Game 26 of 26
The Thorns enter the last game of the regular season close-but-not-quite to clinching a playoff spot
Every team in the NWSL has one last regular season game to go, and they’ll all play it this weekend. Out of the league’s 14 teams, six have a guaranteed spot in the playoffs, and five are guaranteed to be out of the playoffs. There are three teams in the middle, fighting to jam into the last two playoff spots — and the Thorns are one of them.
Here’s what that in-the-middle part of the standings looks like before this weekend, keeping in mind that the top eight teams are making the playoffs. I’m listing each team’s cumulative points, which is the main way that the league standings are ordered. I’m also listing each team’s total goal differential, which is what the NWSL uses as a tiebreaker, if the points are tied:
Portland Thorns | 31 points | -1 differential
Bay FC | 31 points | -11 differential
Racing Louisville | 28 points | -4 differential
So, the good news: Portland is in the best position out of these three teams. In fact, it’s even possible that the Thorns could enter the playoffs in sixth place, as they actually could leapfrog over the current sixth place team, the Chicago Red Stars, who have 32 points. It would take something truly remarkable for the Thorns to get knocked out of the playoffs. And, that is the bad news: truly remarkable stuff does happen in soccer.
These three teams are playing over three different days this weekend, so it’s really possible the race to the final seeding could be a long, nail-biting process. The schedule looks like this:
Friday, November 1: Angel City FC at Portland Thorns (7 pm, Prime)
Saturday, November 2: Bay FC at Houston Dash (6:30 pm, ion)
Sunday, November 3: Racing Louisville at San Diego Wave (2:30 pm, ESPN/ESPN+)
So, the Thorns are the only team with a home game, and they also lead off the weekend. Here’s the bottom line: A win or a tie gets the Thorns in the playoffs, period. And here’s hoping it’s a big, obvious win — not just for the sake of the season, but also because the night, at Providence Park, is going to be centered around giving the franchise legend Christine Sinclair a fantastic farewell in the last game of her legendary career.
The first matchup between Portland and Angel City, on September 23rd, was certainly a part of the Thorns’ big, seemingly unending post-Olympics slide — but it was still a 2-2 tie. A tie in this next game gets the job done! Plus, for that first game, Angel City was still alive in the playoff hunt, only to be mathematically eliminated in the month since then. So, despite everything, there’s reason for optimism in a good result. A win or a tie, and Thorn Nation can rest our collective head on the pillow, on Friday night, not really caring how the rest of the weekend goes.
And, if the Thorns lose, the rest of the weekend gets both a lot more nervy, and a lot more complicated.
As Bay FC and Louisville play their games, here is the sequence of events that would need to happen in order to knock the Thorns out of the playoffs:
Thorns must lose their game
Bay FC must win or tie their game.
Racing Louisville must win their game.
Bay FC or Racing Louisville must surpass the Thorns in total goal differential.
If it sounds unlikely: well, it is. But it’s not that crazy. Here, for instance, is an imaginary group of potential scores from this weekend that would knock the Thorns out:
Angel City 2 - Portland Thorns 1
Bay FC 2 - Houston Dash 2
Racing Louisville 4 - San Diego Wave 1
The big key in the imaginary scenario here is that Louisville is winning their game by a huge margin, meaning they are passing the Thorns in total goal differential.
One last, brain-melting possibility: what if there is a tie among the three teams in both points and total goal differential? The NWSL has, responsibly, already thought about it. In fact, total goal differential is only the first out of seven sequential tiebreakers to determine playoff seeds. The second tiebreaker is: total number of wins on the year. And, fortunately for Portland, the Thorns cannot be passed or tied by Racing Louisville, with one game to go:
Thorns: 9 wins
Bay FC: 10 wins
Louisville: 7 wins
So, since the Thorns are guaranteed to have the advantage in the second tiebreaker (number of wins), Louisville must completely pass them in the first tiebreaker (total goal differential).
Is this all a headache? You bet. Would the Thorns have avoided all of this if they didn’t give up the last-minute goal to Taylor Flint and Louisville in Game #25? Yes, they absolutely would have. Even getting a tie in that game would have eliminated Louisville from playoff contention.
But, you know what: Gotham FC faced a very similar scenario to this one as they entered the last game of their regular season in 2023. And, a few weeks later, they were NWSL champions. As many ups and downs as this season has had: as long as you’re still alive, you can still win the championship. And the Thorns are still alive.