Award nominations galore for the Spirit, DMV native wins USL Young Player of the Year, and more: Tuesday Freedom Kicks
Morning folks! It’s a cold one out there today! According to Capital Weather Gang, it’s the coldest low since March! 🥶
Anyways, here’s your Tuesday Freedom Kicks!
Adrian Gonzales is up for Coach of the Year in NWSL. Since taking over as head coach on July 17th, he led the team on an unbeaten streak that lasted until the 3-2 loss to Orlando on October 18th.
McKeown is up for Defender of the Year after playing in nearly every NWSL game (started 25 of 26 games) and solidifying her spot on the USWNT.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK PRESENTED BY AT&T (NWSL)
Following up with more awards news for the Spirit, Aubrey Kingsbury is up for Player of The Week after her penalty shootout heroics this past weekend.
Furthermore, Kingsbury is up for Save of the Week, Kouassi is up for Assist of the Week, and Monday is up for Goal of the Week.
Loudoun United’s Abdellatif Aboukoura was voted the USL Championship Young Player of the Year. Born in Fairfax, VA (but representing Egypt at the international level), he ended the season with 15 goals and 3 assists across all competitions. Stars and Stripes FC did an informative write up on him about a month ago.
Bournemouth’s Tyler Adams off USMNT squad for friendlies (ESPN)
The USMNT captain suffered a blow early in his match on Saturday, but continued to play until he was subbed out in the 80th minute. To me this feels like a precautionary move. LAFC midfielder Timmy Tillman has been called up as his replacement.
The Americans Abroad Five: McKennie’s bizarre USMNT snub (PSW)
Pulisic is back from injury but not called up for the international friendlies this month.
NWSL playoff recap: Gotham FC stun K.C. Current, Spirit advance, more (ESPN)
NWSL quarterfinal roundup! The fun continues this Saturday at noon at Audi Field!
MLS Cup playoffs Round 1 talking points: Messi, favorites move on (ESPN)
MLS playoff round 1 round up! The fun continues in *checks notes* TWO WEEKS?!
FIFA’s next 2026 World Cup cash cow: Exorbitant parking prices ($NYT)
Further evidence that FIFA is treating the upcoming World Cup as a giant cash grab (as if we needed further proof of that).
Kingsbury is statistically 3x better than all other NWSL goalies (and yet she still got snubbed for Goalie of the Year 🤔)
Imagine pulling up to your Sunday League game, slightly hungover from the a night of debauchery, only to see Emily Heskey, Papiss Cisse, and Danny Drinkwater warming up on the other side. Have any of you had the chance to play against a former pro? Sound off in the comments!
Fun scenes from the Canadian Premier League Final!
Finally, you might have heard of this Manchester United fan who refuses to cut his hair until the Reds win five games in a row. He might have to wait awhile.
Just for fun, I looked up if the Spirit have ever won 5 games in a row and it appears that has been a bridge too far. Apparently DC United once had an 11 game winning streak but that was back in 1999.
That’s it for me folks! Chat away in the comments below!
I haven’t played against a former pro, but when I was in high school, our goalie had a two year old brother. He would run up and down the sidelines with a ball that was nearly half as big as he was, and cheer for his brother.
He grew up to be MLS player Stefan Cleveland.
Very cool! I love hearing those stories! Closest I can think of for me, is when I was in high school, we played against a scrawny kid from Honduras. Ran absolute circles around us.
He grew up to be future DC United player, Andy Najar.
Starting to daydream about what DC United could be like if they let Benteke walk, then sign a DP striker, DP CAM, and DP right winger. They’re all good (in my head), and help unlock Joao Peglow somewhat, and Jackson Hopkins continues to take steps forward. Pirani might up his production by an extra goal and extra assist. Our top draft pick is a CB in the line of Manu Duah for San Diego. Our goalie is… somebody?
It could be fun. Maybe try to sign Aboukoura for grins.
Those three positions? Now you’re speaking my language!
Let’s go inform the scouting departm… oh, right……
Hey, Weiler, could you be a scouting department, perchance?
The US U-17s closed out group play this morning with a 1-0 victory over Croatia and go undefeated in the group winning all 3 games.