The No. 1 Kansas City Current hit an unexpected skid on Saturday, when the 2025 NWSL Shield-winners suffered a 1-0 upset loss to the No. 10 Houston Dash — and lost their star striker, Temwa Chawinga, to injury along the way.
Despite leading the match in shots, shots on goal, and possession, the defeat snapped the Current's 17-game unbeaten streak, leaving the club one result short of setting a new franchise record.
"Sometimes things like this will happen," Kansas City head coach Vlatko Andonovski said postgame. "You're going to dominate, you're going to do everything well, but you're not going to score a goal…. I'm glad it happened now and not two games from now."
The loss stings, but with the top postseason berth already secured, Kansas City's concern turns to their 2024 MVP after Chawinga exited the match with a non-contact injury.
A knock to the upper right leg saw the Malawi international wheeled off the pitch in the 29th minute, with Andonovski later clarifying that it was not a knee injury.
Considered a frontrunner to repeat as both NWSL MVP and Golden Boot winner, the 27-year-old leads the league in scoring this season with 15 goals over 23 appearances.
While Kansas City is still awaiting a specific diagnosis for their star striker, time could be on the Current's side, as this week's international break gives Chawinga a moment to rest before her club closes out their 2025 NWSL regular season — and, more importantly, takes aim at a championship run.
How to watch the next Kansas City Current match
The league-leading Current will be back in action on NWSL Decision Day, with Kansas City closing out their 2025 regular-season campaign by hosting the No. 5 San Diego Wave on Sunday, November 2nd.
The time and broadcast details for the 2025 season's Decision Day will drop at a later date at NWSLSoccer.com.
The Houston Dash are on the brink of a $120 million sale, with Sportico reporting on Wednesday that owner Ted Segal is in advanced talks on a deal that would sever the NWSL club's ties to their MLS counterpart, the Segal-owned Houston Dynamo.
Any agreement is likely to face extensive reviews, however, with questions arising about the funding sources of the buyer, RHC Group.
Namely, RHC Group founder Richard Hsiao is the 24-year-old US-born son of Chinese billionaire Jianhua Xiao, who's currently serving a 13-year prison sentence for what the Chinese government described as financial crimes.
According to Sportico sources, RHC's funds do not have ties to Hsiao's father, but instead originate from "the independent wealth of Hsiao's mother, Zhou Hongwen."
While the NWSL traces the proposed deal's funding, Hsiao is already going through the league's standard background check, a process he reportedly began months ago.
Characterizing the league's "due diligence process" as "ongoing," the NWSL said, "As with all such matters, the NWSL Board of Governors retains full authority to approve or deny any ownership change based on the league's governance standards."
Should the Dash sale go through, the prospective new owners reportedly intend to invest in club infrastructure while keeping the team in Houston.
Angel City FC is on the brink of elimination from making the 2025 NWSL Playoffs, with the No. 11 LA club sitting seven points below the postseason cutoff line after falling to 2025 Shield-winners Kansas City 1-0 on Monday.
"There's no more losses at this point," Angel City center back and captain Sarah Gorden said postgame. "It's win or go home. We're going to have to put that into training this week, and come out and find something in us next weekend."
With only three games left in the regular season, Angel City will face the No. 10 Houston Dash, No. 4 Portland Thorns, and No. 14 Chicago Stars to close out their 2025 campaign.
"I know that if we can perform like this going forward, we will win a lot of football games," LA head coach Alexander Straus said after Monday's hard-fought loss.
In a season headlined by high-profile departures, Angel City now faces their second straight season missing the NWSL Playoffs, having reached the postseason just once since their 2022 debut.
However, that lone run to the playoffs could give this year's squad some hope — the LA club clinched their first and only postseason berth on the final day of the 2023 regular season.
As for the Current, the spoils keep coming for No. 1 Kansas City, who set a new NWSL single-season record with their 19th win on Monday — all while continuing the club's second-longest unbeaten run of 16 games.
"We believe so much in the process that we know if we execute everything at some point, we are going to be successful," said Kansas City head coach Vlatko Andonovski.
With just four regular-season matchdays remaining in the 2025 NWSL season, the clock is quickly ticking down for teams making a late push to rise above the postseason cutoff line on the league table — including the No. 10 Houston Dash.
Currently sitting three points outside of playoff contention, a motivated Houston side will look to make a leap against No. 5 Orlando on Friday night, as the defending champion Pride continues reeling from their recently snapped nine-game NWSL winless streak.
"For us, the next couple of matches are finals," Dash head coach Fabrice Gautrat said after last weekend's 4-0 loss to the No. 2 Washington Spirit. "We have to keep approaching it one game at a time like we've been doing, but we definitely have to have a response against the Orlando Pride."
Notably, Houston enters Friday's matchup with new firepower in the midfield, as teen phenom Chloe Ricketts joins the Dash as a short-term signing from the Spirit before she moves to incoming expansion side Boston Legacy FC in 2026.
"[Ricketts] is very lively, has great energy, great attitude, is eager and ambitious," said Gautrat of Houston's Wednesday signee. "She could play anywhere on our front line, to be honest."
How to watch the Houston Dash vs. Orlando Pride
The No. 10 Houston Dash will host the No. 5 Orlando Pride at 8 PM ET on Friday, with live coverage airing on Prime.
The Washington Spirit punched their ticket to the 2025 NWSL Playoffs over the weekend, downing the No. 10 Houston Dash 4-0 on Sunday to maintain a six-point grip on No. 2 behind Shield-winners Kansas City.
En route to clinching the 2025 Playoffs, Spirit striker Gift Monday scored a first-half hat trick in just 36 minutes — the fastest in the Washington club's history at Audi Field.
"I want to say a very big thank you to my coach for trusting me and giving me the opportunity to start in this game," said Monday afterwards. "I think the hat trick has been waiting for me for a very long time."
With only four regular-season match-weeks remaining and just six points separating No. 3 from No. 9 in the NWSL standings, the battle for the league's final six postseason berths is heating up.
No. 3 Gotham FC is on a roll, extending their unbeaten streak to six games with Friday's emphatic 3-0 win over the No. 6 Portland Thorns, while No. 8 Louisville still clings to their spot just above the postseason cutoff line thanks to a 1-0 Saturday win over No. 11 Angel City — Racing's first victory in five matches.
Meanwhile, the No. 5 Orlando Pride halted their fall down the table by snapping a nine-match winless streak with a 2-1 victory over the No. 7 San Diego Wave on Friday — the reigning league champions' first three-point NWSL result since June 13th.
While the No. 1 Kansas City Current have officially run away with the 2025 NWSL Shield, the race for top playoff seeding rages on, as the No. 2 Washington Spirit fights to hold their ground against an unpredictable No. 9 Houston Dash this Sunday.
Bolstered by star Trinity Rodman's return from injury, the Spirit enter the weekend on a nine-game unbeaten streak, going up against a motivated Dash side sitting just two points outside of postseason contention.
"Every game we just need to be a lot more clinical in the final third," Rodman said after last weekend's 2-2 draw with No. 11 Angel City. "We're doing all the hard stuff and then it's [lacking] quality at the end."
Washington isn't without top-table challengers, with No. 3 Gotham FC riding their own five-game unbeaten streak into a Friday night match against the No. 4 Portland Thorns, who sit tied for points with both the Bats and the No. 5 San Diego Wave in the NWSL standings.
"At this stage, almost everyone still has a real chance to make the playoffs, which is great for the league," said Gotham manager Juan Carlos Amorós after the Bats' 1-1 draw with Bay FC last Sunday. "But it also means nothing can be taken for granted."
How to watch the Washington Spirit and Gotham FC this weekend
No. 3 Gotham FC kicks off this weekend's NWSL action when they host the No. 4 Portland Thorns at 8 PM ET on Friday, with live coverage on NWSL+.
Then in Sunday's NWSL action, the No. 9 Houston Dash will visit the No. 2 Washington Spirit at 1 PM ET, airing live on Paramount+.
No. 8 Gotham FC's results disparity deepened this week, as the NJ/NY club claimed all three points off Liga MX side Monterrey in Wednesday's Concacaf W Champions Cup group-stage play after falling 2-1 to the No. 11 Houston Dash last Sunday — leaving the 2023 league champs without an NWSL win since late June.
Gotham has struggled in the league since returning from summer break, entering the match weekend with two draws in addition to Sunday's upset — fueled in part by veteran defender Emily Sonnett's own goal — under their belts this month.
"We try to always look at the glass half full instead of half empty," head coach Juan Carlos Amorós said after last weekend's loss. "Football sometimes throws you some difficult curves."
Now hitting the pitch on short rest, Gotham will aim to take advantage of the last-place Utah Royals on Saturday as they hunt a boost in the NWSL standings.
With just one regular-season win this year, the No. 14 Royals look ready for an offseason refresh after recently sending star forward Ally Sentnor to the No. 1 Kansas City Current.
"I think we're at 60%," Utah manager Jimmy Coenraets said earlier this week. "The 40% margin is getting people to be able to play 90 minutes in the way that we wanted to play."
How to watch Saturday's Gotham FC vs. Utah Royals FC match
No. 8 Gotham will kick off against the visiting No. 14 Utah Royals at 7:30 PM ET on Saturday.
Live coverage of the match will air on ION.
The first-ever NWSL Rivalry Weekend went off with a bang, with the Portland Thorns emerging as the slates's biggest winner following a definitive 4-2 victory over the Seattle Reign on Sunday.
Four different Thorns goal-scorers found the back of the net to extend Portland's home unbeaten streak to 10 matches.
"Rivalry games are like no other, and to be able to score in front of this crowd was such a great feeling," said Portland forward Pietra Tordin after registering the Thorns' fourth and final goal.
Even more, the result saw the Thorns leapfrog the Reign to claim fifth place in the NWSL standings — the only match to to shift the table all weekend as the bulk of the action ended in draws.
On Saturday, the No. 3 Washington Spirit and No. 8 Gotham FC saw the fireworks fizzle out in a scoreless draw, while a second-half stoppage-time equalizer from No. 11 Angel City's Alanna Kennedy secured the LA side a 1-1 draw with the No. 4 San Diego Wave.
The only other teams to tally three points were Friday victors No. 1 Kansas City and No. 12 Houston, with the Current picking off the No. 14 Utah Royals 1-0 behind star striker Temwa Chawinga's record-breaking goal while the Dash downed the recently coach-less No. 9 North Carolina Courage 2-1.
Call it competitive or call it cagey, but teams across the league have kept scorelines tight and tidy since the NWSL returned to play this month.
2025 NWSL standings: Week 15
1. Kansas City Current (13-2-0)
2. Orlando Pride (8-4-3)
3. Washington Spirit (8-4-3)
4. San Diego Wave FC (7-3-5)
5. Portland Thorns FC (7-4-4)
6. Seattle Reign FC (7-5-3)
7. Racing Louisville FC (6-6-3)
8. Gotham FC (5-5-5)
9. North Carolina Courage (5-6-4)
10. Bay FC (4-6-5)
11. Angel City FC (4-7-4)
12. Houston Dash (4-8-3)
13. Chicago Stars FC (1-9-5)
14. Utah Royals (1-11-3)
The North Carolina Courage cut ties with head coach Sean Nahas on Wednesday, abruptly announcing the manager's firing ahead of the NWSL team's Friday night match against the Houston Dash.
The brief club announcement noted that the termination was "effective immediately."
"The North Carolina Courage remain focused on the continued development of the team and maintaining a professional, competitive environment for players, staff, and supporters," the team said in a statement.
Nahas has helmed the Courage since October 2021, first taking over as interim head coach following the firing of embattled ex-manager Paul Riley. The club elevated the now-47-year-old to permanent manager prior to the 2022 season.
Across his nearly four years in Cary, Nahas amassed an overall 36-35-19 record while leading the Courage to two NWSL Challenge Cup trophies and a pair of playoff berths.
A Thursday morning press conference with NC Courage sporting director Ceri Bowley and director of communications Jake Levy did not reveal any specificities surrounding Nahas's dismissal, with Bowley simply saying the decision was based on a "multitude of factors."
"The standards of this club are extremely high, and it was felt that there [were] reasons that we needed to make a change in order to uphold the standards that we expect of the North Carolina Courage," he added.
The Courage currently sit just outside the postseason cutoff line at No. 9 on the 2025 NWSL table.
Assistant coach Nathan Thackeray will lead the team as they travel to Houston to face the No. 12 Dash on Friday.
The 2025 NWSL season is on summer international break, but many clubs aren't stopping play, with teams competing in strategic friendlies to test their depth and prowess during the long July window.
Last Tuesday, the Houston Dash hosted Liga MX side CF Monterrey, storming past Las Rayadas 4-0 behind goals from defender Avery Patterson and midfielders Delanie Sheehan, Maggie Graham, and Kiki Van Zanten.
The North Carolina Courage then played Liga MX titans Tigres UANL to a scoreless draw in a weather-shortened match on Wednesday.
On Sunday, Racing Louisville tested new and returning players — including star Bethany Balcer — in a domestic clash with regional USL Super League rivals Lexington SC, with the 1-1 draw serving as the NWSL side's tune-up to The Women's Cup, which kicks off this weekend in Brazil.
Meanwhile in Kansas City, the Current kicked off its inaugural four-team Teal Rising Cup tournament on Saturday, securing a 3-0 win over Brazil Série A1 club Palmeiras thanks in large part to forward Haley Hopkins's first-half brace.
The Current will next play in Tuesday's tournament final against Série A1's Corinthians, a team that defeated the Chicago Stars 1-0 in their Saturday semifinal with a last-gasp stoppage-time goal.
How to watch the Teal Rising Cup finale
The first-ever Teal Rising Cup will conclude on Tuesday, with the Chicago Stars and Palmeiras facing off in the mini-tournament's third-place match at 6 PM ET before the KC Current battles the Corinthians for the trophy at 9 PM ET.
Both matches will stream live on ESPN+.