The Death of the WPS Brand as Women's Professional Soccer Lives on in New York

Thursday, Women's Professional Soccer—the league, the brand—was taken off life support and pronounced dead.

Meanwhile most of the U.S. Women's National Team are sitting out club soccer, concentrating on winning Olympic gold as the best way to redeem themselves for their World Cup final loss to Japan last year.

No doubt most of the U.S. internationals consider that World Cup loss a greater blow than the anticlimactic expiration of their professional league. 

it is more than a little ironic, however, that the club for which a large number of the U.S. team played last season, or more accurately its owner, is the reason the league is gone. WPS could not survive the lawsuit brought against it by franchisee Dan Borislow, in retaliation for having his magicJack franchise dissolved.

Anyone who knew anything about Borislow should not have been surprised at the way things ended up in WPS.

Despite soccer icon Abby Wambach's curious loyalty to the man who starved her team and crashed her league, Borislow's reputation preceded him. Several complaints were made about magicJack the phone company, and lawsuits against Borislow and his company brought by the State of Florida, on behalf of unhappy customers. That lawsuit was settled in 2009.

That said, it was surprising that WPS allowed Borislow to buy the franchise.

On the other hand, had Borislow not taken over the former Washington Freedom, there might not have been a WPS season last year. Unfortunately, there are consequences to lying down with the devil, but it's always too late by the time they are made manifest.

So it is against that backdrop that the Western New York Flash, last year's WPS champion and unofficial world champions of women's club soccer, played their second game in the new best women's league in America, the WPSL Elite, against the NY Fury at home in Sahlen's Stadium.

What a difference a season makes. What a difference a week makes.

A week ago, the Flash were just happy to have a place to park until WPS restarts as promised in 2013. This week, the Flash took the pitch having gone from being exiles to refugees.

Unlike last week's stomping of the clearly minor league FC Indiana, this week's match was tougher than anyone on the pitch or in the stands anticipated.

NY Fury, the visiting team, was a motley collection of mostly no-names. Anyone who didn't recognize the man on the NY sidelines must have expected this match to be same song, second verse.

The difference, and what was ultimately the difference in the outcome, no doubt, was that NY's coach, Paul Riley, was no bush-leaguer.

Riley was the 2010 WPS Coach of the Year, coming out of nowhere to lead the expansion Philadelphia Independence to the WPS Championship game—which they lost to FC Gold Pride—and then reprised that performance in 2011.

It was a coaching rematch of what would be the final WPS Championship game, held just nine months ago in the same venue. Riley's Philadelphia club tied the game in the 87th minute and came within a shootout of beating the Flash right in this very stadium, in front of nearly 11,000 fans. 

Tonight there were more like 1,100, and the officiating was was definitely minor league.

But it didn't take long for those with any knowledge of Paul Riley to realize an upset was brewing.

At least 80 percent of the action was played on the NY half of the field, and the Flash had numerous golden opportunities in the first half but couldn't score.

The more the Flash failed to convert on premier chances, the more the frustration became apparent, and the more ominous the mood in Sahlen's Stadium.

Riley's coaching magic was especially apparent where it counted the most. His back line and his goalkeeper were a force-field. They WERE the team in all practical respects, but that was enough.

And who were they?

Not surprisingly, they were the only members of the team with the major league experience. In fact, they were last year's Philadelphia Independence back line: Nikki Krzysik, Leigh Ann Robinson, Kia McNeill and Estelle Johnson.

Goalkeeper Michelle Betos, formerly of the Boston Breakers reserve squad, did an impeccable Hope Solo imitation. Betos was by far the better goaltender this night.

Were it not for having coach Riley, the Fury's sniper-shot kill of the defending world champions would have been apocalyptic. It would have been an a double-shot into the corpse of WPS.

As it is, it simply reinforces the ambiguity of the state of professional women's soccer today.

Not only are we without our official "major" league, the one team we expected to coast through this pro-am league has already been exposed as having clay cleats by the former Philadelphia defense in disguise.

And what of the Flash?

Spanish international Adriana, who waltzed to a hat trick last week against Indiana, was conspicuously out of synch this week. She had several great opportunities but her timing was off, and not just a little.

Laura Heyboer, who scored the Flash's fourth goal last week, was a late substitution and as much out of the game once she entered the pitch as she had been before she was sent on.

The only bright spot for the Flash was the continued workhorse play of team captain, midfielder and one of four returning Flash vets, McCall Zerboni.

After moving around a lot last season, Zerboni seems well-suited for her spot in the middle and kept setting up plays and stopping advances all night long. She also came close with a couple of nice opportunities, but like the rest of the team, "close" wasn't close enough.

It is true the Flash were missing their Alex Morgan clone, Stephanie Ochs. Ochs impressed in last week's match, but was back at the University of San Diego taking finals this week.

They were also missing national team members Lori Lindsey and Meghan Klingenberg, who along with New York's only other marquee player, Tobin Heath, were training with the national team.

All three are expected to join their respective clubs by the next match.

In the end, it was an eerie, surreal event. The WNY Flash on the pitch against Coach Riley, same location as last year's pinnacle match. Yet the Flash were displaced and Riley doubly so, strangers in a strange league that allows six substitutions and one timeout.

And like last week the fans stayed away as if somehow this club had suddenly become junior varsity. Last week's attendance turned out to be 1,304. This week's crowd couldn't have been more than that, might have been less—probably right around the 1,100 of my estimate.

So what is it like for the players, in this parallel universe, having undergone so many changes and so much instability?

After the match I put that question to McCall Zerboni.

"

You can't let yourself get caught up in the roller coaster...Yes, the brand of WPS is dead, but women's professional soccer is very much alive, and it will continue to be. And next year, when there are no Olympics or World Cup, the quality of this league will be much better when the national players come back.

"

Zerboni has obviously found her place in women's pro soccer and in Western New York. She now lives in Metro Buffalo year-round, not far from team headquarters at Sahlen's Sports Park.

And she's drinking the local Kool-Aid.

She is a Buffalo Bills season ticket holder and a Sabres fan, having attended several Sabres games as well.  No wonder she is the team's anchor. This California girl is now happily anchored in Western New York.

Still, one has to wonder: Why can't a women's major soccer league succeed in America, especially given the success of MLS? Can it ever?

Actually, I believe it can. What's needed is a new approach.

That approach needs to include the types and locations of venues chosen for the league, the type of relationships between players and the league and their respective clubs and the nature of league and club ownership.

That approach also needs to include the way the teams are sponsored and marketed. It's time to think outside of the pitch. Next week we'll do that: offer a proposed new model for professional women's soccer in the USA. 

John Howell is a Contributor for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained first-hand.