KANSAS CITY, Mo. There was a word that came to mind when No. 8-seed Gotham FC overtook the No. 1-ranked Kansas City Current 2-1 in extra time in the National Womens Soccer League quarterfinals.
Add to that the fact that Gothams upset took place at the Currents CPKC Stadium, a venue in which they went unbeaten all season and clinched the NWSL shield faster than any team in league history. That word, so central to the lexicon of sports and its triumphant narrative arcs, burns on the tongue.
But dont mention it to Gotham FC and U.S. womens national team midfielder Jaedyn Shaw.
Underdog, my ass, she said after the game. We are not an underdog.
Despite being the 2023 NWSL champions, Gotham were not favored in their battle with Kansas City. At the end of the regular season, 29 points separated the two teams and perhaps most pertinently, Gotham had never beaten the Current. But their quarterfinal meeting was much tighter than that figure and the teams respective rankings or history would suggest.
The first 68 minutes were a tense yet balanced meeting of teams that were deeply familiar with each other and the high-stakes environment of knockout football. Their defenses were well-studied and crisp.
And while Gotham and Kansas City were both without their top goal-scorers in Esther Gonzalez and Temwa Chawinga (the Golden Boot runner-up and winner this year, respectively), both teams attacking lines found ways to slip through the lines and agitate the opposing goalkeepers. Current goalkeeper and Brazilian international Lorena and Gotham keeper and German international Ann-Katrin Berger were called to make critical saves throughout the match.
Shaw, who signed with Gotham in September, scored Gothams lone regulation goal in the 68th minute. Current center back Kayla Sharples, who has arguably been one of the best defenders in the league this season, made a rare miscalculation marking Shaw, stepping early to intercept a pass but arriving a half-second too late. Shaw spun away and angled a low far-post shot past Lorena, tilting the game toward the visiting team.
The Current have been without forward and two-time Golden Boot winner Chawinga since Oct. 18, when she went down with an injury in the middle of their game against the Houston Dash, which marked their third loss of the season. They did not find an equalizer against Gotham until the sixth minute of stoppage time when defender Ellie Wheeler drilled a left-footed shot past Berger and injected some warmth into the Current supporters who braved 31-degree Fahrenheit weather to cheer them on.
Extra time followed. The stalemate carried on. But in the first of the final two minutes of stoppage time, when the frenzy of open play began to still for the anticipation of penalties, Berger launched a long ball into Gothams final third. Defender and substitute Kayla Duran sent it onward with her head toward Shaw, who flicked it deliciously with the outside of her foot to forward Katie Stengel, who is on her second stint with Gotham after a season with Crystal Palace.
I said, Oh, just please hit this with all your might and keep it on target, Stengel said, recalling the moment she ripped the ball past Lorena to cement Gothams victory. Then just relief, everyone running towards me.
Stengel acknowledged that moment was hers, but was adamant that it could have easily gone to anyone on her team. We get played into certain moments, and you can feel the pressure of those moments, but when you have the backing of your entire team, its more like, OK, I just got to do this for everybody, and anyone who would have been in that position, I think, would have finished it.
Gothams regular season has been a mixed bag of results, the inverse of the consistently excellent Current team they beat on Sunday. Gotham spent only four weeks below the playoff line, but hovered at the same No. 8 spot they finished at in the middle of the season for seven straight weeks, mostly during the second half of the season.
Midfielder Rose Lavelle, who captained Gotham in their quarterfinal win, spent the first few months of the season working her way back from an ankle injury. Her first game back was against the Current on June 7, to whom they lost 2-1. Overall, her presence on the pitch, even when she wasnt playing entire games, proved invaluable to Gothams potency and aided in their rotation as they also competed in the Concacaf W Champions Cup and sent international players like Berger and English fullback Jess Carter to the European Championship this summer in Switzerland, as well as Gabi Portilho to Copa America Femenina in Ecuador.
We play more games than anyone. We travel more than anyone. Weve won that competition that is going to give us, obviously, the chance to play in the (Club) World Cup, Gotham FC head coach Juan Carlos Amoros said after the game. I think people, everyone writing us out, maybe worked in a way that is giving this group even more fire to be able to perform at the level that we can, because weve done it during the year.
Gotham will look to keep rewriting the narrative next weekend in the NWSL semifinals when they take on the 2024 NWSL champions, the Orlando Pride, on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on ABC.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
Gotham FC, Kansas City Current, NWSL, Women’s Soccer
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