Onto the semis for the fifth straight year!
Reign beat Angel City to move on to the next round
The OL Reign beat Angel City FC 1-0 on Friday in front of a crowd of 12,152 fans, winning their first playoff game since 2015 to move on to the semifinals. Veronica Latsko scored a late goal while Claudia Dickey continued her hot streak with another clean sheet.
The game began with familiar difficulties for the Bold, as the offense couldn’t get anything going for the first thirty or so minutes of the game. Meanwhile, Angel City put together a moderate offensive effort, getting the ball in front of the net by the fifth minute, when Claire Emslie slotted in a cross that Cook knocked away.
However, other than an Angel City corner in the 18th and a near-threat by the Reign in the 45th, neither team managed to put a whole lot of deep pressure on the other during the half. 0-0 going into halftime.
The Reign were far more aggressive after the break ended. In the 47th, Fishlock got the ball to an open Rapinoe on the left edge of the box, but she kicked the ball just slightly too high, skimming the top of the net. The Bold kept up their attack, with Latsko hitting a 52nd minute low cross that missed everyone and bounced off the post. The drive was capped off by a phenomenal takeaway by Rapinoe, but Angel City keeper Angelina Anderson made a diving save to keep the game scoreless.
The Bold back line continued keeping Angel City’s offense in check, only allowing a couple attacks over the half to get all the way to Claudia, and when it did get to her, she did her part and snuffed out the threat.
Late in the half, the Reign put together another attack, bringing the ball to the front third in the 86th and applying pressure. Rapinoe crossed it into the box in the early 87th, but Anderson got a finger on it to deflect it away and her defense booted it upfield. McClernon then brought it back up the wing and crossed to Latsko, who knocked the ball off Anderson and into the goal.
1-0 Reign, and they held on for the last bit of play to win the game and move on.
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With her clean sheet today, the team has gone seven straight halves without letting in a goal, something Harvey attributes to a whole team effort, especially on defense.
“We’ve had a few games this year where we’ve let goals in that we don’t believe we should have done. Sloppy, I would say sloppy goals,” Harvey stated. “And we’ve just tidied up on that recently. And I think that’s a big key to that. And I also think that Phoebe, Lu, Alana, Shae, Sam, we have a deep amount of people who can play those positions. And I think Claudia’s stepped up, you know.”
Rapinoe credited the team’s second half turnaround to keeping better control of the ball.
“We had a not very good first half, a lot of technical errors and losing the ball and we obviously didn’t want to keep that going, so I think [we had] just a little bit more focus and intensity,” Rapinoe said. “Harvs made some great adjustments and halftime and I feel like we kind of figured out the press a bit better.”
Though the final regular season home game saw an audience of upwards of 34,000, the number of spectators dropped significantly on Friday. Despite vowing to bring all the fans of Rapinoe’s sendoff back in the future, Harvey didn’t focus on the lesser size of the crowd, instead lauding the energy that the fans had and noting that the game was scheduled five days before it occurred.
“I think the atmosphere that Lumen has created has been amazing,” Harvey said. “And I said it after the last game with Pinoe [retiring], we believe that we’ve got a product here that people want to see. And I think we saw it tonight, you know. Quick turnaround, no one knew we would have this game, and we still got a decent crowd. The atmosphere was electric, you know.”
The Reign play in the NWSL Semifinals against the San Diego Wave on November 5 on the road. Even though the Wave won the NWSL Shield this year, the Reign have gone 4-0 against them this year, including Challenge Cup matches. The Reign have not won a semifinal since 2015, despite making four straight semifinals between 2018 and 2022. If they beat the Wave, they would face the winner of the other semifinal between the Portland Thorns and NJ/NY Gotham FC.
