After finishing at the bottom of the NWSL table last season, the Washington Spirit were expected to make some significant changes. Some of them, like using the #1 overall college draft pick to add USWNT midfielder Andi Sullivan, were expected. Others were more surprising: Washington made three separate big trades that ended up resulting in the acquisitions of Rose Lavelle, Rebecca Quinn, Taylor Smith, and Ashley Hatch.
With so much high-end talent coming in and a far shorter list of injured players coming into this season as compared to last year, expectations have been significantly raised.