Casey Stoney is out as manager of San Diego Wave FC of the NWSL as the team sits ninth in the league with a 3-5-6 record.
“We are extremely grateful to Casey for her commitment to our club and the positive impact she has had both on and off the field.” San Diego Wave FC President Jill Ellis said in a statement. “Over the past few seasons, Casey has led us to important milestones, and her contributions have been instrumental in building a strong foundation on which we can build. The decision to part ways was very difficult and not taken hastily, but given the ambition of this club and where we are in the season, we felt a change was necessary at this time.”
The Wave have not won their last seven games (0-2-5) and have recorded just two wins since late March.
The resignation of Stoney, who was hired in 2021 as the club’s first-ever head coach and led the Wave to the 2023 NWSL Shield and 2024 Challenge Cup, comes two days after their 0-0 draw against the Houston Dash. After the game, Stoney criticized the NWSL for creating the schedule, calling their three-game road trip through Houston, Washington D.C. and New Jersey in temperatures above 90 degrees Fahrenheit “unacceptable.”
“I think it’s extremely unfair to players,” Stoney said Saturday. “I think it’s for the good of the players, to ask us to go to Washington, [Gotham] away and then come to Houston in June, two days after we played the previous game, that is unacceptable. In terms of planning, that should not happen.”
NWSL teams have seen changes in schedule formats over the past two seasons. Each team plays at least one game during the week and a weekend game.
Stoney, the 2022 NWSL Coach of the Year, added that she felt like her team was “punished” because Wave defeated NY/NJ Gotham in the Challenge Cup in March, forcing their regular season meeting to be moved to last Wednesday in New Jersey.
“There’s no reason,” she said. “Because we don’t work with foresight in this competition, if I’m honest.”
The club and Stoney agreed to a contract extension in January that would have kept her in San Diego through the 2027 NWSL season, with a mutual option for 2028.
Paul Buckle, who was an assistant with the Wave in 2022, has been named interim head coach.
