red Stars’ lineup.

Simone Charley, Portland Thorns

A member of the outstanding Portland Thorns offense, Simone Charley has flown under the radar since her start in the NWSL. The forward notched a goal apiece in the Challenge Cup and Fall Series, combining for 574 minutes of play during the shortened 2020 NWSL season.

Her value has not gone unnoticed by Thorns head coach Mark Parsons, however, who stated that Charley provides a “unique dimension in the final third” as well as “attacking qualities that provide a constant threat to the opposition.”

Ashley Hatch, Washington Spirit

Ashley Hatch is arguably one of the Spirit’s most talented offensive players, as she scored one goal and assisted on another during the shortened 2020 season, and previously led the Spirit in scoring during the 2018 and 2019 seasons, earning the Golden Boot award in 2018, her first season with the team.

The BYU alum boasted an impressive 100% success rate in tackles during the 2020 Fall Series and a 75% passing success rate, earning a nod from the USWNT as she was subsequently called into October’s training camp.

Addisyn Merrick, Racing Louisville FC

Addisyn Merrick is a noteworthy player who rarely gets the credit she deserves. The 28th-overall pick in the 2020 NWSL Draft, Merrick was the first to be selected in Racing Louisville’s expansion draft, plucking the up-and-coming star from the North Carolina Courage and landing her in Kentucky.

Though she only appeared in eight matches for the Courage, she posted a 62.5% tackle success rate during last year’s Challenge Cup and a 69.2% tackle success rate in the Fall Series. Her selection in the expansion draft dealt a significant blow to the Courage’s backline, and her presence on defense will be crucial for Louisville’s success in their inaugural season.

Rocky Rodriguez, Portland Thorns

A staple player in Portland’s midfield, Rocky Rodriguez proved her undervalued ability during the 2020 Challenge Cup. In only six games played during the tournament, Rodriguez made ten interceptions, seven clearances, and seven key passes to lift the Thorns to the semifinals of the tournament.

Likewise sensational on the global stage, the Costa Rican international has recorded 73 caps and scored 42 goals for her country. Arguably, she is largely responsible for the lethality of the Thorns’ offense, especially when paired with players like Lindsey Horan and Christine Sinclair.

Kristen Edmonds, Kansas City NWSL

Called the “ultimate utility player” in an article posted by the Kansas City Star, Kristen Edmonds was traded from the Orlando Pride to Kansas City in January. In 866 minutes played for her former team, Edmonds posted a 60.3% success rate in duels, 19 clearances, and 9 interceptions.

A versatile asset, Edmonds appeared on defense, in the midfield, and on offense for the Pride and will likely continue a similar pattern with her new team. Kansas City coach Huw Williams has already asserted that the team will be filling the defender in at a lot of spots and that the depth and quality of play that Edmonds provided were exactly what the team was looking for. Headlines from earlier in the tournament may have focused on her scuffle with Portland’s Morgan Weaver, but don’t get distracted — Edmonds is an elite and versatile player.  

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.