Dunaway's late goal moves Aurora to the Semi-Finals

On a hot and humid Sunday evening in Western Pennsylvania, Minnesota Aurora faced their toughest challenge of 2026 so far. Unbeaten Pittsburgh Riveters and a raucous home crowd at F.N.B. Stadium in the Steel City hosted Aurora in the Central Conference Final. The Rivs became only the second team all season to score on Aurora, thanks to a wonderstrike from Irish International Ellen Molloy. But a first half goal from Flavie Dubé and the winner at the death from Gracie Dunaway sent Aurora into the National Semi-Finals.

With a ton at stake on Sunday evening both clubs brought out extremely familiar lineups. The hosts made zero changes to their starting eleven, choosing to bring the same players on after one day off. Aurora did a very similar thing with Jen Larrick's side making just one swap as leading scorer Ai Kitagawa started in place of Hadli Barrera.

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Lineups are out for both teams and they look extremely familiar to Friday. Aurora makes one change with Ai Kitagawa replacing Hadli Barrera. Pittsburgh retains their entire eleven from Friday night’s win over Racing Lou.

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Unlike most of the regular season Aurora did not dominate from the opening whistle. Rather Pittsburgh showed grit and fight from the whistle and tried to force Aurora to play their style of football. That did work for parts of the match but Aurora was able to break down and through the Riveters style. But Aurora did what they do best and that was score early.

Just past the fifteen minute mark Aurora snapped up the ball in the attacking third and pushed into the box. Jeanette Fieldsend slipped a quick pass to Flavie Dubé who then whipped in a shot from the six through the extremely narrow lane between the post and goalkeeper to open the scoring.

Pittsburgh continued to push through and fight, eventually finding a way to break down Aurora's tight, gritty defensive effort to get into the attacking third. However Aurora was able to clear out most of the chances, until a foul was called right near the edge of the box.

That's when Irish International Ellen Molloy, on loan from Shamrock Rovers, stepped up to take the free kick. She then smashed a wonderstrike into the upper corner of the goal, just out of Taylor Fox's reach, to draw the match level minutes before the end of the half.

In the second half the Steel City was home to an extremely steely match between Aurora and the Riveters. Both sides fought and played one of the roughest and toughest matches of the season. They each pushed for another goal and goalkeepers Taylor Fox and Lexi Grundler kept the match 1–1 through almost the entirety of the second half.

But Grundler was only able to hang on and keep the ball out of the net for so long. And that streak of saves ended at the worst time imaginable for a club, at the death. Ai Kitagawa sent a pass to an open and unmarked Flavie Dubé along the right side of the pitch. Dubé then whipped a low cross into the box where Gracie Dunaway got her foot on it and scored as she was being tackled.

The late goal and win gave Aurora their second USL W League Central Conference title in five seasons and sent them to the National Semi-Finals. Following other results on the evening, Salmon Bay FC (Seattle, WA) was set as the next opponent. Much to the dismay of fans that match will be held at the 900 seat Interbay Stadium in Seattle, WA on Saturday, 11 July at 9:30pm CT. The winner of that match will face either Vermont Green or Asheville City in the National Final the following weekend.