DC Power FC 1, Dallas Trinity FC 1
Seven hundred miles from Audi Field, inside White Rock Brewery in Dallas, a crowd of Dallas Trinity FC supporters and club employees gathered around screens on a Friday evening to watch the biggest match of their team’s season. The energy was high. Every time Dallas got forward with the ball, the room got loud.
When Bethany Bos scored in the 52nd minute to give Dallas a 1-0 lead, the place erupted. When Ellie Gilbert headed in an equalizer from a corner in the 79th, the room went quiet before settling into something between applause for the effort and a groan for the result.
A 1-1 draw at DC Power FC. A point gained. A lead lost.
Dallas (9-10-7, 34 points) holds the fourth and final playoff spot by a single point over DC (8-9-9, 33 points) with two matches remaining.
Spokane Zephyr sits at 32 with a match in hand and hosts Lexington on Saturday. A Spokane win would put them at 35 and jump both Dallas and DC. The race for the last playoff spot is now three teams for one place with two weeks left in the season.
A cool evening greeted kickoff at Audi Field, temperatures in the mid-60s, and clouds building through the night.
Nathan Thackeray made his most aggressive lineup decisions of the spring. Jenny Danielsson started at the nine with Sealey Strawn underneath as a free 10. Camryn Lancaster and Jasmine Hamid took the wings. Amber Wisner partnered with Caroline Swann in the double pivot. Cyera Hintzen and Samar Guidry at left and right back.
Omid Namazi went with Makenna Gottschalk in goal and set up with Loza Abera and Alyssa Walker leading the attack, Samantha Cummings captaining from midfield.
DC came out pressing. Abera tested Tyler McCamey inside two minutes, a right-footed effort from the left side of the box off a Walker pass that McCamey saved high. Guidry went down with an injury in the 3rd and needed treatment. Swann went down in the 8th. Walker in the 17th. The first half was physical and stop-start, with five minutes of added time at the end of it.
Between the stoppages, DC was the better side. Abera had four first-half attempts on her own — a header saved by McCamey off a Bagley cross in the 31st, a shot from 35 yards saved in the 34th, and two misses from close range in the 28th and 29th. Dasia Torbert missed from close range in the 43rd off a Colton cross from a corner. Cummings headed high and wide in the 44th. DC had nine first-half shots to Dallas’s two, three on target to one, and two big chances to none. McCamey made three saves before halftime.
Dallas had moments. Lancaster forced a save from Gottschalk in the 36th with a left-footed effort from the center of the box. Wisner headed a Danielsson set piece high in the 23rd. But the first 45 minutes belonged to DC by a comfortable margin.
Thackeray changed everything at halftime. Swann came off for Sydney Cheesman, who dropped into a single pivot. Danielsson came off for Bos. McCutcheon came off for Chioma Ubogagu. Wisner moved from midfield back to center back alongside Flynn. The shape went from 4-2-3-1 to 4-1-4-1, and the match changed with it.
Bos made her presence felt immediately. She headed a Hamid cross on target in the 49th, saved by Gottschalk at the bottom left. Three minutes later, she won the ball just outside the box, pounced on a misplaced touch from a DC defender, and struck a left-footed shot from the center of the box to the top left corner. 1-0 Dallas. Her second goal of the season.
“We made some halftime subs to bring some more energy onto the field, and that’s what I was trying to do,” Bos said afterward. “I just put the defender under pressure, and she misplaced a pass, so I was able to pounce on it close to the goal.”
Dallas had a chance to double the lead in the 60th when Bos got on the end of a Hamid pass on the right side of the box, but Gottschalk saved at the bottom left. That was as close as Dallas came to a second. From there, the match became a test of whether Dallas could hold the lead against a DC side desperate to equalize. They held the ball less, dropped deeper, and relied on McCamey and the back line to absorb what DC threw at them.
DC kept coming. Emily Colton forced a save from McCamey in the 69th from outside the box. Abera was blocked twice in the 87th. Corners piled up — DC finished with 11 on the night, Dallas with none. Namazi brought on Alexa Fraley and Alexis Theoret in the 58th, then Gilbert in the 77th. The pressure built and built.
It broke through in the 79th. A corner from Theoret found Cummings, whose header from the left side of the six-yard box was blocked. Gilbert was there. From close range, she put it into the center of the goal. 1-1. Another late goal conceded. Another lead surrendered. The pattern that has defined Dallas’s spring continued.
Lancaster missed high from outside the box in the 80th. Allie Thornton, on for Hamid at 72, conceded a corner in the 92nd. The final whistle came with DC still pressing and Dallas still hanging on.
Thackeray’s message afterward was about what lies ahead, not what slipped away. “I just want them to continue to believe in what we’re doing and where they’re trying to go, and fight for what’s in front of them. They’ve got a great opportunity to get themselves in a good position.”
Cheesman spoke about the atmosphere inside the group. “There’s definitely a different vibe in the locker room over the past couple of matches, with the standings being so close. People are just really locked in and uplifting to one another. We all know that this pressure is a privilege, so we’re all trying to step up.”
DC outshot Dallas 21 to 6. Dallas put four of those six on target. McCamey made four saves, giving her 40 on the season across 13 matches. Dallas held 44.6 percent possession and won no corners. The numbers say DC deserved more. The scoreline says The Golden Girls are still alive.
Dallas sits fourth at 34 points. DC sits fifth at 33. Spokane sits sixth at 32 with a match in hand tomorrow against Lexington. Two matches remain for Dallas — at Tampa Bay on May 9 and home against Fort Lauderdale on May 16. The series with DC finishes 1-1-2 this season, 2-2-4 all-time.
Next up, Dallas heads to Tampa Bay Sun FC (4-12-9, 21 points) on Saturday, May 9 at 6:30 p.m. CT at Suncoast Credit Union Field. The match airs on KFAA and streams on WFAA+, Peacock, and TUDN Radio.
STARTING LINEUPS
DAL: McCamey; Hintzen, McCutcheon, Flynn, Guidry; Wisner (C), Swann; Lancaster, Strawn, Hamid; Danielsson
DC: Gottschalk; Bagley, Cummings (C), Colton; Walker, Gaynor, Murnin, Bedoya, Torbert; Abera
SCORING SUMMARY 52′ — DAL: Bethany Bos 79′ — DC: Ellie Gilbert (Sydney Cummings)
DISCIPLINE 49′ — DC: Justina Gaynor (Yellow Card) 53′ — DAL: Samar Guidry (Yellow Card)