Boston Legacy FC is a couple months into its inaugural season. Here’s how it’s going.
With the Legacy unlikely to be a NWSL championship contender in Year 1, the club is focused on building a foundation for its future during its inaugural season.
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Before the season began, coach Filipa Patão said her focus was on being competitive — not necessarily winning every game, but approaching every game as though they could. Through 12 matches, Boston is 2-7-3 (9 points) and in 14th place out of 16 teams.
After the first 2½ months, here’s where the Legacy stand, and what we’ve learned.
Young team has room to grow
The team’s age and inexperience, as expected, has shown itself. Boston is the second-youngest team in the league, with an average age of 25 years, 89 days.
Arguably more consequential than age is a lack of experience. Just 11 of the Legacy’s 25 players had NWSL experience prior to this season — and one of those 11, Hannah Stambaugh, was on Angel City’s roster but never appeared in a game.
The team had about two months of training together prior to the season, and it took a few games for younger players to get used to the level of competition. The Legacy lost five consecutive games to open the season before going unbeaten in five straight.
Boston’s progress was perhaps most noticeable to Nicki Hernandez, who was injured in the Legacy’s March 14 opener and didn’t appear in another game until a 2-1 win over Orlando on May 12 — the fourth contest in Boston’s unbeaten run.
“It was a huge difference today — not only the fight, but just the intelligence that the girls are bringing,” Hernandez said after that win. “The girls are tackling and giving everything their all. I’m really proud of coming back to a team like this.”
Attendance up to NWSL standard
The Legacy’s attendance has been on par with peer expansion clubs despite not having a permanent home.
Boston played its first six home games at Gillette Stadium, where 30,207 fans filled the lower bowl for the inaugural game. In the games since, however, the team struggled to make the hulking venue look full despite attendance numbers hovering around the league average.
The Legacy recently played their first of seven games this at Pawtucket’s Centreville Bank Stadium while the men’s World Cup takes over Gillette, offering the Legacy a glimpse into what their future could look like once renovations are completed at White Stadium. In their first game at the Rhode Island venue, the Legacy drew 9,141.
Through seven home games, the club averaged 12,012 fans — about 2,000 more than the league standard last season.
When Bay FC joined the league as an expansion team in 2024, they averaged 14,226 fans through seven home games. Utah — while not an expansion team, having rejoined the league under new ownership in 2024 after a hiatus — averaged 10,595 in its first seven home matches.
But the Legacy lag behind fellow 2026 expansion club Denver, which through three games has averaged 32,303 fans — a number inflated significantly by the Summit’s record-breaking home-opener crowd of 63,004.
Playing style still under construction
As she promised before the season, Patão has instilled a high-pressing, possession-focused style. Though the coach tinkers regularly with the lineup and the formation, the Legacy have taken that identity in stride.
But the young team is still settling into the pace and physicality of the NWSL.
The Legacy’s hard press has come back to bite them at times, as Boston is the most heavily-penalized team in the league with 174 fouls, 29 more than the next team. The Legacy have received 27 cards (25 yellow, two red), and their May 22 loss to Seattle was the only game this season in which they didn’t receive a card of any color.
“It’s different coming from other leagues where some of the fouls aren’t fouls in those leagues, and here they’re calling it as fouls,” defender Annie Karich said after Boston’s 1-0 loss to San Diego on April 3. “We just have to learn from every game that it’s not going to change, and that that’s how it is here in this league.”
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