Heather Stainbrook earned a spot in the USL Super League’s Team of the Month for March on Wednesday, with captain Amber Wisner named to the bench. The recognitions come with six matches remaining and a playoff spot still to be secured, a timely reminder of what this club has in its two most consistent performers.
Stainbrook has been one of the best players in this league since the day she arrived. The Washington Spirit loanee joined in January as part of a three-player winter addition that quietly reshaped Dallas’s trajectory, and she has not stopped producing since.
Through eight appearances this season, Stainbrook has two goals and an assist across 670 minutes, numbers that underline the way she controls the tempo of a match and creates problems for opponents in transition. March gave her the defining moment. The stoppage-time winner at Lexington SC on March 8 – a left-footed strike past the right post in the 90th-plus minute – is the latest game-winning goal in club history. It came in a match where Dallas had been outshot 14 to 6. She started all five matches in March and logged 387 minutes.
It is worth stepping back and saying plainly what Stainbrook has been for this club. Dallas’s midfield was inconsistent after the departure of Deb Abiodun. Stainbrook has filled that gap. She anchors the press, finds pockets between lines that others don’t see, and has a scorer’s instinct that her modest goal tally doesn’t fully capture. She arrived from Washington, having played limited minutes behind established NWSL starters, and she’s made her mark in her short time in this league.
Wisner’s selection is her third of the year, joining September and February. It is a fitting accumulation for a player doing what she has always done. She has played every minute of every league match this season, all 22 of them, 1,980 minutes in total, and has three goals on the year, including penalty conversions in back-to-back matches against Tampa Bay and Spokane.
On a roster where the lineup has shifted week to week around injuries and acquisitions, Wisner has been the one constant. She holds the NWSL record for most consecutive minutes played, made 150-plus NWSL appearances across a career that included Portland, Seattle, Houston, OL Reign, Washington, and Bayern Munich, and won two NCAA titles at North Carolina, whose program retired her number 22. She was the first player ever signed by Dallas Trinity.
This is her final season, Wisner said so herself. Every recognition between now and May carries more weight because of it, and this one is no different. Three Team of the Month honors in a farewell campaign tells you something about what she still brings to a match at 35.
Also worth noting: goalkeeper Tyler McCamey was nominated for Save of the Month for her 90th-minute stop at DC Power on March 12. Fan voting is open now on league social media channels, with the winner announced Thursday at 1:00 p.m. CT.
Dallas (9-8-5, 32 points) sits fourth in the Super League standings with six matches remaining. They will be on the road at Brooklyn FC this Sunday.
Super League Team of the Month for March:
- F: Tyler Lussi (CAR) – Player of the Month
- F: Faith Webber (TB)
- F: Loza Abera (DC)
- M: Darya Rajaee (LEX)
- M: Sophia Boman (JAX)
- M: Heather Stainbrook (DAL)
- D: Regan Steigleder (LEX)
- D: Ginger Fontenot (SPK)
- D: Maggie Illig (JAX)
- D: Taylor Chism (TB)
- GK: Sydney Martinez (CAR)
Bench: Kaitlyn Parks (JAX), Tori Zierenberg (SPK), Catherine Barry (LEX), Mia Corbin (CAR), Amber Wisner (DAL), Emily Colton (DC), Jenna Butler (CAR)
Coach of the Month: Philip Poole (CAR)