With Olympic preparations in full swing, every team is taking a hit. Some teams are set up to handle it better than others though, and with just two players heading to Rio, Sky Blue FC might be in one of the best positions of all.
In 2013, the Portland Thorns were, right out of the gate, the team to beat. The Thorns had the biggest stars and attracted the biggest crowds, and they backed up all that off-field stuff on the field, too. Through the first five games of that inaugural season, Portland couldn't lose. Cindy Parlow Cone's team kicked off the season with a draw against FC Kansas City, and then rattled off four straight wins. By the time the Thorns were set to host Sky Blue FC for the first time in mid-May, they were already the heavy favorites to run away with the thing. Sky Blue had opened the season strong, too, losing just once in their first five, but that they could beat a stacked Portland team? It shouldn't have been as shocking as it was when Taylor Lytle's goal stood up as the game-winner, but somehow, it was.
This season, Portland is again the team to beat — the Thorns still haven't lost a game in 2016, going 7-0-5 to start the season. Sky Blue, meanwhile, has had an up-and-down year thus far, only recently putting together a string of results that could serve as an argument for the possibility of a trip to the postseason. By the time they faced off against the Thorns last Saturday, Sky Blue had managed to put together a four game unbeaten streak, and the team from Jersey very nearly made it five, that effort undone only by a second half penalty kick and injuries to Tasha Kai and goalkeeper Caroline Stanley. There were seven minutes of stoppage, but you almost got the feeling someone could have tied it up again had there been eight.
It's not just Portland that should be worried about Sky Blue though. Those four unbeaten games included results against two more of the league's top clubs: a draw in Chicago and a win in Washington. Sky Blue is currently five points out of a playoff spot, but their schedule in the four weeks between now and the Olympic break is about as favorable as a team that's trying to crack the top four could ask for: hosting a struggling Houston, away at a Boston team that's currently at peak Boston, and a home-and-home with a Washington team they beat two weeks ago.
So how does a team with just one current USWNT player, no standout goal scorer, a captain who's the league's oldest player, two inexperienced goalkeepers, a pair of rookies in the back line, and a "star" player who's playing this season for the first time in five years suddenly look like a contender?
Part of that can be attributed to the fact that Sky Blue does — or doesn't — have all those things. While other teams will lose, or have already lost, large chunks of their rosters to national team call-ups, Sky Blue will feel only a minimal impact. Only Kelley O'Hara (U.S.) and Sam Kerr (Australia) are shipping off to Rio, leaving Sky Blue as one of the three teams losing the fewest players. Seattle and Boston are the other two that will only lose two, though one of Seattle's is Megan Rapinoe, who hasn't made an appearance yet for the Reign this season due to injury.
Of course, the staying together strategy has brought mixed results. Chicago used the roster consistency to their advantage last season, using rookies and homegrown players to make a run up the table while other teams saw their rosters either ravaged or turned into revolving doors thanks to the World Cup. Seattle did too, with a roster built in large part with very good internationals from teams that didn't qualify for the tournament. Other teams, like the Atlanta Beat in WPS (think Boston, but more southern and wearing red), promised this very same thing would be an advantage during the 2011 World Cup and then didn't score a goal for 797 minutes, a streak that was mercifully ended when that league folded.
And the players that Sky Blue gets to keep? First is their captain and the oldest player in the league — that's Christie Rampone, long-time captain of the USWNT and one of the best central defenders in the world. The curtains may have closed on Rampone's role as a top player on the international stage, but watch her with Sky Blue — at 41, she can still run down just about anyone on the field. Rampone's experience and ability to remain composed under pressure are extra important now that O'Hara, Sky Blue's second most experienced defender, is off with the USWNT. The rest of the back line in New Jersey is incredibly young, with two rookies, Erin Simon and Erica Skroski, and second year player Kristin Grubka holding things down in front of Stanley, who had played just one professional game before this season and who's now out with a shoulder sprain.
Stanley's injury initially brought some additional inexperience into the lineup, with fellow Goalkeeper Named Caroline Caroline Casey the only option left in net. As of Friday afternoon though, the injury will instead bring some additional experience back into the lineup, as the team announced they'd signed Jill Loyden. Loyden, formerly of Sky Blue FC and the USWNT, has been serving as the team's goalkeeper coach since retiring at the end of last season.
Casey, Simon and Skroski aren't the only rookies Sky Blue has, and as the 2015 Red Stars proved, consistency is key when it comes to a team heavy with inexperience. In addition to the young defense, midfielder Raquel Rodríguez is in her first professional season, and the Costa Rica international appears more comfortable in each game she plays with Sky Blue. Rodríguez has already made major steps from her early season form — at times seeming uncomfortable with the speed of play in the NWSL — towards becoming a player like the ones that have been the Reign's backbone and a valuable commodity in the league, a top tier international from a team that isn't.
There's also Leah Galton, a rookie forward who's quickly become a regular starter for Sky Blue after opting to sit out the beginning of the season to finish college. Galton's tallied one goal and three assists in her six appearances this season and was a constant threat in the game against Portland last weekend.
And as for the lack of a go-to goal scorer? That might not be a bad thing for Sky Blue to be missing. The Jersey team has tried putting all its eggs in various single baskets in almost every season it's existed, and much like me going to the grocery store to pick up a few things and then struggling to not dump stuff all over the aisles because I should have just gotten a cart, it has never gone particularly well. This season, Sky Blue has scored 12 goals, which is pretty consistent with the rest of the mid-table teams. That seven different players have scored those goals is a definite positive. Of Portland's 17 goals, six different players have scored, but eight of those 17 came from three players — Tobin Heath, Lindsay Horan and Christine Sinclair — who won't be available due to the Olympics. Sky Blue, on the other hand, will lose just two of its goal scorers in O'Hara and Kerr, and they've each only scored once.
The final piece of this lacking puzzle is that the biggest star player Sky Blue's got is Kai, who's always been a favorite in New Jersey despite a history of not quite living up to the hype. Before this season, Kai had last played professional soccer in 2011, when she was a member of the Philadelphia Independence in WPS. Before that, it was two underwhelming years in New Jersey. Kai's role this season has already changed though, with high hopes at the beginning of the season giving way to the possibility that she may be better suited as a late-game spark, not so far from what had made her so successful with the USWNT so many years ago.
Sky Blue will take on Houston on Saturday in New Jersey, and the Dash was in rough shape even before losing half their roster to international duty. After losing Carli Lloyd to injury early in the season, Houston will now also be without Morgan Brian, who, along with Lloyd, was called into USWNT camp. The Dash is also without one of its most promising young rookies in Janine Becky, as well as Allysha Chapman, who are both away with Canada. Goalkeeper Lydia Williams is with Australia and Poliana and Andressa are both with Brazil. The Dash hasn't won — or scored a goal — since May 7.
What Houston is going through now is exactly the thing that Sky Blue is avoiding. The Red Stars have been one of the league's biggest success stories over the past season and a half, and the Reign a dominant team — even with this season's less than impressive start — since 2014. In taking a page from their books and choosing consistency over quick success, Sky Blue could finally be on the way back up.
Saturday
Western New York Flash vs. Seattle Reign FC, 7 p.m., Frontier Field (YouTube)
Washington Spirit vs. Chicago Red Stars, 7 p.m., Maryland SoccerPlex (YouTube)
Sky Blue FC vs. Houston Dash, 7 p.m., Yurcak Field (YouTube)
Portland Thorns FC vs. FC Kansas City, 10:30 p.m., Providence Park (YouTube)
Sunday
Orlando Pride vs. Boston Breakers, 5 p.m., Camping World Stadium (YouTube)