From the College Cup to the NWSL and finally an agreement in Denmark, buckle up

It has been quite the week in women’s soccer.

How can I possibly touch on one topic in women’s soccer when the College Cup is this weekend, former Seattle Reign head coach Laura Harvey threw us all a curve ball and accepted the job as head coach of Salt Lake’s NWSL team, Denmark’s women’s national team and their federation reached a four-year agreement and of course ‘tis the season for new coach signings (we’re looking at you, Houston.)

I figured I’d give you the Skimm of women’s soccer this week, because it’s all important and worth knowing. So here, we, go (MLS Instant Replay voice.)

No. 1 Stanford (22-1-0, 11-0 Pac-12) vs. No. 5 South Carolina (19-2-1, 9-0-1 SEC) will open up Final Four play on Friday at 5:00 p.m. ET at Orlando City Stadium and No. 3 Duke vs. No. 4 UCLA will follow at 7:30 p.m. ET. The top-seeded Cardinal will look to advance and win the program’s second national title, while the Gamecocks are making their first College Cup appearance.

The Cardinal stomped over No. 3-seeded Penn State, 4-0 in the quarterfinals. All of Stanford’s goals against the Nittany Lions came in the first 25 minutes of play. While Stanford is no stranger to postseason play (this is its eighth in program history and seventh under head coach Paul Ratcliffe), this year it has everything and more to prove after an early exit last year in the second round of postseason play against Santa Clara. All year what has made the Cardinal so hard to beat has been their defense — ranked among the best in the country thanks in large part to the dynamic center-back duo of Alana Cook and Tierna Davidson.

Next: Who’s going to the NCAA women’s College Cup?

On the other side of the field, Stanford leads the NCAA in goals with 86 to date, also a program record. Six different players have 22 goals or more, if that says anything. The Gamecocks are in for a fight, but they do have bite in forward Savannah McCaskill, who leads the team in goals with eight and has added nine assists. McCaskill was named a MAC Hermann Trophy semifinalist earlier this week along with her teammate, defender Grace Fisk. South Carolina punched its ticket to the College Cup after a dominant 2-0 win over Florida last week and is flying high as it has outscored opponents 7-0 through the postseason so far. While the Gamecocks are most definitely cruising, I don’t see anyone stopping the Cardinal this time around, especially with U.S. women’s national team midfielder Andi Sullivan back for her red-shirt season and looking stronger than ever.

The other two sides battling it out for a ticket to the championship game are Duke (23-2-0, 10-0-0 ACC) and UCLA (19-2-2, 8-2-1 Pac-12.) The Blue Devils blew over Baylor 4-0 last week to earn their sport in the College Cup for the second time in the past three years. Duke has yet to win a national title despite being a late postseason contender almost every year. It has been a historic season for the Blue Devils, who set a program record for most single-season wins, ranked wins, home wins and shutouts. Much of the credit should go to the backline, which has earned a shutout in each postseason game, with goalkeeper Ej Proctor earning her 34th career shutout to match Duke’s all-time record previously set by Melissa Carr from 1992-1995.

The Bruins are advancing to their 10th College Cup in program history after defeating Princeton 3-1 in the quarterfinals. The Bruins have all the young star power in sophomore midfielder Jessie Flemming and freshman forward Ashley Sanchez. Flemming and junior forward Hallie Mace (previously a standout center-back for the Bruins in 2016) were recently named Mac Hermann semifinalists. Flemming will be a threat, per usual, against Duke as she has a way with scoring big game-winning goals (already three this year.) Sanchez leads the Bruins with 15 assists and has already made her mark in the college ranks in just her first season. The Duke-UCLA matchup should be a defensive battle with two top-ranked midfields controlling the play. This one is surely a toss-up, but given the solid senior class on the Blue Devils, I’m going with the veterans after their first national title.

As the faces of future NWSL first-round draft picks take the field this weekend, the winningest coach in NWSL history, Laura Harvey, is getting her newest team in Utah ready for the rookies.

Harvey stepped down as head coach of Seattle Reign last month and rumors began to circulate almost immediately that her next move would be with the USWNT — wrong, Harvey is now committed to building up the team in Salt Lake City which officially replaces FC Kansas City. When Harvey was in Seattle she held an impressive record of 51-33-26 overall. She led the Reign to the Shield in both 2014 and 2015. While Utah may be the unexpected path for Harvey, NWSL fans everywhere will surely be excited to keep the winningest coach in the NWSL in the mix.

“This is a great place for me to continue to develop as a coach, and I believe we will be able to make a huge stamp on women’s soccer not just in Utah but nationwide,” Harvey told the NWSL.

In other NWSL news, the Houston Dash named Vera Pauw the second head coach in the team’s history, the club announced on Tuesday. Pauw joins the NWSL as just the second woman head coach in the league (Harvey is the other). Pauw coached the South African women’s national team and led them through the 2016 Rio Summer Olympic Games. Before her time there, she was involved with the Russian women’s national team as a technical director and interim head coach. Pauw has also served as the head coach of Scotland and Netherlands. The Dash finished in eighth place in the 2017 season, but from players like Carli Lloyd to Rachel Daly and a *fingers crossed* healthy Kealia Ohai in 2018, Pauw has more than enough talented personnel to have a turn-around year.

Last but not least, a four-year agreement has finally been made between the Danish women’s national team and their federation (DBU). This is a long time coming after the dispute resulted in the national team forcing the federation to cancel a World Cup qualifying match against Sweden back in October. The agreement was approved on Saturday and will see more than 2 million kroner (~$320,000) more a year for women’s soccer. The agreement also means players’ salaries and scholarships will increase 180 percent. Denmark isn’t the first European team to demand better work environments for female players; earlier this year the Irish and Scottish women’s national teams reached agreements as well.