
Juventus forward Sofia Cantore signs with the NWSL's Washington Spirit
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Washington Spirit have acquired Juventus forward Sofia Cantore, who becomes the first Italian international in the National Women's Soccer League.
Cantore's contract will keep her with the Spirit through the 2027 season, the team said Tuesday. She will join the Spirit on July 1.
Cantore is currently on Italy's provisional roster for the European Championship. She has made 37 appearances for the national team with five goals.
She scored 11 goals for Juventus in Italy's Serie A this past season.
'I'm very proud to join this important club and grateful for their trust in my abilities,' Cantore said in a statement. 'I'm excited to start this new chapter of my career as the first Italian player in the NWSL and can't wait to work every day with coach Adrián González and my new teammates.'
Thursdays
Keep up to date on sports with Mike McIntyre's weekly newsletter.
___
AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Winnipeg Free Press
an hour ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Tkachuk, Barkov and Reinhart play through significant injuries to help Panthers win Stanley Cup
SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Some top Florida Panthers players gutted through significant injuries to help them repeat as Stanley Cup champions, most notably Matthew Tkachuk dealing with a sports hernia and torn adductor muscle on the same side. 'He was a mess,' coach Paul Maurice said. 'That's the medical term: He was a mess.' Maurice said Aleksander Barkov's point production in the final was affected by one of the captain's hands being cut open and that Sam Reinhart returned from a Grade 2 MCL sprain in the Eastern Conference final. 'In Game 1, Sasha split the palm of his hand open,' Maurice said. 'He had those sutures torn out twice 'til he just glued it together.' Reinhart came back to score four goals in the clinching Game 6 against Edmonton. No player has done that since Maurice 'Rocket Richard' in 1957. Tkachuk scored what turned out to be the Cup-winning goal, four months after getting injured playing for the U.S. in the 4 Nations Face-Off. He missed the second half of the regular season. 'I was really not hopeful at the start that he would survive the first round,' Maurice said. 'We just didn't think he could do it.' Smiling ear to ear on the ice after hoisting the Cup, Tkachuk beamed about the medical treatment that made him able to play. 'I wouldn't be here without the trainers and the doctors and those people, and that's what makes this Cup more special for me is how hard it was just to be out there and to get to the point of playing,' Tkachuk said. 'I owe — this Cup is because of them for me. I'm so lucky.' Perry comes up short Corey Perry became the first player in NHL history to lose in the final five times in six years with four different teams. Perry was also with the Oilers last year and before that lost in 2022 with Tampa Bay, 2021 with Montreal and 2020 with Dallas. Had Edmonton won, Perry would have broken the record for the longest gap between Cup championships. He won it with the Anaheim Ducks in 2007. Cup handout surprise Barkov did not hand the Stanley Cup to a longtime teammate like Aaron Ekblad or Sergei Bobrovsky. It went to newcomer and third-pairing defenseman Nate Schmidt, who won it for the first time in his career. 'He just looked at me and he gave me the 'Cap' death stare,' Schmidt said. 'You don't turn those eyes away. No, I didn't know. It was awesome.' Schmidt then handed it to Seth Jones, who gave it to Tomas Nosek to Vitek Vanecek to A.J. Greer and on to all the other players who hadn't hoisted the Cup before. Jones, a trade acquisition from Chicago late in the season, later celebrated on the ice with his father, retired NBA player Popeye Jones. '(Barkov) looked me and he said, 'Hey, the guys that haven't done it before, we're going to take a back seat to you guys,'' Schmidt said. 'It means a lot.' Dynasty talks Thursdays Keep up to date on sports with Mike McIntyre's weekly newsletter. There are a few teams that people point to when the word dynasty comes up. Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls. The Tom Brady-led New England Patriots. After successfully defending their title, should this Panthers team be added to that list? 'Hell yeah,' Matthew Tkachuk said. 'Absolutely.' The dynasty talk started before the series even began, when it became clear that the Florida Panthers would play in their third straight Stanley Cup Final. They've played more hockey games than any other team in the NHL over the past three years, which obviously means they've done a lot of winning. ___ AP NHL playoffs: and


Winnipeg Free Press
2 hours ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Royals' All-Star reprise in Texas includes homer from Witt against his hometown team
ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Bobby Witt Jr.'s biggest memory from All-Star festivities in his hometown last summer was coming up about 6 inches short — his measurement — in the Home Run Derby. Now the star shortstop of the Kansas City Royals has his first homer that counts at the home of the Texas Rangers. Witt went deep in the fifth inning after sparking his offense with a double and a run scored in the first, and fellow 2024 All-Star Salvador Perez homered twice in a 6-1 victory over the Rangers on Tuesday night. As for the other active Kansas City All-Star from last year in the trio's return to Globe Life Field, Seth Lugo struck out a season-high nine in his first victory since May 1. The right-hander allowed three hits and one run in six innings. Pretty good hat trick in an All-Star reprise as the Royals ended a six-game losing streak that tied their season worst. They also stopped a five-game skid against the Rangers, their co-tenant at spring training in Arizona. 'Seems like a little more than a year ago we were here and had good games,' said Lugo (4-5), forgetting for a moment that it's been about 11 months since he pitched a scoreless inning in the American League's 5-3 victory. 'And now we've got the W, so that's what's most important.' Left-hander Cole Ragans, whose career started with the Rangers, is the Royals' fourth All-Star from a year ago. He's on the injured list with a left rotator cuff strain. Witt — the son of former major league pitcher Bobby Witt, who spent 11 of his 16 big league seasons with the Rangers — lost the derby to Teoscar Hernández last July when a homer that would have forced a tiebreaker bounced off the wall in left field at Globe Life. The 25-year-old wasn't the starter at shortstop for the AL — that was Gunnar Henderson — but Witt played and struck out. His only other homer against the Rangers was in a 12-3 loss at home two years ago. His first at Globe Life was his ninth this season. 'It was great to just check off another ballpark,' said Witt, the former Dallas-area high school star who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2019 amateur draft. 'But yeah, it was cool.' Thursdays Keep up to date on sports with Mike McIntyre's weekly newsletter. Perez made the biggest news of the night by breaking Hall of Famer George Brett's franchise record with his 18th career multihomer game. The significance wasn't lost on a nine-time All-Star who won a World Series with the Royals 10 years ago. Brett was on the franchise's other championship team 30 years before that. 'When you pass a Hall of Famer, now you know you're going to be next to him,' the 35-year-old Perez said. 'So it's super exciting for me.' ___ AP MLB:


Winnipeg Free Press
2 hours ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Yankees searching for answers after 3rd straight shutout
NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Yankees' offense is drifting toward uncharted territory — and not in a good way. The team tied a franchise record by getting shut out for the third straight game Tuesday night, when the Yankees went 0 for 10 with runners on base in a 4-0 loss to the Los Angeles Angels. 'Obviously, we're not getting the job done,' outfielder Cody Bellinger said. 'We're not getting a lot of baserunners. We're not causing traffic. We've got to keep going and wake up tomorrow and we've got to get going.' The Yankees have been blanked in three consecutive games seven times in their 123-year history — but only three times in the last 50 years, most recently from Sept. 22-24, 2016. The last major league team to get shut out in four straight games was the Kansas City Royals in September 2017. 'It's a little bit foreign for us to go through this for a few days,' Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. New York has lost five in a row and mustered only five runs in its past six games, including a 1-0 win last Thursday in Kansas City. The last time the Yankees scored five runs or fewer in a six-game span was August 1968. In the past six games, New York is batting .164. Giancarlo Stanton is 4 for 8 in his first two games since returning from injuries to both elbows. But lineup mainstays Bellinger (.152 in his last eight games), Paul Goldschmidt (.164 in his last 17 games) and Aaron Judge (.125 in his last seven games) are all mired in extended slumps. Judge, who began the night leading the American League in all three Triple Crown categories, was booed following strikeouts in the sixth and eighth innings. Boone tinkered with his lineup — batting rookie Jasson Domínguez first and dropping Goldschmidt to sixth — but it didn't yield results for the Yankees, who were limited to four hits and got just three runners to second base against Kyle Hendricks and a trio of relievers. Boone implored the Yankees to remain patient at the plate but acknowledged they might have been pressing Tuesday, when they went up against the soft-tossing Hendricks on an unseasonably cool 67-degree night. 'You want to be the guy (to) kind of get the hit, get it going,' Boone said. 'But that's where the patience comes in and that's where just you can't obsess on the result. You can't go up there (like) 'I gotta get a hit, I gotta do this.' It's got to be, 'I gotta go take a tough at-bat.'' Thursdays Keep up to date on sports with Mike McIntyre's weekly newsletter. Even with the slump, the Yankees still rank among the top five teams in the majors in runs (370), homers (109) and OPS (.784). They finished among the top five in all three categories in five of Boone's first seven seasons as manager. 'It's been a little struggle the last couple days, which unfortunately is going to happen,' Boone said. 'It's just always shocking to see our group not score runs, right? Especially a few days in a row now. 'We've just got to focus on the little things — think small, big things come.' ___ AP MLB: