A reinvigorating Olympics usher in a new era of U.S. women’s soccer

PARIS – This is what the U.S. women’s national soccer team should look like at the end of a major international competition: Absolutely spent athletes in red, white and blue falling to their knees and all over each other, some with arms raised in full triumph, some without the energy to do even that. Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A” blared through the speakers at Parc des Princes. It had been a bit.

The American women didn’t come to the Paris Olympics to extend a dynasty, as had been the mission at such tournaments so frequently over the past three decades. They came to reestablish it. We have learned scenes such as Saturday’s don’t transpire automatically. It’s hard.

“It’s not about just putting your jersey on,” veteran defender Crystal Dunn said. “It’s doing the work and really earning every step on the pitch.”

Funny what a few weeks can do. A proud program arrived here as a listing tanker. It leaves with the holes in its hull patched, steaming forward. Mallory Swanson scored the goal that provided a 1-0 victory over a feisty Brazil side to win the Americans’ first Olympic gold medal in a dozen years. Swanson did so by converting a beautiful through ball from Korbin Albert.

Swanson is 26. Albert is 20. Go down the U.S. roster: Trinity Rodman is 22, Naomi Girma is 24. Sophia Smith turned 24 on Saturday. They were all key in this perfect run through Paris. They’re all young. There is speed and skill and stamina here. There’s more on the way.

What a pivot. The Olympics were about winning gold, of course, after a disastrous Women’s World Cup less than a year ago. But for this group at this time, the Games were also about charting a completely new direction with so many new players. It’s a path lined with something that was missing as the program drifted and the results disappointed.

“Most importantly, you keep probably hearing it: We’re all playing with joy,” said Swanson, who joins Smith and Rodman to make a front line that could be lethal for years. “We’re having so much fun. I’m just so happy.”

Those players won the gold – with a massive contribution from Alyssa Naeher, the 36-year-old goalkeeper who doubles as a team backbone. But they all were put in position by Emma Hayes, the 47-year-old Brit who coached her first major international tournament with the Americans here.

Coaches don’t receive medals at the Olympics. Can someone make Hayes a replica? Out of actual gold?

“She came in with an incredibly difficult task,” Dunn said. “But we just embraced it. We knew it was going to be difficult and challenging in some ways, but we got the job done.”

Think about how quickly this transformation took place. Hayes coached her first match with her new group June 1. Her record to this point: 9-0-1, including a 6-0 romp through the Olympics in which the Americans outscored their opponents, 12-2.

“Winning’s in my DNA,” Hayes said. “I’m used to being in finals. I’m used to competing for trophies. And so is the U.S. women’s national team.”

After a bruising World Cup in New Zealand and Australia – one in which the Americans won only one of four games and were eliminated before the quarterfinals for the first time ever – the program seemed in disarray. Vlatko Andonovski, then the coach, had stuck with an aging roster and seemed unable to inspire. In Andonovski’s two major tournaments leading the team – the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and the World Cup down under – an American program with four World Cup titles and four Olympic golds had managed only a bronze medal and a historic flameout.

So Hayes’s hiring was inarguably necessary. But it was also inspired. Rather than drawing from the American professional ranks, U.S. Soccer – the organization that overseas the national programs on both the women’s and men’s sides – plucked Hayes from English power Chelsea, a program she led to seven FA Women’s Super League championships, including the past five.

Unfamiliar with that circuit? Doesn’t matter. Hayes came with a combination of credibility and experience that was precisely what the beat-up American outfit needed.

“I think sometimes we always look at negative experiences or setbacks as something that shouldn’t happen,” Hayes said. “I think the opposite.”

The previous losses, she believed, were about growth. She also, just about immediately, showed she was unafraid to make difficult decisions. When a program is as storied as this one, it can be easy to genuflect to the players who gave it that status. Hayes simply didn’t. When it came time to choose an Olympic roster, with just 16 field players and two goaltenders, she left off Alex Morgan, a two-time World Cup champion who helped drive the Americans to their most recent Olympic gold, in 2012 in London.

This was a substantive move. But it was also symbolic. Morgan is 35. She created very little offense at last year’s World Cup. There were solid soccer reasons for the decision.

But it also established a clean break, and gave this group a new identity.

“All the players being coachable, buying in – it’s not easy,” captain Lindsey Horan said. “It’s really not easy. It’s not easy for Emma. It’s not easy for us. I think this journey has been incredible. But there’s so much belief in every single one of us.”

After the final whistle, and after more than a few American players exchanged hugs with Brazilian icon Marta – who, at 38, still hasn’t broken through at the Olympics or the World Cup – Hayes gathered her charges in a circle just outside of midfield. It was the end of the tournament. It felt like the beginning of something fresh.

“I think it’s important that we realize: There’s so much more that we can do,” Dunn said. “And having Emma now for the long haul is going to be incredible.”

Hayes took a step toward the middle of the circle and spoke. She thumped her chest. And then she gave her players a round of applause.

They deserved it. But so did she.

“I’m a delighted, sort of half-American today,” Hayes beamed.

“Ah, you’re full American,” Horan said.

When the American team took the medal stand – holding hands, stepping as one, then saluting the crowd – Hayes stood to the side and cheered some more. The gold medal represents what they accomplished over two-and-a-half weeks in France. But it also points to what they can accomplish in the future.