USWNT salvages draw against Netherlands in World Cup group play

The U.S. women's national soccer team narrowly avoided a loss yesterday thanks to a tying goal in the 62nd minute. The Netherlands held a 1-0 lead for most of the match after scoring quickly in the 17th minute. Joining me now is CBS Sports Galanzo Network analyst Lisa Carlin. Hey Lisa, I'm glad that you're here. So I wasn't sure whether or not I was surprised by this outcome because I knew that the Netherlands was a formidable team, you know, the last time around and now they've had time to really kind of gear up and become even better. How, I guess my question to you is just how important was the equalizer for the Americans in their, when it comes to their World Cup hopes? Annemarie, the equalizer was everything for the United States. It came a little bit later than I would have hoped for this team. I think they would have hoped as well, but ultimately they do get it in the 62nd minute on a goal from Lindsey Horan and that's what really keeps them alive and shows their fight in this World Cup. After going down that first goal to the Netherlands in the 17th minute, they lost control of the game. It ran away from them and you could see on the U.S. players' faces, they just needed to get to halftime so they could communicate with each other, regroup and come out in the second half with a different game plan. But you're exactly right. The Netherlands is a top-ranked nation and everyone knew that this was going to be a big uphill battle for the United States. So the U.S. is going to be taking on Portugal in the final match of the group stage on Tuesday. How do the two teams match up? Yeah, Portugal is a tough team. When you look at how they played against the Netherlands, they held the Dutch to a 1-0 scoreline in that match. Portugal's got grit. They're really tough. They also play really compact defensively, so they'll stack a lot of numbers behind the ball right on top of their defensive 18, which is going to be difficult for the United States to break down. However, the United States should have the upper hand over Portugal in this match. However, there's a bit of a caveat. When you look at the standings, the United States ideally needs to get number one in their group in order to have the easiest path towards the final. I don't say easy. I just mean easier than the latter. If they were to come out second in their group, Netherlands being the first-place team, it's going to be a much harder battle for the United States. So not only does the U.S. need to get a win over Portugal, they also need to rack up goals so they can expand their goal differential and remain in the number one spot in the group. Okay, then let us talk about the possible opponents moving forward past this group, right? Who would be kind of the most concerning opponents? Yeah, so if the United States were to win out in their group and then they move on, they'll go on to play the winners of the group that's next to them. So in this chance, it'll be group B. So it'll either be Nigeria, who just beat Australia this morning, Canada, Australia, or the Republic of Ireland is out in that group. So it could potentially be Nigeria, Canada, or Australia. Those are tough competitors. You look at Canada, those are CONCACAF rivals. There are brothers and sisters to the north. There's always a lot of tension. There's a lot of familiarity with those teams. Australia being the host nation in this World Cup, they've got a lot riding on their shoulders. They've been without their superstar forward, Sam Kerr. She's dealing with a bit of an injury. They're hopeful that if they get out of the group stages, they will have her back and that could be trouble for the United States. She owns the record in goal scoring in three different continents, Sam Kerr. And then Nigeria, they're a tough team that knows how to compete. You saw them get the win early this morning in the wee hours of the morning over Australia. All right. Should be interesting. Lisa Carlin, thank you.