Reign at Wave: Highlights, stats, quotes

Frustrated that the NWSL scheduled a game on the West Coast on Friday after a dozen players across both teams had international matches in Europe on Tuesday, Seattle Reign head coach Laura Harvey started a heavily rotated squad against the San Diego Wave on Friday night. Just Jordyn Bugg and Claudia Dickey started for the Reign after international play.

The rotated Reign lineup held strong in the first half, and two strikes from distance by their young players gave the Reign a 2-1 victory at Snapdragon Stadium. Sally Menti, in her first professional start, opened the scoring in the 67th minute. Emeri Adames scored the game-winner in the 87th minute following a lovely chest pass from Jess Fishlock.

Delphine Cascarino scored the lone goal for the Wave.

Up next for the Reign (5-4-2, 17 points) is another road match against the Chicago Stars. That match kicks off at 2 p.m. PT on Saturday, June 14, and will air on ION.

Highlights

Stats

SCORING SUMMARY

67' - Sally Menti (Assisted by Lauren Barnes) - SEA

75' - Delphine Cascarino (Assisted by Maria Sanchez) - SAN

87' - Emeri Adames (Assisted by Jess Fishlock) - SEA

LINEUPS

61’ - Lynn Biyendolo for Maddie Mercado; Sam Meza for Ainsley McCammon

73’ - Maddie Dahlien for Lauren Barnes; Jess Fishlock for Nérilia Mondésir

80’ - Emily Mason for Shae Holmes

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62' - Kyra Carusa for Adriana Leon; Kennedy Wesley for Hanna Lundkvist

72' - Gia Corley for Kimmi Ascanio; Maria Sánchez for Melanie Barcenas

90+3' - Quincy McMahon for Perle Morroni

POSSESSION

Wave: 62.7%

Reign: 37.3%

EXPECTED GOALS

Wave: 0.93

Reign: 0.53

TOTAL SHOTS

Wave: 8

Reign: 7

SHOTS ON TARGET

Wave: 4

Reign: 4

SHOTS OFF TARGET

Wave: 3

Reign: 1

SHOTS BLOCKED

Wave: 1

Reign: 2

SHOTS FROM INSIDE THE BOX

Wave: 6

Reign: 2

TOUCHES INSIDE THE OPP. BOX

Wave: 26

Reign: 15

PASSES

Wave: 583

Reign: 345

PASSING ACCURACY

Wave: 86.1%

Reign: 75.7%

PASSES IN FINAL THIRD

Wave: 139

Reign: 85

PASSING ACCURACY IN FINAL THIRD

Wave: 72.7%

Reign: 64.7%

CROSSES (EXCLUDING CORNERS)

Wave: 13

Reign: 8

CORNERS WON

Wave: 5

Reign: 3

OFFSIDES

Wave: 5

Reign: 0

FOULS

Wave: 6

Reign: 13

YELLOW CARDS

Wave: 0

Reign: 2

RED CARDS

Wave: 0

Reign: 0

Quotes

Laura Harvey

On what worked for the team to score two goals for just the second time this season:

Yeah, I think right now the team that we need to be is we need to be really solid defensively and we need to be good in transition. And the attacking side we can keep working at. And I said that to the group after the Washington game that we have players that want to be good on the ball. We have that in our group.

And it's not that we can't be that way, but I think being OK not being that way, I think will win us games right now. And we can solve all of that later as long as we are good in transition and we have the bodies to be able to do that now. You know, I think Lynn had a chance before Emeri scored her goal, but that, we won it in transition too. So yeah, I think we just need to keep working at being who we are right now. And then when the summer comes, we have time to really master the other side of the ball. When, you know, we've got everyone fit, we've got time to train, and really hone in on being better on the ball.

But, you know, I think tonight is an example of the team we can be right now. We can be that team, we can defend. We can let the other team have it, and we can hurt you in transition. And I'm all right with that.

On the team responding with another goal after conceding:

I just think there's belief, you know, there's belief. And I think we would have been disappointed if we'd have come away without a win. We definitely could have been disappointed if we've come away with nothing. And, you know, credit to Claudia, that is one of the best saves I've seen, live. Everyone thought it was in. They even put the smoke up. They thought it was in. That's an unbelievable save.

So, you know, little things like that, we need that. We need that little bit of quality. That's quality for her, right? Making the big saves, quality.

And then we can go up the other end and show a bit of quality ourselves, cause Emeri's goal, they're gonna have to fight out which one was better. I'm not going to decide which one was better, but they can fight it out between them.

On what the players did well to prevent San Diego from being threatening:

Run. No, honestly, you got to work hard. And I think I said this before the game. I think they're the best football team in the league, San Diego right now. And I think their two holding midfielders, Dali and McCaskill, I think have been superb this season. So our game plan was to try and restrict how much influence they had on the ball and to restrict the amount of time the ball goes to Delphine Cascarino.

And you saw that with their goal and with the chance that Claudia saves. So that was their job. How do we stop Cascarino getting it? And the big reason that she gets it is those two. And we did a good job. There was times we lost them, there was times that they got away from us, but we solved it in different ways. Sally and Ainisley I thought were brilliant, and then Sam Meza comes on and we know that that's sort of her game too, like gritty and can break play up.

So I thought that was great, and Coco worked so hard defensively, her job was very, very specific, was to deal with the six and then to get out to McNabb, which is hard work. And then Jess came on and sort of took that role on a little bit. So yeah, just the team effort. I thought the backline did brilliantly too. These are tough games to play. There's a lot of decisions that they have to make, but Claudia made obviously an exceptional save, but she didn't have to make loads of saves, which is great. And we're disappointed to concede off a set piece. We haven't been doing that. So it's something that we know we can work on pretty quickly going into the Chicago game.

Lauren Barnes and Sally Menti

What it's been like to get minutes and work into the squad:

Menti: Yeah, I had a little injury coming out of college, so everything kind of was slow to begin with. I wasn't there for the preseason, I joined beginning of March, so kind of just it's been getting my fitness up, getting used to my team, getting comfortable with the coaches and everything, so it just kind of all been building and I mean everyone here has been so welcoming and encouraging that it was a pretty natural build for me, and I just appreciate my teammates a lot and coaches for helping me get here.

Barnes: Sally has a history with us as well. This isn't her first time with the team, and we knew we had something special for a really long time, and we always knew we needed to keep her around. And yeah, so when she's healthy and fit, she's in here, and you guys got to see just a tad of what she's going to bring. So it's really exciting for her.

On the team's performance despite having so many players just returning from international duty:

Barnes: Yeah, I would love to talk to the NWSL about that. I think it's wild that they make people play two days later after traveling from Germany, Wales, everywhere. It's really unfortunate because you want to have the best product on the field, so, that really eliminates that. But in saying that, I'm so proud of the team because there was so many people flying in, jet lag. Literally everything, right?

We just trained for a week and a half without half the team, and, you know, they have to come in and learn what we're going to do in 2 days, while trying to battle everything else. So super proud of the group.

This is a hard June for us, we're away for every single game. So getting 3 points our first game off is incredible. We hope to use that momentum moving forward.

And we played a really good side today. The top of the table, I think they're 2nd right now. They've been really improving as well. It's been the fastest rebuild of a team I've ever seen in the league. So yeah, we knew they were gonna have a lot of the ball. We knew we had to weather the storm in the first 45 minutes, kind of get our feet underneath that. And we did.

We stuck to the game plan and we scored two beautiful goals from, you know, people that really had to step up today. It was a lot of responsibility on some young kids and some, you know, first starters and yeah, I'm just super proud, like you, you can't write what just happened. So it's pretty incredible.

And for being an older player, I know how special these things are. I cried both of their goals. So there's that, especially with little Emeri too, she's been with us and she's been working hard trying to break the starting lineup, and it's a tough one to break up top. And you know, she's never put her head down. She's fought till the end and so she really deserved today, and it wasn't even her goal, to be honest. The girl was running at 97th minute as fast as she could still, and, you know, I look at that and I'm like, I wish to be young again, but that is who she is.

I'm super proud of them both and, you know, having Sally in there for her age right now, she brings such a calmness, and that's exactly what this team needs right now, and we want to play, and Sally's a ballplayer. So having her in there and this game especially is what we really needed, and she stepped up.

On what she saw on her goal:

Menti: Well, first of all, I missed an opportunity to shoot like 15 minutes earlier and I look over at the bench and Laura was like, 'What are you doing?' I was like, 'Yeah, I know, I know.'

So I knew I wanted to get that chance back. And yeah, once I think Lu, you played the ball on top of the box, I like that like smaller touch to draw players in and a lot of the times I slip that ball, but I kind of heard everyone screaming around me to pull the trigger, so I just kind of let one go and it went in, luckily.