“It’s unreal,” defender Ellie Wheeler told reporters after the match. “I think it’s just so special and so deserving for how much work we put in and just how we look towards every single game and the focus we have… We’re definitely gonna, you know, acknowledge what we’ve done and the history we’ve made, and celebrate that, and then obviously get back to work, but enjoy it while we can.”

As the 10 minutes of stoppage time ticked away, the humongous teal Tiffany & Co. box made its way down to the pitch. The CPKC Stadium crowd roared, the platform appeared and the Current lined up in their freshly-printed Shield-winner shirts – which promptly sold out at the team store within 20 minutes of the ceremony ending.

Kansas City now has an untouchable 53 points and a 17-2-2 record with five matches remaining in the regular season. Winning the Shield also guarantees bids to the 2026 NWSL Challenge Cup and 2026-27 Concacaf W Champions Cup. 

“We work for things like this, moments like this all season,” head coach Vlatko Andonovski said after the match. “It’s a justification of the work we’ve done this year and last year.”

Back in early May, the Reign were the first team to shut out the Current, winning 1-0 at Lumen Field. It was Kansas City’s second consecutive loss, dropping the Current to 5-2-0 at the time. They went on to outscore their next four opponents 10-3 and start an eight-game winning streak. The club’s unbeaten streak now sits at 14 matches. 

The Current had a few early chances, including an Ally Sentnor shot blocked in the second minute, one wide-right by Nichelle Prince in the seventh, and another by Robinson in the 10th. Temwa Chawinga, making her return from a knee injury, had another good look in the 13th that went wide right.

Debinha broke the drought, burying a penalty kick in the 34th minute. The penalty, a handball in the box, was assessed after confirmation from VAR. The Current carried that lead into halftime with a 13-0 advantage in shots and 66% of possession. 

The second half started much slower with a litany of breaks for players down on the pitch and the Current exhausting their substitutions by the 73rd minute. Kansas City also appeared to lose veteran defender Hailie Mace to an ankle injury, forcing her to exit in the 62nd despite entering the match at the beginning of the second half.

Chawinga scored the go-ahead goal in the 74th, collecting a carom after Bia’s shot was blocked. She headed it past goalkeeper Claudia Dickey and the CPKC Stadium crowd erupted into a spirited rendition of “Happy Birthday.”

It’s the first Shield of Andonovski’s decorated NWSL coaching career, which includes a pair of Championship titles in 2014 and 2015 with FC Kansas City. The Seattle Reign captured the Shield in those two campaigns.

In the space of two years, perceptions of Vlatko Andonovski’s coaching ability have fluctuated wildly. In the summer of 2023, he oversaw the earliest World Cup exit in United States women’s national team history. In the present, he leads a Kansas City Current side standing head and shoulders above the rest of the National Women’s Soccer League.

How could a coach be so successful in one job, having fallen flat in another? It’s a conundrum, but not one lacking for theories.

The main difference between national team and club is the time in training. Where club coaches can work with talent on a day-to-day, week-to-week basis, there are long spells where national team coaches don’t interface with their players. This is a big reason why many coaches — particularly those who enjoy having full autonomy and developing players — steer clear of the international arena: they would be driven mad without regular on-field contact and the chance to impose themselves on their teams.

It’s true that some coaches just don’t thrive in the international environment. But time on the training ground isn’t the only reason.

The Current’s season has been fluid, with various players all excelling and playing in great form simultaneously. Striker Temwa Chawinga has carried her scoring form from 2024 into 2025, already with 11 goals. At the other end of the pitch, Kansas City has conceded just 10 goals, with defender Kayla Sharples emerging as their defensive anchor. In attack, Michelle Cooper and Bia Zaneratto add directness, while Debinha provides the creative spark to tie the forward line together.

However, the midfield engine room has been a major reason for their success, and at the heart of that is their young defensive midfielder, Hutton. She acts as the conduit between the attacking and defensive line, constantly putting the Current into good attacking transitions and defending her space in defensive transitions.

Hutton’s rise in the league hasn’t gone unnoticed (she now has six caps with the U.S. women’s national team since her senior international debut on February 23, 2025, after making her professional debut in 2024), but appreciating her true tactical talents is often drowned out by the more flashy players like Chawinga and Cooper. For her part, Hutton adds bite and ball-recycling to a team full of technical quality; holding the midfield together is a shared task between her and Lo’eau LaBonta.

Without the ball, it’s Hutton’s proactivity and hunger that stand out. The modern defensive midfielder is expected to be an all-round player, and Hutton is already showcasing her on-the-ball talents. In essence, she’s a midfield anchor primarily tasked with winning back possession and serving as a disciplined shield for the backline — a tempo-controlling midfielder who links play through and between the lines for more creative players. 

Her tackling, recoveries, and interceptions reflect her reading of the game, and though there are lapses in concentration at times, her recovery and athleticism are impressive. 

The midfielder’s data shows balance. Hutton ranks in the mid-70s and 80s in most of her key metrics like tackles + interceptions, blocks, take-ons, touches, and progressive passes, which are the traits you look for in a modern holding midfielder. 

In their game against North Carolina Courage on April 26, the Current were pressing North Carolina high up the pitch with Chawinga closing down the full-back. Still, the Courage found a way through with one sweeping pass to their striker. In this moment, Hutton is already positioned slightly higher to keep the lines compact and allow KC to keep play happening in the final third. Once the ball is passed through, she runs towards the line of the pass, and though she doesn’t make the interception, she immediately dispossesses the opposition striker cleanly and gets the ball out to Hailie Mace, who drives forward, back into the Courage’s defensive half.

Hutton ranks in the high 80th percentiles for tackles and interceptions, and her volume is among the league’s best. At just 18, she still has moments where a missed challenge leaves space exposed, but that’s a natural part of her development.

However, Hutton has shown an immense capacity to cover her position and make enough tackles and interceptions that put the Current back into attacking transitions, as seen here against the Portland Thorns.

In this game on August 23, the Portland Thorns were playing out from the back, with KC Current trying to get close to tracking each pass. As the ball progressed, Hutton had to track back from a higher position into a more defensive one to cover for center-back Sharples’ push towards the ball carrier. Hutton is the one to mark that space and cover for her defender, and managed to do so by intercepting the pass into the onrushing Thorns midfielder.

The way LaBonta and Hutton are set up is very interchangeable positionally. Hutton will often start slightly ahead of LaBonta, being the aggressor, and because of her pace, covers for LaBonta’s lack of mobility in comparison. LaBonta will play the riskier, more creative passes to get the offensive line moving, but Hutton’s secondary role is to recycle possession as she patrols close by, showing for the ball to keep possession ticking.

The clip below shows one example of the Current’s style of building out from the back. The first point to note is LaBonta’s and Hutton’s positioning, with the former positioned deeper than Hutton but placed between the lines of Courage’s pressure. Once LaBonta breaks through the press with her pass into Debinha, Hutton is immediately available for the wall pass and takes a quick touch (albeit a heavy one) into Chawinga that puts the Current through into an attacking transition sequence.

However, Hutton isn’t all about quick link-up play — she also excels at slowing down and orchestrating play when there is no obvious pass forward. She is a high-volume passer, averaging 42.84 passes per 90 minutes (according to FBref). While this only places her in the 68th percentile, it is extremely similar to elite defensive midfielder Sam Coffey‘s 45.99 passes per 90, with Coffey being a more established ball progressor and passer. These passes aid in recycling possession and ensuring that KC doesn’t needlessly lose the ball and can re-adjust their shape.

The above example from the game on August 1 against Racing Louisville shows the Current pushing through the middle. But we see that both Chawinga and Zaneratto are marked by Louisville’s compact back four. Instead of playing into that, which has a high probability of losing possession, Hutton turns and plays it back to her defense to reset play and find an alternate solution.

Hutton is still a bit raw, but every game showcases her elite potential to become a world-class defensive midfielder. She is so far an effective and invaluable member of the midfield who complements LaBonta’s style, which has unquestionably aided in propelling KC Current to the top of the league.

The playoff field has its first confirmed guest, and transfer rumors are swirling over Angel City. Meanwhile, the Sphere of Mediocrity grows ever larger.

Here’s how they shape up after most of Week 18:

Cream of the Crop

x-Kansas City Current (15-2-1, 46 pts; vs Courage, 2-0):  Temwa Chawinga did not score against the North Carolina Courage, but neither did the Courage. That leaves Chawinga with 11 goals while the Current have conceded only 10. Kayla Sharples continues to stay in the discussion for Defender of the Year, and even as it has taken Ally Sentnor some time to fully integrate into the attack, the defense has become a well-oiled machine, and the win over the Courage made the Current the first team to secure an official invite to the 2025 playoffs. The only bad news is that Esther Gonzalez scored for Gotham to edge ahead of Chawinga in the Golden Boot race.

Angel City wins two in a row as transfer rumors involving Alyssa Thompson heat up, the Kansas City Current clinch a playoff spot before Labor Day, bottom teams continue to make things interesting, and Racing Louisville drop yet more points in stoppage time.

Where does Angel City stand amidst Alyssa Thompson’s reported transfer interest?

Angel City earned a 2-1 win over California counterparts Bay FC, and now sit just outside the playoff line in ninth place. Monday night’s result, however, feels like a burial of the lede, as it was set in the backdrop of multiple departures. On Wednesday, the club announced the transfers of Alana Kennedy and Katie Zelem to the Lion City Lionesses for an unspecified fee. Those exits were soon overshadowed by bombshell reports of Chelsea’s interest in 20-year-old star winger Alyssa Thompson. The deal is reportedly in “advanced talks” prior to the FA Women’s Super League’s deadline day on September 4, as Thompson was an “excused absence” from Monday’s match.   

The Most Valuable Player debates in the National Women’s Soccer League can often be contentious, with much debate over what should quantify a most valuable player. Could continue to perform without that player? When they do, does that hurt said player’s chances? For lesser teams, does an MVP need to go above and beyond to put themselves in the conversation?

That a team could perform well without a certain player doesn’t mean that player isn’t valuable, of course. Maybe that team has a great coach, or had a GM that build a great roster. Regardless, whether or not a team is good—and could do well without them—shouldn’t discount a player’s chances at MVP. Oftentimes, a player is great because of the teammates they have around

There’s no denying the belief in Ally Sentnor that every coach and sporting director has shown her over the last few years.

From the University of North Carolina to every draft war room across the National Women’s Soccer League, from the Utah Royals brain trust to U.S. women’s national team head coach Emma Hayes, everyone believes that Sentnor has the goods.

The trouble is that she has been stuck on a cellar-dwelling roster of a recent expansion team that forces her to be everything the rest of the squad can’t be. Not an easy thing.

That ended on Friday, when The Athletic reported Sentnor would be transferred to the Kansas City Current. Jeff Kassouf followed up in ESPN with details of the record-breaking $600,000 intra-league transfer fee (plus a 20% sell-on fee) the Royals would receive.

We’re bringing back an old feature where we will take a deeper look at a goal from the prior National Women’s Soccer League weekend. I’ll be sharing responsibility for this space with Arianna Cascone.  Onto the first goal.

The Kansas City Current beat down Bay FC across the board on Saturday at CPKC Stadium. They were already sitting on a 1-0 lead from an early goal that technically started with a keeper giveaway but was more the product of Bay laziness. The visitors made it through the half hour mark having conceded only that early goal. And then trouble struck.

Now, through five games, it appears the whole squad has picked up right where it left off last November when the Current advanced to the league semifinals. The biggest difference?

“It’s just more mature,” coach Vlatko Andonovski said after his team’s 2-0 victory against Houston on Saturday. “We still have a very similar system and the structure is very similar but there are little things that we do better.”

One specific thing that has helped the Current take over the top of the table is their ability to limit scoring. At this point last season, the Current had conceded 10 goals including four in a nine-goal barnburner against Portland to open the season. They also had a 1-1 draw against Gotham. 

This time around, Kansas City is undefeated and has allowed just one, giving goalkeeper Lorena four shutouts to start the season. It also helps that she’s only faced 15 shots on target. That mark is second-lowest in the league, though Orlando has allowed one more goal.

“She certainly gives comfort and confidence to the backline,” Andonovski said. “Our whole line plays more composed, they defend with confidence, it’s just a different feeling and I’m glad that we have that. It shows every game.”

So far, Lorena appears to be another rousing success story for Andonvski’s international recruiting portfolio, playing in her first NWSL season. The Ituverava, Brazil, native made her professional debut in 2017 and helped lead her home country to a silver medal in 2024 Olympic Tournament.

With her in goal, the Current set a club record last week with 401 consecutive shutout minutes. Her five straight wins to start the season is the second-longest streak of its kind. As a team, the Current have won nine regular season matches in a row and boast an NWSL-best +6.9 expected goal differential.

“I think it’s really engrained in this team that everyone has to defend and also what we really try to hit on is defend with attack in mind,” Kayla Sharples said after the match. “Being put in those specific positions also allows us to score on the other end, to be lethal and attack in transition. I think it’s all just coming together.”

Another valuable element to this team is the lack of offseason movement. Outside of Lorena, who signed a three-year deal in December, the club did not add any other consistent contributors after the Olympic break, which proved to be an important turning point for the team last year.

Adding Sharples and Alana Cook, as well as goalkeeper Almuth Schult, who departed in the offseason, the Current went on a run, ending a three-match losing streak and allowing just one goal in the next six matches. Now, they are finally seeing the benefits of a full season together. Beatriz and Nichelle Price are healthy too, which certainly doesn’t hurt.

“We had all of last year to put everything into place for us,” veteran midfielder and Current captain Lo’eau LaBonta said. “Now, there is no new learning this year. You know what you are supposed to do and if you don’t do it, the next person will do it for you. I think everybody knows their roles and everything has fallen into place.”

A record crowd of 19,254 fans, clad in yellow and black Washington Spirit gear, rolled up to Audi Field on Saturday night to watch their team open the 2025 season at home. Although the Spirit were unable to secure the win, falling 0-2 to the impossible talent of Temwa Chawinga and the rest of the Kansas City Current, the supported their club to the very end. 

That was no mean feat, considering the game ended with eleven minutes of stoppage time.