by Alyce Collett (30/9/26)
Above: Ryan Williams (right) in action earlier this year against KC Current. Photo: via NC Courage.
Despite how much she is a core member of the North Carolina Courage defence these days, things have not always been easy in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) for Courage co captain Ryan Williams.
Williams was initially drafted to the Courage in the 2018 NWSL College Draft with the very last pick of the entire draft, and going into the draft had no expectations for how draft night would go for her.
“I really was not expecting to be drafted at all. I actually wasn’t even watching the draft at the time” Williams recalled.
“But my parents, they’ve always been so supportive of soccer. My dad played soccer, so they’ve just been obviously my biggest fans, and drove me around, and my dad was my coach as a kid, and so they were watching the whole draft.
“I had a text from my college coach, and they were kind of getting near the end, and he texted me and asked me if I was watching – and I was actually at the grocery store – and he told me that he thought I was going to go and get drafted. So I got in my car and I raced home, and I turned the draft on my phone – it was on YouTube at the time – so I had just gotten it on. I walked in my living room in my college house, and they happened to call my name, last pick of the draft. I had literally just pulled it up on my phone.
“So it was really honestly so exciting and so fun, and I think that… there’s pros and cons about not having or having a draft. But when I think of the draft it always brings back really good memories.
“[It was] definitely something I was not expecting, but I was always hopeful, and I think I’ve always had really good self-belief in myself, and I’ve always wanted to back myself, so I was hopeful but I also knew that if I didn’t get drafted there were other ways that I could continue playing soccer.”
In Williams’ first few years at the Courage she had some big name team mates – including the likes of Sam Mewis, Debinha and Crystal Dunn – so game time was hard to come by for her in the early years. Not only was she competing with some big names for game time, but the team was also having a lot of success when it came to winning trophies, which always comes with a reluctance to tinker with the side too much.
“I mean, I definitely was not prepared in some ways. But I think it was good because I got here and they were all so humble and welcoming and kind people, and they’re still people that I have relationships with today” Williams explained.
“It was fun. It was a big transition, and it was a hard transition from college to pro, and really something I was not prepared for. But I think that I look back on that time and I’m really grateful for it because I think it had to happen the way it did for me and I had to pay my dues with this team, and I learned so much even though I wasn’t physically putting in the minutes in game time.
“I think it made me work really hard in a way and it taught me a lot of patience, and I wasn’t patient every day. It was definitely frustrating at times. It’s not fun watching the game from the stands when everybody comes into a pro team and they’ve gotten significant minutes on every team that they’ve been on.
“So it was, it was hard, but I think that it really did teach me a lot of things and I think I got better. I think it made me work harder. And I mean there’s I feel so many lessons that I learned throughout that. And I honestly don’t think I was ready to play in game minutes when I got here.”
Williams has grown since those tough early days to become one of the most consistent, most reliable and first choice players in the Courage team, but those hard early days have given her more perspective on the position she finds herself in now.
“I feel really grateful for the position that I’m in, because I think that I can really relate to the players who aren’t playing because I’ve been there” Williams said.
“I’ve been in the stands. I’ve been not rostering. I’ve been not traveling, and I know that it’s hard, and they’re putting in just as much work, if not more, than the starters and people who are playing in game minutes in practice, and they’re, they’re doing a really thankless job. I also think I’ve learned to really value the players that are not getting game minutes, because I think that I’ve seen how much they truly impact the players that are playing significant minutes.
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“I think that a lot of starters in the NWSL maybe have always been starters, which is also great, and that’s also a unique position. But I think for me, I like to really make sure that these players that aren’t playing a lot or not traveling or are sitting up in the stands, they know how valued they are and how important they are to this team and we’re not successful as a team without them.”
Williams was made one of the Courage captains ahead of the 2026 season – alongside new inclusions Kailen Sheridan and Talia Staude – which she described as “really such an honour.”
“Obviously, I’ve been at this club for a long time, and I think just looking back on my journey and my career, when I first got here, I wasn’t even on a full contract in my first season” Williams said.
“I was kind of in and out of a contract with the national team replacement. So I think for me, from the moment I got here, I wanted to be on this team, I wanted to play for this club. I just felt so welcomed, and it just felt so special here from the staff to the players, to the culture to the city, and I think I wanted nothing more than to have a contract here, and now to be named captain, I feel like it’s very full circle.
“It’s been really fun and such an honour, and I think it’s made me better. I’m not just worried about myself. I have a responsibility to the team, and I take that really seriously, and I want to bring people with me and keep the standard really high and keep the culture really good here.”
Williams is well known as a right back, but has been given the freedom by first year Courage coach Mak Lind to play a more wing back like role and push more into the attacking play than Courage fans are used to seeing.
“It’s been really fun” Williams said, speaking about the change in role she has had this season.
“I think that Mak really trusts us as players to take the game on and he talks about super strengths and all these different things, and it’s part of our tactics, and I think it’s been really fun to have that trust and the freedom to find the ball and get higher up, but also obviously get back and defend.
“I think our tactics are really good, and I think everybody’s really bought in.
“I think that’s something that our team knows I’m going to get high [on the pitch] but it’s just really important and helpful that the girls behind me are so organized and we have our principles and we have our tactics, and I think it’s been really helpful for me to be able to go forward and know that everything’s being taken care of behind me because we really trust each other.”
Despite her obvious talents, opportunities at international level is something that has eluded Williams to date. However, this is not something weighing the star defender down.
“I think for me, what I want to focus on is my club” Williams said.
“I mean, the Courage has truly given me everything and I think for me, I really want to focus on what I do have and instead of what I don’t have. I think that it can be stressful and it can be frustrating, but I think that if you focus on the things you don’t have, it’s really tough to be happy and it’s really tough to be present.
“I think for me, I’m so grateful to this club and I’m so happy here, and I have such amazing friends, and I love the staff, and I love where I live.
I think for me, my focus is to get better every single day and be a really good leader, and I want to bring people with me. I want to help younger players and I want to help the players on our team get better and be happy here and learn about themselves.
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“I don’t want to go down that rabbit hole of thinking about things that I don’t have or thinking about things that I haven’t achieved because I feel really proud of what I’ve done here and I know that we’re not done yet here at the Courage, and I see us going really far this year.”
Williams has been called up to the national team set up once, for a training camp in January last year that had no matches involved.
“That was really fun” Williams recalled.
“It was my first camp ever” she went on to explain.
“I was not in the youth program, so it was a really cool experience and definitely very exciting. I think I definitely took some stuff with me and learned a lot about kind of the way the national team works and I also learned a lot about myself.”
That team first mindset of Williams is also a huge factor in what she says is her ultimate goal for the rest of her career moving forward.
“This club has obviously had a great history of being really successful, and I think for me, I think it’s time that we win something again here at the Courage, and I think it would just be really special to be a part of that in a different way, which would be like being one of the captains on this team and getting game minutes in big games, quarterfinals, semifinals, championship” Williams explained.
“I have a lot of belief in this team right now, and for us we are taking it day by day, but obviously the bigger goal is to ultimately do the little things right day to day, and hopefully that results in us winning shields and championships here at the Courage.”
Hindsight is something that has shaped the player that Williams has become, and that hindsight is a funny thing when you look back at the type of player Williams could have been if not for a particular coach in college.
“As a kid you kind of play anywhere, but then in high school and middle school once you kind of started having positions, I actually did play forward” Williams explained.
“So I was one of the many players that started out as a forward/ like outside mid, and then once I got to college they actually transitioned me into a right back. It was the first day of our pre-season in college, and they were like ‘We really need a right back’, and they put me there, and it just kind of stuck from there.”
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