The Utah Royals have not lost since March 22, and a team that finished 11th in 2024 and 12th out of 14 teams last season is now pushing toward its first playoff berth. With 17 points and three matches left before the month-long NWSL summer break, Utah is eight points shy of the total it posted in each of its previous seasons.
The Royals are on a seven-match unbeaten streak, a run that has changed the conversation around a club that has spent much of its short history near the bottom of the standings. It also puts the current team in position to do something neither the 2018 nor 2019 version of the original Utah Royals franchise managed: reach the playoffs.
Goalkeeper Mandy McGlynn said the group has stayed focused on the details rather than the table. “We’re not expecting an outcome of a win, expecting a shutout,” she said. “We’re just going there and we know how to execute the game plan and do that to our full ability.” McGlynn has logged three shutouts since returning from injury, giving Utah a steadier base as the wins and draws have piled up.
The rise has been even more striking because it came after the Royals dropped consecutive matches to the Current and the San Diego Wave. Since then, they have won five of their next seven matches and picked up seven points in eight days with wins over Angel City FC and the Houston Dash before drawing Bay on Sunday. McGlynn said the compressed stretch sharpened the team’s focus. “It’s been so great, especially in this three-game week, that we just focused on us, us, us, and that has been really, really, perfect for this process for us,” she said.
Coach Jimmy Coenraets said the turnaround has been built less on talent spikes than on buy-in. “We have a team that actually wants to work hard,” he said. “We don’t have divas or big stars. We have players that, individually, want to contribute to the bigger team.” He said the players had been hungry for structure, clarity and simplicity, and that the coaching staff did away with the 27-point game plan ahead of the 2026 campaign.
Instead, the Royals have focused on repeating what worked over and over again, with Coenraets saying the biggest change was standards. He pointed to Kate Del Fava as a player who drives the professional culture in the squad. That message has traveled through the team even as Mina Tanaka, last season’s leading scorer, missed the first two games while winning a continental title with Japan.
Tanaka later made her 2026 NWSL debut with a late equalizer against the Washington Spirit, adding another piece to a season that has kept getting harder to dismiss. For Utah, the math is now straightforward: stay steady through the final three matches, and the club’s best season yet could end in a place it has never been before.
