The Boston Breakers defeated the Washington Freedom 2-1 Sunday at Harvard Stadium to win their third-straight game and send Washington home now winless in its last seven.

It took some time for the two teams to feel each other out as the first 15 minutes of the match were marred by giveaways and sloppy play, but Washington was not complaining.  The Freedom got on the board in just the third minute when Sarah Huffman went on a 50-yard run and burnt Breakers left back Stephanie Cox.  Huffman than sent a low cross to Nikki Marshall - who found herself playing forward in the absence of Abby Wambach - and Marshall tapped the ball into the net to give Washington a 1-0 lead.

Marshall almost doubled the Freedom's lead in the 17th minute when Sonia Bompastor played a ball over the top, but Marshall's shot was kick-saved by Breakers goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher.

Boston would equalize in the 23rd minute when Kelly Smith faked out Freedom midfielder Beverly Goebel nicely and played a ball wide left to Liz Bogus, who took a touch and fired the ball between the legs of Freedom goalkeeper Erin McLeod.  The goal was Bogus' second in as many games and came against the run of play.

Bompastor attempted to chip Naeher from the corner of the 18-yard box in first half stoppage time, but Naeher tipped the ball over the crossbar and preserved the 1-1 score entering halftime.

The second half produced much more rhythm for both teams as they pushed for a winner, and Boston would break through in the 74th minute off a spectacularly taken corner kick.  Second half substitute Kristine Lilly served a ball to the back post, where Ifeoma Dieke headed it toward goal and Lindsay Tarpley flicked it on to Jordan Angeli, who volleyed the ball into the back of the net.  The goal was Angeli's third of the season and second in two games and would end up being the winner for the Breakers.

"I knew that it was coming toward the middle of the goal and I just kind of put myself in there and it dropped in front of me and luckily Tarp got her head on it and it came right to me and I got to put it in the back of the net," Angeli said.

The win was the third-straight for Boston.  Shockingly, Washington is now winless in its last seven matches and has not won since a 2-1 victory over the Philadelphia Independence May 30.  Boston (4-5-4, 16 pts.) has made the middle of the table even more crowded, while the once second-place Freedom (4-5-5, 17 pts.) continue to skid.

"It's kind of been the way we have gone the last six or seven games," Freedom Head Coach Jim Gabarra said.  "We have kind of, at times, been good enough to win games  and we've had some spells where we have given up what I would call soft goals and the results were taken away from us.  It's definitely a bad patch we are going through, but I think we were set back the last couple of games where we gave up goals and I think we are fighting to get that belief back we need to win games."

Next up for the Breakers is a critical match Wednesday at home against FC Gold Pride and the Freedom plays next when it hosts FC Gold Pride Saturday on the Bay Area's second game of its East Coast road trip.