2025 NWSL Rosters, Mid-January Update

Taylor Vincent
Taylor Vincent, Resident NWSL ExpertJanuary 14, 2025
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NWSL teams are able to start their preseason camp as soon as Wednesday, and with it are required to be at 40-player camp rosters—including both rostered and non-rostered invitees (NRIs). Here’s a look at where the NWSL rosters currently stand ahead of preseason starting.

Reminder from the NWSL Competition Manual:
“A Team may exceed the maximum number of Players assigned to its Roster and the maximum number of international Roster spots starting the day following the NWSL Championship through the Roster Compliance Date of the following League Season, but a Player’s Salary Cap charge will count towards a Teams Salary Cap at the daily rate for the number of days the player is on the Roster.”

Teams have until March 12th to get into full compliance with both their INTL roster spots, and the 22-26 active roster, and while there is no penalty for being temporarily over in terms of INTL spots, even players who don’t play any games this year for a team will still count toward the salary cap in a prorated way. 

Overview of 2025 Rosters (End-of-day 1/13/25)


Table 1: An overview of active and non-active rostered players for 2025. Filled green box means the club has eight INTL spots, red means six INTL spots, no special shading means the club has the standard seven maximum spots. 

At full capacity, where every NWSL team uses the maximum 26 active roster spots, there can be 364 active players in the league. Currently, 312 of those spots are in use, with 27 non-active players (1 D45, 2 outgoing loans ending in June, 24 2024 SEI remaining on rosters), which leaves only 25 open spots for the remaining 61 free agents, and collegiate players looking to land on a team for the upcoming season. 

Bay FC and Orlando will have to be smart about their non-active players re-joining the active roster as Bay sits at the maximum of 26 but has a 2024 SEI who is eligible to come off non-active and Orlando has 24 active roster players, but four 2024 SEI’s who are eligible to put them over the active roster limits. North Carolina, Seattle, and Washington are all at the 26 player maximum if you look at their combined total, although especially for some of the later in the 2024 SEI’s, the feasibility of them re-joining in 2025 might be small. San Diego, Angel City, and Portland are all under the 22 active player limit when including their SEI’s. Utah and Chicago are currently under with their active players, but if their SEI’s are included would be in a roster complaint range. 


Chart 1: A breakdown of the 2025 International Spots allocated to players

With each team starting with seven international spots, there are 98 INTL spots in the NWSL for 2025, but only 70 actively in use with another 6 attached to non-active roster players. After trading for an additional INTL spot last year, the Utah Royals are under SEI compliance even if their one SEI INTL player comes back in 2025, considering how late Cloé Lacasse tore her ACL in 2024, this would definitely be a push. Keep an eye on the Washington Spirit though because they currently have all seven of their spots in use, and an additional one that could come back in Ouleye Sarr who was battling a back injury from September through the NWSL Championship. 

Free Agency Update:

Looking at free agency as a whole, there have been 56 players who have signed with teams in 2025, 8 free agents have signed with clubs outside the NWSL, and 11 players have announced their retirements. There are 61 free agents who played in the NWSL in 2024 who have yet to sign with a club for 2025. 

Most teams have put out ‘Thank You’ posts to their 2024 rostered free agents who they will not be re-signing in 2025, or announced it in the end-of-season roster announcements in December. That being said, there are still 12 players who have yet to receive a ‘Thank You’ post or the last update from the team was that they were in negotiations:

Angel City FC - Christen Press

Chicago Stars - Sarah Griffith

Houston Dash - Erin McKinney, Havana Solaun

Kansas City Current - Elizabeth Ball, Kristen Hamilton, Mallory Weber

NJ/NY Gotham FC - Michelle Betos, Midge Purce

North Carolina Courage - Kerolin

Portland Thorns - Gabby Provenzano

Seattle Reign - Lauren Barnes

Bonus Charts– Positional Breakdown:


Chart 2: A breakdown of the 339 players currently under contract for the 2025 season, both active and non-active. 

 


Chart 3: Breaking down each team’s active players by position

 


Chart 4: Breaking down each team’s non-active players by position


#nwsl #offseason #nwsl free agency
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