KC Current forward/union leader explains process behind the NWSL’s schedule talks
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- NWSL Board of Governors tabled a vote to move schedule from spring-fall to fall-spring.
- The league made a statement, committing to maintain its schedule through the 2030 season.
- The NWSL’s commissioner says the league continuously evaluates its competition calendar.
Nearly two years after reaching a historic collective-bargaining agreement, the National Women’s Soccer League just avoided another groundbreaking shift.
This time, talks centered around a potential schedule change.
The NWSL Board of Governors recently tabled a vote regarding a proposal to move the league’s schedule. The change would shift the NWSL’s current spring-to-fall format to a fall-to-spring schedule, according to multiple reports, including via ESPN and The Athletic.
Such a schedule change would align the NWSL with global soccer’s calendar. Most leagues around the world, including those in Spain, England and France — ones the NWSL considers competition — operate on a fall-to-spring schedule.
The NWSL this week released a statement in which the league committed to its current scheduling format through the 2030 season — the length of the current CBA. NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman has also said the league is continuously evaluating its setup.
“Following extensive evaluation and close collaboration with key stakeholders, we have made the deliberate decision to maintain our existing competition calendar for this period,” the league’s statement reads. “This decision reflects our confidence in the strong momentum and growth the league has achieved under its current structure, and our commitment to providing stability for everyone invested in the NWSL’s success.”
There are both pros and cons to playing a fall-to-spring schedule. Lining up with the sport’s primary scheduling format internationally could enable quicker and smoother player acquisitions. And the NWSL playoffs would be played in the spring, instead of during the fall, when American football remains king.
But the NWSL Players Association and star players like Trinity Rodman and Sophia Wilson have voiced concerns about player health and venue availability — and whether the infrastructure is in place for additional cold-weather games
Summer brings severe storms and extreme heat. The Current and other teams have encountered both in recent years. But winter matches in Kansas City, Boston, New Jersey and even some Southern climates mean venues that are ill-equipped for the cold.
Current forward and NWSLPA president Haley Hopkins said every player was involved in discussions about the schedule. An overwhelming majority of the union’s board representatives were in favor of the current calendar, according to Hopkins. And the sentiment didn’t change when the players were asked: More than 50% who participated in a recent poll on the matter chose no change, she said.
“It’s been a very busy couple weeks, but, ultimately ... we got to the right answer at the end of the day,” Hopkins said.
“We want to thank NWSL for approaching players and welcoming feedback, because, again, it was a lot of meetings and a lot of hard conversations, and we ultimately got to the right decision,” she said. “There was a lot of implications that were going to come with that calendar flip, and players felt so passionately about that.
“Ultimately, it just further shows the strength of our players and in our union that aside from, like a CBA or big topics like that, that player power is still, you know, just can be so, so strong, especially when we come at it together and on an issue like this that really does not only impact players, but staff and everyone alike. I just commend our players and their engagement participation.”
International players like the NWSL schedule because it plays during the summer with breaks throughout the season, Hopkins continued.
The current CBA requires the league to provide at least one year’s notice before initiating a calendar change. A scheduling committee would be formed and additional bargaining could be entailed, if a new format conflicted with terms of the current CBA. The current CBA also calls for the establishment of an “extreme cold policy.”
Some teams could encounter scheduling conflicts as non-primary tenants of the venues in which they play. Teams would also be required to provide indoor facilities.
But at the end of the day, the league has mostly sole discretion over how it schedules its games.
“Kansas City is great. We have the investment, we have the resources,” Hopkins said. “But that’s not true for a lot of clubs, and so we need to get that right first before moving forward and making a monumental shift.”
KC Current coach Chris Armas trusts his players’ input and believes the league should wait and see how things go with Major League Soccer’s schedule change. The men’s league will move to a summer-to-fall format in 2027.
The NWSL could also evaluate the USL Super League, a Division I women’s organization like the NWSL. The USL Super League, in its second year of operation, runs a fall-to-summer format on a smaller scale — the league features just nine teams.
“Everything’s at a really good place,” Armas said. “Why would you change that? That’s probably a lot behind it right now and again, how the players feel.”
“It would be a big decision to change. Let’s look at how it goes for MLS. Let’s learn from some of the bumps and bruises they can take along the way and see what can we learn from that.”
