Crystal Dunn wins Player of the Week...again

For the second time this season, the NWSL Media Association picked Crystal Dunn as the Player of the Week. In Week 13, the North Carolina Courage traveled to Seattle Reign FC and earned a 4-1 win on the road.

The game started out sloppily, with Seattle taking a 1-0 lead in the 18th minute, but Lynn Williams managed to send a header into the back of the net off a Jaelene Hinkle cross in the 27th minute to even the scoreline. Six minutes later, Jess McDonald took a long throw that caught the Seattle defense napping. Williams chested the ball down and passed to back to Dunn who was sitting at the top of the 18. She sent a low shot into the bottom-left corner of the goal, past the outstretched arms of the Reign goalkeeper. The Courage would take that 2-1 lead into halftime.

Three minutes after the second half started, defender Merritt Mathias dribbled around Megan Rapinoe and sent a curling shot into the right upper 90 of Seattle’s net to extend the lead. The Reign spent the next twenty minutes pressuring the Courage, but in the 70th minute Lynn Williams broke that pressure and streaked down the right side of the pitch. She dribbled right at the Seattle defense and six defenders converged on her. Dunn made the right run, and Williams calmly played the ball out of pressure into the path of Dunn. She took one touch to get behind the entire Seattle line that was moving the wrong direction, and shot back across the face of goal, hitting the right side netting.

Those two goals were the fifth and sixth of the season for Dunn, who now sits just one goal behind Portland Thorns FC striker Christine Sinclair.