DC Power FC entered their final home match of the fall section of the 2025-26 USL Super League season wanting to break above the playoff line in the table. However, they saw a 57th minute goal by Rylee Biasden become the difference in the match as they fell 1-0 to Carolina Ascent on Friday night at Audi Field.

The first half was very tight on both sides as the teams looked to feel each other out. DC Power kept trying to get the ball over Carolina’s very high press to forward Gianna Gourley, but the passing was just off every time. After the match, head coach Omid Namazi did not hold back on his disappointment at how they performed.

“I just thought, to be honest with you, it was not a very good performance for us. And I take the blame,” Namazi said. “You know, players looked nervous. They played, it seemed like, with fear. And we’ve been talking about just going out and playing free and without fear. And at the end of the day, if we lose 4-0 or we lose 1-0, it doesn’t matter. But go out and play and don’t worry about making mistakes.

“It just seems like tonight…we weren’t able to play under that pressure. But just overall, I can’t say that anybody had a good game. And when you have that across your team, it’s tough to get a result.”

“We had a discussion before the game started because usually Carolina plays a pretty high line,  so we wanted to kind of get on them fast and just play balls over the top and challenge them quickly,” Gianna Gourley said. “And I think it worked in the beginning, but we just have to finish and put things away and connect our passes.”

Both teams had opportunities in the first half, but they were left wanting more as they headed to the break scoreless.

The second half began, and still both teams didn’t have a lot of space to operate. But finally in the 57th minute, Carolina struck. The one bit of space that Carolina got, they took advantage. On a long cross from the left wing, Emily Morris found Rylee Baisden, who headed it calmly into the net to make it 1-0 to Carolina.

After the goal, the match started to get a little more open as DC Power fought to try and get the equalizer. In the 78th minute, their best chance of the night came on some great buildup play. Substitute Loza Abera got the ball in their defensive third and dribbled the ball to midfield. After a pass, the ball finally getting sent forward to Gourley, who laid it off for Emily Colton on the give-and-go. Gourley sprung free on the right side of the box, but her shot went just wide left.

DC Power played more aggressive as the game went on to try and get that equalizer, but despite a late flurry, they could not find it. The match ended, and Carolina – who were level in the USL Super League table with DC Power – zoomed past them above the playoff line.

“I think the biggest thing is kind of how we’ll rally around each other,” Dasia Torbert said when asked about the positive takeaways from the match. “Even when moments get really frantic or like [Gianna] said, there’s a few back-to-back bad passes or we’re not connecting and we’ll kind of look towards a few of our teammates close by and look for that quick encouragement and that lock in. And we’re pretty strong on that. It’s just now we need to push it between the lines, through the lines…but, I think we do a good job of kind of finding each other and lift each other up in those tough moments where we can get back and we can repress and we can have that fight where it’s not going to be easy for people to get wins out of us.”

Omid Namazi was a bit more direct when asked about the positive takeaways: “To be honest with you, there wasn’t a lot of positive tonight,” he said. “I can just look back at the game and say we created a few goal scoring chances, but we [have] got to be better.”

“[Going] forward we gotta make sure that they feel the confidence. And I told them, ‘We lost the game, we weren’t good tonight. Let’s put it out of our minds.’ You have to have a short memory because we got a game coming up next weekend…and we proved that we can go on the road and get the points.”  

DC Power will have to rely on the road for their source of points for a while, as Friday night’s loss was the last home match at Audi Field for several months. They will play three straight on the road to close out the fall and then will have 2 matches on the road to open the spring slate. Their next match at Audi Field will not be until March 13th, so the team hopes they can be road warriors for the next several matches.