The Portland Thorns are looking for a repeat of last year. Sure, both years they lost the Shield on the final weekend of the National Women’s Soccer League regular season, but last year’s NWSL Championship win likely soothed some of that pain. Now, they are focused and ready for this weekend’s semifinal matchup against Gotham to get them back in the final. Heading into the weekend, head coach Mike Norris alongside MVP finalists Sophia Smith and Sam Coffey talked about the upcoming game.
“We’re so excited,” Coffey said of the semifinal. “The team is in a great spot. Obviously, we had some players here, some players returning from international duty, but to get together this week and finally have the whole team back together has been awesome. We’ve had a really good week of training, energy’s high, team is feeling good. We’re ready to go.”
Smith added, “it’s been a really good few weeks.” “We weren’t here last week, but from what we’ve heard, the energy has been really high and people are just focused on the task at hand and that’s to win this first game. We’ve been through a lot this season. We’ve had our ups and downs and that’s normal. That’s what comes with the long NWSL season… This is when we need to just give everything that we have and save nothing because we have nothing to save it for.”
