The Washington Spirit scored all of their goals in the second half in a 3-1 victory over the Houston Dash on Friday night in the National Women’s Soccer League.
Hal Hershfelt tied it at 1 in the 52nd minute before Brittany Ratcliffe’s long shot put the Spirit ahead in the 82nd. Croix Bethune scored an insurance goal two minutes later for the Spirit’s third straight win.
Houston’s Natalie Jacobs scored just 59 seconds into the match to give the Dash (1-2-1) the early lead. It was the fastest goal in Houston history.
Jacobs was substituted late in the first half after colliding with a Spirit player on a header attempt and falling hard. She grabbed her back as she was attended to by trainers.
It was the Spirit’s first three-game regular season winning streak since winning four in a row in 2021. It was also just the Spirit’s (3-1-0) fourth road win since the start of the 2022 season.
The loss spoiled Dash’s 10th anniversary celebration of their first NWSL match.
Spirit midfielder Andi Sullivan, a regular on the United States national team, played in her 100th NWSL regular season game.
PRIDE 1, REALS 0
Marta came on as a second-half substitute and scored in the 68th minute to give the Orlando Pride a 1–0 victory over the expansion Utah Royals.
It was the first victory for Pride, who had three draws in a row to open the season and remain undefeated. Orlando is one of four NWSL teams without a loss this season.
Marta, a six-time FIFA World Player of the Year and Brazil’s career goals leader, was coming off international duties with Brazil in the recent SheBelieves Cup.
The Pride were playing in Utah for the first time since 2019 during the Royals’ first iteration. The team went bankrupt in 2020 and its assets were moved to Kansas City, but was revived as an expansion team this year.
It was the second time in Orlando’s history that the team went undefeated in the first four matches. In 2021, the Pride are unbeaten in their first seven games.
Utah has one win and three losses to start the season.
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