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Boston Legacy: New faces, a nomadic existence and a solid NWSL debut season
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- Boston Legacy: New faces, a nomadic existence and a solid NWSL debut season
There'll be no bucking the trend for an NWSL expansion team this season but Boston Legacy still have every chance of upsetting the natural order between now and the end of the season.
The Legacy are officially out of play-off contention, becoming the third team to bow out of the NWSL postseason race after their 2-0 loss to Seattle Reign on Friday night.
Boston Legacy: New faces, a nomadic existence and a solid NWSL debut season
The loss to Seattle was their second in a row after a muted performance that saw Reign contain Boston's usually strong attack. This ended Boston's hopes of becoming one of the few NWSL teams in league history to reach the postseason in their inaugural campaigns.
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Reign midfielder Jess Fishlock scored a brace, making her Seattle's all-time leading goalscorer (52 goals) in her final season, surpassing the record previously held by former U.S. women's national team star Megan Rapinoe . The historic moment in Seattle simultaneously put an end to Boston's impressive 13-game scoring streak.
There were glimpses of what could have been for Boston in their first year but with a 7-14-5 record, the team's identity is continuing to slowly take shape with plenty to look forward to.
As we will do with all teams that get eliminated from playoff contention, here is The Athletic's review of Boston's season and what comes next.
How it started
Day one for the Boston Legacy was electric. The club drew a record-breaking crowd of 30,207 fans for their inaugural game against Gotham at Gillette Stadium in March, demonstrating how fans in the city yearned for the return of professional women's soccer. Boston also held their own against the 2025 NWSL Championships, falling 1-0 even while playing with a player down for the final 13 minutes of regular time.
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The team is anchored by general manager Domenec Guasch, known for his time at FC Barcelona , and head coach Filipa Patão, who most recently led Benfica in Portugal.
The club took a global approach for their first roster, signing NWSL newcomers like Brazil's Amanda Gutierres and Mali's Aïssata Traoré, while balancing their pool with experienced league stars like Canadian forward Nichelle Prince and U.S. goalkeeper Casey Murphy . Despite this being their first year in the NWSL, Gutierres and Traoré proved to be the club's most lethal forwards, respectively scoring 10 and seven goals to date in the 2026 season.
The team was winless in their first five games, with their first franchise victory coming in May against fellow expansion side Denver Summit. Boston came back from behind twice in that match, winning the fixture 3-2 with a stoppage-time goal. It was an emphatic moment that set the stage for similar adrenaline-fueled wins later in the year — though not enough to carry the club into the 2026 postseason.
What went wrong?
It would have been the exception to the rule if Boston had a historic inaugural year in the NWSL, the kind that included a playoff push and chances at a NWSL Championship. Expansion sides generally need time to build and this is certainly the case for Boston. As expected, once the team found its rhythm on the pitch, the rest started slowly coming together.
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Boston invested in promising young stars like 19-year-old Chloe Ricketts, who underwent ankle surgery in June, which limited her availability this year. The club also acquired 2025 NWSL Rookie of the Year Lilly Reale, a Boston native, from Gotham shortly after announcing Ricketts' surgery. The defender has proven an invaluable asset to Boston, though her availability at times has also been limited by injury.
Boston's first year was about building chemistry and adjusting to the league. The team has proven to be resilient, especially as they adapt to first-year growing pains that include having a slightly nomadic match schedule that will continue next year.
The team, this year, also had to adapt with losing access to Gillette Stadium because of the men's World Cup and next year will play all their home games at Centreville Bank Stadium in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, as their future home at White Stadium in Boston remains under construction.
Where do they go from here?
Boston is clearly a team that is still finding its footing as an expansion club. This year for Boston and Denver, however, was notably different, with no expansion draft for teams to pull from when building their roster. The upside of eliminating the draft is that players who sign with expansion teams now are generally more bought-in than in years past — at times, players were forced to uproot their entire lives to start over with a brand-new club from scratch.
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In Boston, players have committed to the club's long-term vision. In her inaugural press conference, Patão made that clear, telling reporters: "This city deserves strong women's football and this is why I'm here, because I know this project is ambitious." That project, as expected, will take time.
Still, Boston has had promising results in recent weeks, offering glimpses of what's still to come. Earlier this month, Boston had back-to-back wins against the Utah Royals and Washington Spirit, currently ranked No. 4 and No. 3, respectively. The club's late 3-0 win over Spirit at Audi Field on Sept. 13 was especially impressive and included a world-class showing from Traoré, who opened scoring in the 81st minute, and Gutierres, who scored an impressive stoppage-time brace.
With four games left in the schedule, Boston remains a tough team to go up against. While the postseason is off the table for them, they could provide some massive upsets in these final weeks — they have games against Portland Thorns, San Diego Wave and Angel City to come — and they could prove to be a spoiler in the tightly contested league table.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic .
Boston Legacy FC, NWSL, Women's Soccer
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