With the release of the NWSL 2018 schedule last week, I decided to take a look at the strength of each club’s schedule.

In 2018, each of the nine NWSL clubs will play the other eight three times, home-and-home, with an additional home or away against those same sides. While this is balanced in a sense, a discrepancy arises in whether that third match is home or away.

Take the Washington Spirit, who had the lowest points per game when playing on the road last season (0.421). It would be more beneficial for a side to host Washington for an additional home match than to host the N.C. Courage, the club with the best road form last year (0.615 PPG).

From the above chart, we can see each team’s additional home and away match slate of opponents.

Here, we can calculate the average PPG of each team’s home and away slate of fixtures to come up with an overall strength of schedule for the 2018 season. By distinguishing between home and away PPG, we can see a minor imbalance between the sides this season, despite each team playing all other sides the same amount of times.

The average PPG for each clubs’ home and away opponents for 2018.

(Note: I removed any results involving the Boston Breakers last season from the calculations, so as to not skew any data with a club no longer in the league. I have also considered the Utah Royals as the on-field successor to FC Kansas City).

The average PPG of opponents (home and away) for each side for the upcoming season. Clubs are listed in order of their regular season table finish from last year (L to R), excluding Boston.

From the chart above, we can see that the Courage have been blessed with the easiest schedule for the 2018 season, with their average opponent earning 0.99 points per game last year.

Two of the other playoff teams from 2017, the Portland Thorns and Chicago Red Stars, have a relatively easy schedule with average opponent PPG of 1.01 and 1.03, respectively.

On the other end, the Houston Dash were dealt the hardest schedule of the season — an average opponent PPG of 1.12. The Utah Royals, in their inaugural season, drew the second hardest schedule, alongside Sky Blue FC, with an average opponent PPG of 1.11.

Three of last year’s playoffs teams — Courage, Portland and Chicago — sit clearly above the rest of the league in terms of ease of fixtures, so it would be no surprise to see these sides repeat their success from last year.

The numbers don’t tell the whole story, though.

First, it is unclear how the newly-minted Utah Royals will replicate the same home and away form as FC Kansas City after moving most of the roster to Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy, Utah. This model also assumes that many sides will carryover a similar roster from last season, with little change in the offseason.

While the season is still a few weeks away, the strength of schedule for the league can give us a good indication of how clubs should be set up to perform this season.

The N.C. Courage open the season March 24 against the Portland Thorns in a rematch of last year’s championship final.

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