NWSL Week 7 preview and fixtures: Red Stars vs. Courage is a compelling instant rematch

Before last weekend, the North Carolina Courage looked pretty much unstoppable. Coming into that game, against Chicago, the Courage had lost just a single game — and that it was to the previously winless Orlando Pride made the result seem more like a fluke than anything else.

Before the loss to Orlando, North Carolina had spent four games pretty thoroughly dominating everyone it faced. Washington, Portland, Orlando, Boston — four games, four wins. The Courage had jumped out to a sizable lead at the top of the table, thanks mostly to a combination of a relentlessly high-pressure defensive strategy and — if an opponent could actually get into North Carolina’s defensive end — one of the league’s quickest and best breakouts. None of the four was a particularly high scoring affair; the Courage allowed just a single goal in all those games and all but one, the win against Orlando, finished 1-0.

North Carolina, in a previous life as the Western NY Flash, was a high-scoring team, sure, but it was mostly one-note and played in the key of Boston flat. Or flatten Boston, whatever. This year’s version, though, was almost immediately a more refined team, relying less on pure offensive power and more on the abilities, technical, bone-crushing or otherwise, of a roster that had, in the course of a year, gone from a bunch of rookies, no-names and second-chancers to bona fide stars.

If you were looking for instructions on how to defend a title, especially one that some people called a fluke or dumb luck (hi!), how the Courage started this season would’ve been a pretty good place to start. It took until Week 5 for North Carolina to lose for the first time or to even allow more than one goal in a game. That loss, 3-1 to Orlando in the Courage’s second meeting of the season with the Pride, was the first blemish on what could have been a perfect season.

But even then, losing to one of the league’s worst teams, it didn’t seem like it was time to panic or like maybe North Carolina was finally starting to come back to Earth. Mostly, it just seemed like one of those things, that old trope about parity and how on any given day any team could beat any other team, coming to life, temporarily.

The next week, last weekend, the temporarily part of that statement went out the window though. North Carolina, coming off a loss for the first time this season, didn’t do the thing where you rebound with a statement win, putting up five goals and then three more that you forgot you were supposed to use in the last game. Instead, the Courage followed up their first loss of the season by losing again, this time 3-1 to Chicago. Suddenly, the team that allowed just a single goal through four games had given up six in two.

Chicago’s start to the season was about as opposite of North Carolina’s as you can get. The Red Stars went 2-2-1 through their first four, splitting two games with Houston, losing to Portland, beating FC Kansas City, and playing to a draw against Boston. And where the Courage came into the season with a definite game plan and then employed it, Chicago’s start to the season was all over the place. The Red Stars had different formations and lineups in every game, never sticking with one thing for too long, even when it was working.

By the time the two met last weekend though, the Red Stars were unbeaten in two. And so North Carolina, apparently inspired by Chicago’s suddenly good form, decided to make some lineup changes of its own, using Jess McDonald as an outside back for the first half. Things McDonald is: the league’s all-time leading scorer, a good target forward. Things McDonald is not: an outside back, or apparently, a good defender. Memos Paul Riley did not get: that one.

What happened to North Carolina last weekend against Chicago wasn’t entirely McDonald’s fault, but playing her wildly out of position certainly didn’t help. Chicago’s first goal, a PK converted by Christen Press after Sabrina D’Angelo took her down, came as a result of McDonald mostly watching Press run onto a ball from Danielle Colaprico. Though the other two goals Chicago scored in the first half weren’t really on McDonald, she did spend the entire 45 minutes looking uncomfortable and uncertain the way someone who lied on their resume and then got a job as pilot might when all of a sudden they’ve got to fly a plane.

In addition to creating a defensive issue by putting McDonald in the back, the Courage’s high-pressure game never really got going, and North Carolina also lost a major chunk of its offense. McDonald and Lynn Williams are one of the league’s best scoring tandems, and McDonald, at 6’0, is always a threat on set pieces.

Beyond however much of Chicago’s win was on Riley’s strange choices, the Red Stars do appear to have gotten over their early season struggles. Chicago was a good team a season ago, and without many changes to the roster, there wasn’t much of an explanation for the slow start beyond Rory Dames’ tinkering.

Now Chicago has settled into the season. Press and Colaprico have started to link up better and Press, after struggling at the start of the season, has started to look more confident offensively. In addition to scoring the PK last weekend, Press also tallied an assist and won Player of the Week honors. Sofia Huerta, similarly, has started to integrate herself more into the Red Stars attack. She scored her first of the season last weekend.

On Saturday, the Red Stars and Courage will face off once again, and though North Carolina did get back in the win column by beating Sky Blue 2-0 on Wednesday night in North Carolina, the Red Stars are the team coming in with most of the momentum. Chicago, after beating the Courage last weekend, is now unbeaten in three and in second on the table.

Because North Carolina played — and won — on Wednesday, there’s now a five-point gap between them and the Red Stars again, but Chicago could gain some serious ground if tit can knock off the Courage for a second straight game.

Beyond that, North Carolina comes into Saturday’s game in Chicago on only three days rest, while the Red Stars haven’t played in a week. That’s kind of the perfect scenario for Riley to do some experimenting again, and Riley, if his entire tenure in Portland is any indication, is not a man who is afraid of such things, even when previous experience says he should be.

All times Eastern

North Carolina Courage 2 - 0 Sky Blue FC

Houston Dash vs. Seattle Reign FC, 4 p.m., BBVA Compass Stadium (Lifetime)

Chicago Red Stars vs. North Carolina Courage, 4 p.m., Toyota Park (go90/nwslsoccer.com)

Sky Blue FC vs. Orlando Pride, 7 p.m., Yurcak Field (go90/nwslsoccer.com)

FC Kansas City vs. Washington Spirt, 8 p.m., Children’s Mercy Victory Field (go90/nwslsoccer.com)

Portland Thorns FC vs. Boston Breakers, 10 p.m., Providence Park (go90/nwslsoccer.com)