Laura Harvey rebuilds Seattle Reign: Leadership void, trusting young talent and Mia Fishel takes next step

There are few people with so much expertise in the NWSL as Laura Harvey, the Seattle Reign Head Coach who has been in and around the competition since the inaugural season in 2013. The triple coach of the year starts every conversation with the confidence that is of course accompanied by that level of profit.

“The true, real rivalry, I think, his Portland-Sattle and La-San Diego,” she told CBS Sports prior to the rivalry match of the Reign in the Portland Thorns on Sunday (4 p.m. et, et, et, CBS). “The rest is not a real rivalry. That is my own opinion. I just don’t think they are.”

The rivalry of the Reign with the Doornen is easily the most legendary and oldest of the competition, with its 43rd edition that takes place this weekend, and has almost always realized the invoicing because both teams have been historically two of the best in the NWSL. Harvey believes that the combination of qualities has also promoted a unique and healthy sense of competition between the two teams.

“It’s authentic, right?” Harvey said. “And I think it is actually based on respect, what, I think that when people talk about rivalry, we don’t always show that, but I think the thing that these two clubs have done is whether they are shielding or championships, there is not many years in which one of these teams has been in that conversation and I think that the rival is even more.”

When the reign and the thorns meet on Sunday, it will be a fight between two Playoff opportunities in the fifth and sixth place respectively, although both are at a moving distance of second place. The thorns are four points behind the Orlando Pride and the reign only two, even if the collecting all three points in Portland sounds like a tough battle after being excluded in their last three trips to the south. The side of Harvey, however, is in such a good position to break their losing series of months away from their lowest NWSL finish of the 13th, the reign is again one of the best teams of the NWSL and show no signs of delay.

“We want some of the really good things that we have done in the first half of the season,” said Harvey. “This year, at the beginning of the year, we changed and really digging on what that can look like, so that we can sometimes be a bit more unpredictable, I think, is the key.”

‘Last season to bed’

If the Reign’s journey of last season feels like an exercise in contrasts, the transition from 2023 to 2024 is an example of extremes. In almost record time, the reign of a trip to the NWSL championship from 2023 went to dealing with an exhausted selection, supplemented with the retirement of the American national team star Megan Rapinoe and the output of the winners of fellow ladies’ winners Rose Lavelle and Emily Sonnett as free agents. Harvey said that the team was unprepared for the adjustments that they were waiting, aggravated by the sale of the club by the French Ol Groupe to MLS ‘Seattle Sounders who dragged to the opening months of the 2024 season.

“I think we are embedded in having people, players, employees who have been in this club for a long time and gradually have runs away from people,” said Harvey, specifically pointing on Rapinoe, Lauren Barnes and Jess Fishlock as three players who had played for the government since the NWSL’s inaugural season in 2013. And without a kind of pinoe influence with the other two, things like that would be lost. “

The reign, “were never miles away” from the better teams of the NWSL in 2024 – even when they achieved 15 losses last season, there were only four with a margin of more than one goal. There were necessary adjustments after a defensive shaky season in which they had an average of 1.69 goals against per match, a deviation from the characteristic stability of a Harvey team at the back. The reign then had their desired outdoor season without large departure and a large incoming veteran Lynn Biyendolo, the group stepped collectively on the plate separately. Harvey has also updated the team’s tactical foundation and the group in line in a 3-5-2 instead of the 4-2-3-1 of the 2023 season, in which they walked to the NWSL championship.

Part of this was made possible by the takeover of June 2024 of the Sounders of the France in Ol Groupe, which gave them an early lead on their rebuilding of 2025.

“The thing we have always argued for here is that we are people at first,” said Harvey. “We care about everyone who is here. We want them to feel that this is their place, their family, their club. I think the French ownership has made that challenging because there was a little disconnection between what that meant, what it always meant and what it means now.

There is a new balance at the reign when you look at them, although they are still rooted in the tried and tested principles of Harvey. Anchored by goalkeeper Claudi Dickey, who once described uswnt-head coach Emma Hayes as the best shotsopper in the NWSL, two defenders who entered their peak years in Phoebe Mcclernon and Shae Holmes and the 18-year-old rising star Jordyn Bugg. It has compensated that they are not the most dynamic attacking side of the competition, but they still have an average of 1.36 goals per match, more than the 1.04 average they posted last season. Biyendolo, the always reliable veteran of the USWNT, has done the same with two goals and one assist in 10 games before the reign to date, but it is just one of her many strengths.

“Lynn has filled the emptiness of Pinoe and I think she has not only filled the void,” said Harvey. ‘She also influenced and inspired the other two [Barnes and Fishlock] To really be himself again, which has long been the core of this club. Their task is now to ensure that the day they all walk out of the door, we will no longer get this golf, so that is the culture we want. “

The presence of Biyendolo, Harvey argues, was something that the veterans needed more than the rising talents of the Reign.

“I think the old one with their experience of last year and not successful, looking at these young people and saying:” We have to make sure you get on our page quickly because we need you, “said Harvey.” When I brought them in quickly, I really think, the young players also helped to feel it quickly. “

However, the baggage of 2024 is finally behind them.

“I think we put to bed last season in the first half of the season last season,” she said, “and now it’s about having gone through that kind of initial phase of which team we want to be.”

Reign’s young core leads first

The “off” years of the great competition of the USWNT have a first transition period in the American women’s game, one in which just about everyone is enthusiastic in their pursuit of the next stars of the sport. In a few places that is more truly than Seattle, the reign that relies on a handful of young players to lead the lead while putting on a comeback. Various players, such as leading goal scorer Emeri Adames and Rookie Maddie Dahlien, are in their first two years as professionals, while Dickey, Bugg and Sam Meza recently earned their first caps with the USWNT. However, the most exciting rebellion of the Reign is a new recruit-by-out Mia Fishel. The 24-year-old debuted her debut for the reign in last Friday’s victory over Angel City as a replacement, Harvey illuminates her in the spotlight while she makes her ACL in the spotlight a year after tearing her ACL.

Harvey had worked with Fishel when she was the head coach of the U-20 USWNT and “got a suspicion” last spring that the attacker was looking for a move from Chelsea. Like many, the Reign the Reign has high expectations of Fishel after she signed a deal with the team that holds her in Seattle until the end of the NWSL season of 2029. However, Harvey quickly acknowledged that Fishel has the benefit of time, especially with the World Cup world cup for a little less than two years away.

“She is a player with whom I enjoyed working with because she wants to learn,” said Harvey. “She wants to be the best she can be possible. I can always work with that. Secondly. If she is great, great.

Although the play -off Push is top of views with 12 games to go into the regular season, Harvey continues to find the balance between patience and urgency. While Fishel is starting to get that treatment, midfielder Sam Meza has already benefited from it. Meza was prepared by the reign in 2024, but only made two performances in her Rookie season, both during the NWSL X Liga MX Femenil Summer Cup that took place during a break of the regular season last summer. She went on loan from the Dallas Trinity of the USL Super League in August and used it as the basis for a Breakout season so far with the reign in 2025.

“For our team it might be better for her to stay with us and not to go on loan, but for her I thought it would be really important to play her development,” Harvey said. “I didn’t think she would get that minutes last year and she didn’t really want that, right? She wanted to stay and I understand that taking that risk, what was a risk for her and committing, she is now picking the reward. That can’t happen for everyone, but I think it’s a very cool story to say, take a chance of yourself sometimes.”

The involvement of the players in the national team is validation for their bets in themselves, as well as Harvey’s work to promote their growth. She and the Reign have created a symbiotic relationship with Hayes and the USSWNT, one that is ultimately a great showcase for the players on the field than something else.

“Me and Emma didn’t really have an earlier relationship, so it’s good to see how she works and how she works,” Harvey said. “She is very open about what she wants from her players. We are very open because we want to hire it and help them in any way and I am really happy for all players … I think the expectation for them is now that they have seen what it can be like and what it can look like for them and it is now to make sure that those opportunities keep coming back now.”