Utah Royals FC’s success has taken the NWSL abruptly this season with a seven-game unbeaten streak.
By the primary quarter of the 2026 season, Utah has climbed its method as much as fourth place in NWSL standings behind Portland Thorns (No. 1), Washington Spirit (No. 2) and San Diego Wave (No. 3).
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Utah was even ranked second — its highest rating in crew historical past — previous to its most up-to-date match, a 0-0 draw with Bay FC.
Going into the season, ranked the Royals dead-last in sixteenth in its preseason prediction, and had the Royals in eleventh, only a one spot enchancment from final 12 months’s twelfth place end.
Courtney Brown (16) celebrates after scoring her first objective for the Royals. | Emma Corona
In 2026, Utah already has 5 wins — one win shy of its win complete from final season.
The Royals’ final misplaced was on March 22, the second week of the season, and up till Utah’s draw with Bay FC, the Royals had a 17-game scoring streak and a five-game win streak.
Goalkeepers Mandy McGlynn and Mia Justus, who crammed in for McGlynn at first of the season, have put collectively a 468-minute shutout streak and haven’t conceded a objective since March 28.
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What’s behind the Royals’ new-found success? In line with new addition and Utah native , it’s friendship.
“We are saying that our superpower is that we like one another, and so, I feel you possibly can see it on the sphere. Like, we do get pleasure from enjoying with one another, and I feel it’s that further connection that we now have with one another that’s actually serving to it deliver all of it collectively and making us actually a crew to compete with,” she informed reporters following on Might 6.
Successful by friendship and ‘togetherness’
Brown described the connections throughout the crew as “underrated” and “intangible.” Regardless that teammates are competing for minutes, they’ve developed a team-first mentality.
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“I feel that’s what makes the locker room wholesome, proper, is such as you need to be enjoying minutes and also you need to be getting time and also you need to be making an impression on the sphere,” she stated. “But when that’s not your position that weekend, like your position is to assist the crew, and it needs to be like this crew mentality of, you understand, ‘the crew earlier than me.’ I do know it’s tacky, however it’s so essential and it’s so true, and that basically goes together with our superpower.”
Jason Kreis speaks at America First Area in Sandy on Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. Kreis, Actual Salt Lake’s first-ever participant and its MLS Cup 2009-winning head coach, has been named the membership’s president of soccer operations. | Laura Seitz, Deseret Information
What Brown described is demonstrative of the tradition of “togetherness” that president of soccer operations Jason Kreis has labored to determine inside each the Royals and Actual Salt Lake.
Kreis informed the Deseret Information Friday that “togetherness” is crucial for the crew having the ability to “persistently compete for championships.”
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“The imaginative and prescient assertion for our golf equipment is ‘successful collectively by growth.’ That phrase is I feel completely essential. With out it, I don’t suppose RSL or Utah Royals has an opportunity to win something,” he stated.
For that “togetherness” to occur, Kreis stated your complete group needs to be aligned, from possession all the way down to the gamers, and he’s happy with how that’s translated to the gamers’ performances on the pitch.
“They’re feeling like this actually robust sense of togetherness, which I feel will proceed to result in good outcomes, and when dangerous outcomes occur, then we must lean on that actual sense of togetherness to get by them,” Kreis stated. “And there might be dangerous instances. I might by no means challenge that issues are going to proceed from begin to end like they’ve within the first eight or 9 video games.”
Royals gamers have discovered methods to indicate up for one another off the pitch as properly. The gamers lately threw a child bathe for Danish midfielder Janni Thomsen, who’s anticipating her first baby this summer season. The gamers all confirmed up sporting blue to rejoice Thomsen’s child boy.
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“You’ll be able to inform that we root for one another,” Brown stated. “It’s simple to play when you understand that your teammate has your again and that they’re rooting for you.”
What’s subsequent for the Utah Royals?
Kreis acknowledged the robust momentum the Royals have constructed.
However he stated the crew must proceed to have a “week by week mentality” to persistently enhance as a result of “finally in soccer, similar to every other American sport, when you must be at your finest is the top of the season if you wish to have an opportunity to win championships.”
Very similar to the 2009 Actual Salt Lake crew Kreis coached to a MLS Cup title, he sees a robust core to construct round on the Royals.
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“If you look by the backbone of that crew and also you see a Mandy McGlynn in objective, you see a Kate Del Fava, a Kaleigh Riehl as middle backs, you’ve obtained actual management in that entire triangle. You undergo the middle portion of the midfield with what Ana Tejada has finished with this season has been nothing in need of spectacular. The development that she’s proven, and he or she’s anyone that’s obtained, can have some verbal stuff on the market as properly, some management.
“The brand new central midfield gamers are available, high, high participant as properly, Narumi. Clearly Mina Tanaka, a unbelievable participant for us and anyone that each one of us can look to, the entire gamers on the sphere can look to as a central determine,” he stated.
Kreis avoided sharing any expectations for the rest of Utah’s 2026 season as a result of that phrase “all the time creates a false narrative,” he stated, however he expects the tradition and the crew’s processes to stay robust.
“We don’t deal with outcomes first. We deal with the method, the tradition, the id first, and we imagine that after we do that basically, very well, keep centered on that, the outcomes will care for themselves,” he stated.
Utah Royals FC hosts Racing Louisville Sunday at 6 p.m. MT. The match might be streamed on Victory+.