Side quest: complete (for now)
In the middle of everything else, the Thorns were also competing in the CONCACAF W Champions Cup
At the start of September, Thorn Town explained the CONCACAF W Champions Cup, a tournament of unknown importance, which turned Portland’s push to the playoffs into a two-games-a-week ordeal. That side quest has been completed — for now. Since the last time Thorn Town checked in on this tournament, the team played their last two games on the fall 2024 schedule.
October 1: Thorns 2 - Santa Fe 1
The Thorns’ 2-1 victory over this Panamanian team was both wider and narrower than the final score line showed. Portland ended up rolling out a starting lineup of mostly backup players. Santa Fe rarely threatened for a goal, but, while Portland often had success creating shot opportunities, they were plagued by being imprecise with their play in the final third. The Thorns ended up not connecting on a number of golden fast breaks and shots.
However, it was a brilliant night from the player Thorn Town has most often hollered for more regular season minutes: Payton Linnehan. Early in the game, Linnehan drew an obvious penalty in the area, and the penalty kick was buried by Izzy D’Aquila. In the second half, Linnehan did show fantastic offensive precision, and buried a one-on-one fast-break opportunity.
Just when it seemed like the Thorns were simply going to walk this one home, a miscue on a free kick from Shelby Hogan allowed Santa Fe to kick in a blooper of a goal. And, suddenly, it was just a 2-1 lead, with the Panamanian team energized by a possible tie. While Portland ended up shutting the door, it was a victory that ended up feeling more exhausting than energizing.
October 15: Thorns 6 - Vancouver Whitecaps Elite Girls FC 0
This Canadian team has one of the longest names for a sports team I’ve ever heard…and, despite all that, I really couldn’t get a great handle on what’s exactly going on here. As of right now, Canada has a pretty complicated system of academies, developmental programs, semi-pro leagues. The good news is, that is about to change dramatically in April 2025, when the Northern Super League (now that’s a name!) kicks off with six fully professional women’s teams. And, to pick up on a stray piece of news from October that Thorn Town missed: Christine Sinclair has already joined the ownership group of her home-region team, Vancouver Rise FC.
Across their four games in this tournament, the Whitecaps got outscored by a 14-goal margin — but, to their credit, they did grind out a win on the road against Santa Fe. In future editions of this tournament, it will be pretty fascinating to see how qualifying teams from the Northern Super League compete against NWSL squads.
Although the Whitecaps actually got off the first few good shot attempts in this game, the Thorns eventually proved their class, regularly scoring on wide-open fast break opportunities. Were the Thorns rudely running up the score here? As we’ll see in just a minute: no.
What happens next: pause button
Out of the ten teams in this tournament, the Thorns were one of the four teams who qualified to the next round. And, that next round is going to take place all the way on May 22, 2025. On that day, the Thorns will travel to a still-unknown neutral site to take on Mexico’s Tigres UANL Feminil in a single-game elimination match. For the moment, this is a Mexican team that has a surprising number of familiar faces: this team has Spanish World Cup hero Jenni Hermoso, former Racing Louisville high-energy forward Thembi Kgatlana, and also former member of the 2024 Thorns, Ana Dias.
On May 25th, the championship game of the tournament will be held. There is going to be the winner of Thorns vs. Tigres, emerging out of one semifinal. And, in the other semifinal, we have Gotham FC against Mexico’s Club América — who the Thorns beat 3-1 in early September, in their first game of this tournament.
The major shock here is that the San Diego Wave have been eliminated from this tournament — even though they beat the Thorns in mid-September, 3-2. Both the Thorns and the Wave got the same nine points out of their four group games. The tie-breaking difference was goal differential: Portland had a +8 cumulative difference, while San Diego was at +4.
The difference 100% came down to: how each team performed against the Whitecaps. While San Diego won their game against Vancouver, 2-0, the Thorns’ decisive 6-0 victory gave Portland their ultimately crucial margin to stay alive.
The ultimate goal: FIFA Club World Cup
It can be hard to remember, but: the ultimate point of this tournament was that it would produce the North American qualifiers for yet another tournament — the first-ever FIFA Women’s Club World Cup, in 2026. When Thorn Town first examined this complex system of qualifiers, it was still unknown how many teams from North America would be in the 16 teams to compete in the FIFA Women’s Club World Cup.
And: it’s still an unknown.
It does feel possible that the FIFA Women’s Club World Cup would accept four teams from North America. And if that ends up being the case: the good news is, the Thorns have already qualified. The bad news is: it seems like those games in May wouldn’t mean a lot. But, if it ends up that North America is allowed three entrants, or under, then there will clearly be a lot to fight for. Hopefully this will get sorted out before those May games actually come around.
All in all: thank goodness we’re back to the regular season.