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Sporting Jax names first signings: Meet Jacksonville's new women's soccer players
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- Sporting Jax names first signings: Meet Jacksonville's new women's soccer players
(This story has been updated to add new information.)
Jacksonville's first women's professional soccer signing is now officially on the First Coast.
Two of them, in fact.
Sporting Club Jacksonville added its first two players for its women's soccer roster in the USL Super League, signing University of South Florida defender Georgia Brown and Florida State University midfielder Ashlyn Puerta on May 21 ahead of the 2025-26 season.
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Brown and Puerta now enter the history books: The first players on the first professional top-division women's sports franchise ever in Jacksonville, scheduled to kick off at the University of North Florida's Hodges Stadium on Aug. 23 against DC Power FC.
That game marks the return of fully professional league soccer to Jacksonville for the first time since the North American Soccer League's last game in 2017.
Georgia Brown, Ashlyn Puerta: Meet the players
Sporting Jax W-League defender Georgia Brown waves during the club's uniform release at Friendship Fountain on May 13, 2025. [Clayton Freeman/Florida Times-Union]
Both players bring Sunshine State ties as well as active international experience.
Brown, 22, originally from Highworth, England, scored 10 goals in 54 games for USF women's soccer from 2022-24. She won defender of the year honors with Florida Elite Soccer Academy in the W-League in 2024, before Florida Elite's merger with Sporting Jax.
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The Scottish Football Association selected Brown on May 19 to join Scotland's Under-23 national team for home matches on May 29 and June 2 against Iceland in Falkirk.
Puerta, 18, a native of San Diego, scored four goals and five assists in 21 games during her freshman season for FSU, which spent a portion of 2025 atop the NCAA rankings.
She is scheduled to join the United States women's Under-20 national team for the CONCACAF Women's U-20 championships in Costa Rica from May 29-June 8 in Alajuela, Costa Rica.
Brown and Puerta's signings are the first of many for the Sporting Jax women, under head coach Stacey Balaam , ahead of the July 1 opening of preseason. Clubs in the league, which adds title sponsorship from Gainbridge for 2025-26, include a minimum of 20 players on their rosters.
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Sporting Jax, which includes Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow and former Jaguars running back Fred Taylor in its ownership group, is also preparing for the launch of its men's soccer team after receiving a franchise in August 2022 in the second-level USL Championship.
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Sporting Club Jacksonville: USL Super League club signs first players
