NWSL Week 16 preview: The Olympics break is over and every game matters

Hello friends. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?

There was some little thing going on called the Olympics, which was pretty cool. We got that tournament’s first all-European final, with Germany taking on Sweden to see who got to stand on the tallest part of an awkwardly long podium to watch a flag go up into the sky. Germany, a team that’s somehow never done better than bronze, won gold. Silvia Neid managed to not fall off her chair, I don’t think. It’s hard to know, because despite myriad options for Olympic viewing, NBC didn’t have a Silvia-cam. I think she just stood the whole time.

Sweden won silver while wearing H&M, which was cool, because when my mom told me that I shouldn’t wear pants from H&M to a wedding I was like, “if it’s good enough for the silver medalists at the Olympics, then certainly it’s good enough for a wedding,” and my mom really didn’t have a response. I mean, gold would have really helped me nail this sartorial point, but I think silver did the trick -- she hasn’t brought it up again.

Canada won bronze for the second straight time, beating Brazil in the third-place match. That game was kind of heartbreaking, because Canada is still insisting on using a font that someone thought looked cool on the menu of a dimly lit German restaurant for the names on their jerseys, and because the Olympics were in Brazil and the country got behind the women’s team and supported them in way that I don’t think they normally do, only to have it all fall apart again. It was also not heartbreaking, because it’s generally hard to hate on Canada, and even more so when there’s not another CONCACAF horse in the race.

I don’t really know what happened to the other CONCACAF team that was in the Olympics. I think it was the U.S. I thought it was super unfair when FIFA or the IOC or whoever made them decide the quarterfinal by seeing who could build the big Expedit shelf the fastest. Jill Ellis had been sketching plans for the Kallax in her journal for a year, and then they throw out the Kallax’s discontinued predecessor? Obviously Sweden, in their shiny H&M getups, was going to win. I heard Alex Morgan was still standing in the center circle in Brasilia clutching an Allen key and a bag of leftover bolts hours after the match ended.

Fun times, indeed. But all that Olympic-ing also meant that we had a little break from NWSL action for most of August, save for a makeup game between Houston and Washington last week (Washington won, 2-1). But now that we’re all done having to explain to “soccer people” that yes, the men’s Olympic tournament is a U-23 one, but the women do in fact play with full national teams, and with absolutely nothing else of note going on in the world of women’s soccer, we can shift our focus back to the league and the final month of the season.

When we left off, way back on July 31, the Spirit and Thorns were locked in a two-way tie for the top spot on the table. Washington claimed sole possession of first place with that win in Houston, pushing the Thorns into second. The Flash and Red Stars were occupying the final two playoff spots, a single point separating third from fourth. Below the red line, Sky Blue and Seattle were both making pushes towards the postseason, sitting just on the outside of the top four. The Pride and FC Kansas City weren’t far behind, but without many games left, time and the schedule were becoming the biggest opponent for both. Houston had started to turn things around, though the Dash’s playoff hopes had grown pretty faint thanks to a string of losses. Even Boston found something positive to go out on, a win on the last day before the break giving Matt Beard’s team something to feel okay about as the league went dark.

That 1-0 win over Orlando may have sent the Breakers into three weeks off on a high note, but it does little to stop the tide from going out on a season that wasn’t supposed to go this way. Boston is all but officially eliminated from postseason contention, and might actually be done by the time they take the field in Kansas City on Sunday. The good news for Boston is that FC Kansas City is one of just two teams they’ve managed to beat this season. In fact, until three weeks ago, the Blues were the only team the Breakers had managed to beat. The bad news, if it possible to get bad news when you’re already locked in a basement and someone’s taken an ax to the staircase, is that a lot has changed since the last time the two met.

Mostly, it’s that FC Kansas City has a lot more to play for with five games remaining than they did in mid-May. Then, the season still felt young and full of possibility, and a slow start still seemed like just that, and like something correctable. Now, FCKC is getting precariously close to not making it to the postseason for the first time ever, the two-time champions seeing their chance at becoming a dynasty derailed by huge offseason turnover and that slow start’s transition into a struggle of a season. The Blues finished off an up-and-down July with a 1-0 loss to Chicago, and come into the weekend in eighth. FCKC should get some help with the return of Heather O’Reilly and Becky Sauerbrunn, but it might be too little, too late -- a loss to Boston could put the Blues on the brink of elimination.

But while Houston, Boston and FC Kansas City gaze into the abyss, there are fights of a different kind going on a little further up the table. Fifth-place Sky Blue hosts fourth-place Chicago on Saturday, and the two teams are only separated by three points, meaning whoever wins would claim the fourth playoff spot, at least for this week.

Saturday also brings us the latest edition of the league’s biggest rivalry. The Thorns will head to Seattle to take on the Reign, and both teams could use the points, though for different reasons. A win could put Seattle as high as fifth, and with five games remaining, the Reign are running out of time to make a push for the postseason. But as Seattle makes a last-ditch attempt at a climb up the table, Portland is already about as high as you can go. The Thorns could move back into first with a win and a Washington loss.

Or Washington could extend their lead over the Thorns and possibly become the first team to claim a spot in the postseason. The Spirit take on the Pride on Friday night, and a win, combined with Seattle and Sky Blue losses, would clinch a playoff berth for Washington. Washington will be without leading scorer Estefania Banini, who’s set to miss 4-6 weeks after knee surgery last week. Orlando was also dealt a few blows on the injury front this week, losing both Steph Catley and Laura Alleway. Catley is done for the season due to a metatarsal fracture and hamstring strain, and Alleway will miss Friday’s game with a quad strain. If there’s any good news for the Pride, it’s that the expansion club can’t be eliminated this weekend, and that maybe someone convinced Alex Morgan to put down the Allen key and get on a plane back to the Magic Kingdom.

So there you have it. A weekend of huge games with playoff implications on both ends of the table, and all of it is just the setup, really. After this week, most teams will have just four games remaining, and without a clear favorite, or even a clear top four, the final month of the season is shaping up to be one full of crazy possibility. It’s good to be back.

All times Eastern

Friday

Orlando Pride vs. Washington Spirit, 7:30 p.m., Camping World Stadium (YouTube)

Saturday

Sunday

FC Kansas City vs. Boston Breakers, 6 p.m., Swope Soccer Village (YouTube)