How A Team With 0 USWNT Players Won The NWSL Challenge Cup

/ American Soccer, NWSL / By

For as shitty as 2020 has been, it’s offered some kick-ass sports stories. The following is just a blog about me gassing up the 2020 Houston Dash.

https://twitter.com/kristieamewis/status/1287515281498284033?s=20

The Challenge Cup brought many surprises, an undefeated Courage losing in the first round, Sky Blue FC proving all the idiot analysts wrong, and thousands of people praising a goddam playground.

But best of all, we got to see a new champion crowned. A team that maybe wasn’t written off, at least not on this website, but never got the respect it deserved. Houston’s run for the title was different in that for the first time in professional women’s soccer history, in the USA (don’t fact check me), a team won the competition with no current US National Team players. Also, unlike their baseball counterparts, they didn’t cheat to win the title.

Now that statement is just a tiny bit misleading. Not that the NT is the end all be all for a team’s success. In fact, in my humble opinion, the goal should be for the league to be bigger than the NT someday. But let’s just be honest, a team with no members from the best team in the world isn’t supposed to win championships. Now I mentioned it was a tiny bit misleading because there are definitely players that are either good enough to have a place on the NT, or have already played with the NT (Mewis, Campbell, and Groom did get called up to the NT AFTER the tournament).

The story of this 2020 Houston Dash is an interesting one which I’ll try to break down into 4 plots.

Part 1: The Not-So-Little-Brit That Could

Every championship-winning team is built around that one giant superstar on the squad. The Cavaliers had Lebron, the Patriots had Brady, and the Dash has Diesel. No, of course, I’m talking about that British Goddess we all love unless your name begins with M, ends in A, and has ART in between.

Watching Rachel Daly is a joy I can’t explain. If I were to try, I’d compare it to finding money in an old pair of pants or seeing that your asshole neighbor got a parking ticket because he’s a douchebag that thinks he can just park wherever TF he wants, FUCK YOU CARL! Too specific? I digress.

Rachel Daly has been the heart and soul of this Houston franchise for the past 4 years. She’s been through the ups and downs. She’s seen players pass through the organization like water. Daly has played alongside some great players at Houston in Carli Lloyd, Denise O’Sullivan, Morgan Brian, and Christen Press (almost). Daly has seen some shit at Houston and it brings me joy for her and the Dash to finally prevail.

Now I’m not sure I even need to go through the stats and numbers to tell you how great she’s been. Just a glimpse of her work ethic on the field should be enough for you to see she’s a game-changer. Running her ass off for 90 minutes, stringing together passes and shots that pop off the chart, making linesmen/women shit their pants with her death stare, she can do it all. But her leadership was also on full display for the entirety of the Challenge Cup, and honestly, I’d run through a brick wall for that woman (even if sometimes I don’t understand what she is saying).

All her work for the past 4+ years cumulated to an NWSL Challenge Cup MVP and a Championship win. But wait, the best is yet to come. Fortunately, she’ll be terrorizing the NWSL for the next 3 years so that’s pretty great.

Part Deux: The Emergence Of An Old Hero

I don’t know if a league as a whole has fallen in love with a person like we all fell for Kristie Mewis. Maybe only Christen Press is ahead, but not for journalists tbh. It’s a story that needs to be told in a long format. A tiny paragraph in a shitty blog does not do it justice. It’s the story of a GIGANTIC COMEBACK! Some might say the best comeback. A story that involved an ACL injury, bouncing around the league a few times, and ultimately a season MORE THAN WORTHY, of being nominated for FIFA’s Best XI and POY (🖕FIFA).

What we saw from Kristie was the best story we had in all of American Soccer in 2020. It’s either that or Orlando City SC somehow becoming a competitive team. There is absolutely no doubt in anyone’s mind that Kristie was the MVP of the league, and it wasn’t close. For you bozos so caught up on stats, here’s a sneak peek of Kristie’s Stat Line. 3 Goals – 6 Assists – 77% Pass Competitions – 1 Enormous Hangover.

Kristie’s stellar season led to a call up to the National Team for the first time in 5 years. Really a long-overdue return. Here’s how that went:

Part C: Reinforcements Coming In Hot

The haters will tell you I wrote a blog clowning on the Dash for trading away Sofia Huerta. It’s with deep sadness I can confirm the haters were right. I was an idiot. Looking back, that Huerta trade is one of the best trades in NWSL history. Megan Oyster and Shea Groom were gigantic additions and contributors to this championship team (understatement of the year) be it through their play on the field, or their Mario Kart bonding off it.

But it didn’t start there. Houston did the unthinkable in trading away Kealia Watt to Chicago for Katie Naughton. Kealia alongside Rachel Daly was the face of the Dash. She was one of the OG’s of the team. She is still to date (not for long tho) the leading goal scorer in the Dash’s history. Sure the trade was necessary, but who’d have thunk the Dash were capable of trading away Kealia Watt! Alongside Oyster, Naughton just brought a different type of tenacity in defense, which in my opinion should have led to a NT call-up.

Add to that the ball of energy that is Bri Visalli, a healthy Veronica Latsko, and a bit of drama behind the scenes to get the adversity flowing, and you have yourself a team ready to compete for a championship.

Part IV: Help From Another NWSL Team?

Is it unfair for anyone to say that the Orlando Pride Stan account had a hand in Houston winning the title? Probably. But facts are facts. Teams stunk it up when Orlando “Stanned Them.” It honestly was comical to see a team that has stunk it up for a couple years, not play in a tournament and somehow still take L’s. Sure it ran its course and started to get real corny, but it was fun while it lasted.

All jokes aside, this Houston team balled out (without banging any trash cans) and they should be a strong contender for many years to come. Especially with a good chunk of the roster being resigned the only thing that could possibly stop the Houston Dash in its tracks is a new logo curse or the continuation of using a culturally appropriated chant.

Related Posts