Thorns GM LeBlanc steps aside amid NWSL skid

Karina LeBlanc will transition out of her role as the general manager of the Portland Thorns at the end of the 2024 NWSL season to assume a position that encompasses both the Thorns and Portland’s 2026 WNBA expansion team, which will share ownership.

The team’s ownership group, RAJ Sports, announced the move on Wednesday, with the Thorns in the middle of their worst run of form in history. Portland has lost six of its last seven regular-season games and has not won in league play since Rob Gale was elevated from interim coach to full-time coach in July.

The Thorns said a search for a new general manager will begin immediately.

“We’d like to thank Karina for everything she has done for the Portland Thorns since she joined the club in 2021,” Lisa Bhathal Merage, co-executive chair of RAJ Sports, said in a statement. “Karina provided stability for the Thorns during a very tumultuous time, contributed to a NWSL Championship in 2022, and has been an integral part of this club’s work in the community.

“We believe now is a good time to make a change and set the club, and Karina, up for future success. Karina will remain with RAJ Sports in a role that will allow her to thrive and drive impact in our community as we build Portland into the global epicenter for women’s sports.”

Portland currently sits in seventh place, level on points with expansion side Bay FC. Each team is just three points clear of dropping out of the playoffs with three games to play in the season.

The Thorns — perennial contenders since the NWSL’s inception — last won a league game on July 5. They won the inaugural NWSL Championship in 2013 and followed that up with two more titles and two NWSL Shields, in addition to leading the NWSL in attendance in each of the league’s first eight seasons.

Bhathal Merage and her brother Alex co-founded RAJ Sports, which acquired the Thorns earlier this year. They were awarded the WNBA’s 15th franchise last month.

“I’m incredibly honored and empowered to represent RAJ Sports through the unique and passionate lens of Portland,” LeBlanc said in a statement. “Having played here and now living and raising my daughter in Portland, I have firsthand experience of how deeply rooted this community is in the success of women’s sports. I truly believe Portland can become the epicenter of women’s sports, and I’m excited to be part of the team driving that vision forward.”

LeBlanc, who was the starting goalkeeper for Portland that inaugural season, joined the Thorns at the end of 2021, shortly before the team hired Rhian Wilkinson — a former teammate of LeBlanc’s in their playing days with the Canada national team and a former Thorns player — as head coach.

Portland won the NWSL Championship in 2022, but Wilkinson resigned shortly after. She was investigated and cleared of misconduct by the league for conduct with a player, but Wilkinson resigned because she felt she lost the locker room.

LeBlanc hired Mike Norris, who Wilkinson had brought on as an assistant in 2022, as the team’s new head coach. Sources at the time said that players supported continuity and wanted Norris to become head coach. The Thorns finished second in the league under Norris in 2023, battling through inconsistencies that included an embarrassing 5-1 loss to Angel City FC on the final day of the season that cost them the Shield.

The Thorns lost in the semifinals at home to the eventual champion NJ/NY Gotham FC in the playoffs last season.

Portland earned only one point from its first four games to start 2024 and Norris was reassigned to the front office to be technical director. Gale, who Norris had brought in as an assistant coach in 2023, was named interim coach.

The Thorns won six straight games to start Gale’s interim era before being hired full-time in July. LeBlanc said the team conducted “a global search” but ultimately felt that Gale was the right hire.

LeBlanc told ESPN at the time that Thorns players expressed their support for hiring Gale prior to the decision in July.

“This is a club that we want to be successful, so Rob’s record in the interim was impressive, but it also was beyond that,” LeBlanc told ESPN in July. “I mean, the players love him, the community loves him, the fans love him, the staff love him. But in the beginning, I said to him, ‘Make this [decision] hard on us.'”