The Americans enter the World Cup on the short list of favorites alongside Germany and Japan, the past two champions.
Megan Rapinoe is soccer’s stream of consciousness.
When the mood strikes her, the U.S. women’s national team and Reign midfielder will fire off that impossibly angled pass, and try to beat a dozing goalkeeper from near midfield. Rapinoe drops off a back heel, makes a darting run, flicks the ball over her shoulder without a second glance — the bob of a blond head, the flash of a neon cleat, the flick of a hip.
Often times it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. Part of the joy of watching Rapinoe is having no idea what is going to happen next.
The same could be said of the U.S. women’s national team as it prepares for the 2015 World Cup, which kicks off Saturday in Canada.
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The Americans enter the World Cup on the short list of favorites alongside Germany and Japan, the past two champions. The U.S. team also has looked, at times, as vulnerable as ever in the lead-up to a major tournament. It has been through three coaches in the past four years. Veterans have held out stubbornly in pursuit of a trophy that the U.S. hasn’t lifted for 16 years, and it sometimes can look stale.
“We have gone through some struggles,” Rapinoe said in a preseason interview. “I think we’re starting to come out of that, and it really tested a lot of us in a lot of ways. We didn’t just roll over teams like we used to, and I don’t think we can expect to do that anymore.”
A perception problem
This team can sometimes come across as standoffish and entitled. Abby Wambach, one of the game’s greats, gave a less-than-flattering description of her teammates in a recent interview with the New York Times.
“Why do you think I’ve made the career that I have in the World Cup and the Olympics?” Wambach asked the Times. “Why do you think I score?
“Because people are a little bit scared. They’re like: ‘I’m going to pump that ball up to Wambach, see what happens.’ … And I just make stuff happen.”
Hope Solo was suspended after her husband, former University of Washington and Seahawks tight end Jerramy Stevens, was arrested for drunk-driving a U.S. team van, but with no viable backup option she has been restored as the starting goalkeeper.
Rumors that former coach Tom Sermanni had been forced out via player revolt were swiftly denied by those involved, but the episode did little to dispel the black cloud hanging over the national program.
A lot of the perception problem, though, comes from being constantly compared with the iconic 1999 World Cup winners. The “1999ers” eagerly took to the role of women’s soccer ambassadors, role models dedicated to growing the game on and off the field. They lifted the World Cup on home soil in front of a sold-out Rose Bowl and spawned a generation of youth soccer players.
“I think it is the standard,” Rapinoe said. “At times, it’s been frustrating. But I think they gave us something valuable. They gave us that expectation of winning. There is no other option. … You will always believe, no matter what. You’re down in the last millisecond, there’s still a chance. While sometimes it can be frustrating getting compared, they did something that was incredible.”
Settled and mature
Rapinoe never breaks eye contact as she speaks, her tone as confident as her game. She is this national team personified. As a young upstart she once yelled Bruce Springsteen lyrics into a boom mic as a goal celebration but now is more settled, more mature.
Put in Seattle terms, she lived on Capitol Hill when she started with the Reign but has since moved to Seward Park because it’s quieter. This city is home now, she said, as if the knit hat she’s wearing despite unseasonably warm spring weather didn’t give her away.
Asked if she needs a World Cup triumph to validate a career — as Wambach has suggested about her accomplishments — Rapinoe doesn’t hesitate.
“I need it,” said Rapinoe, whose career includes an NCAA national championship with Portland and a UEFA Champions League runner-up medal with Lyon in France. “As a team, we want to put our legacy down, too. It’s an amazing group of players. I think it’s important for us to put our mark on U.S. Soccer, as well.
“Coming so close last time, it was, ‘Oh, my god.’ Brutal. Knowing what it took and how possible that was and what we have to do. We’re very capable of doing that.”
Oh yes, last time.
In the 2011 quarterfinals against Brazil, Rapinoe made perhaps the most important play of her career, finding Wambach with a Hail Mary of a cross in the 122nd minute of a match the U.S. would win on penalties.
But Japan flipped that script two rounds later, ripping the trophy out of the Americans’ hands with three minutes remaining. Homare Sawa scored in the 117th minute of a 2-1 game and the Japanese completed the stunning upset in a shootout.
‘On the chopping block’
For this generation of American players, even the ones with multiple Olympic gold medals to their names, winning that elusive World Cup title had long since become a quixotic quest. The pain of the Japan loss, coming so close to the ultimate prize but falling short, has turned it into a borderline obsession.
Wambach turned 35 years old Tuesday. Defender Christine Rampone is 39, Shannon Boxx is 37, and Solo is 33. Heather O’Reilly and Carli Lloyd are on the other side of 30, and Rapinoe will hit the big 3-0 on the day of the final, July 5.
“(Wambach) has all these awards,” Rapinoe said. “She was the FIFA Player of the Year and blah blah blah. All those little things do is get you to the point where you can get a World Cup. If you don’t get any individual awards but you get a World Cup, you’re a World Cup champ. And that’s it. That’s what we do all this for. That’s most important for us.”
The pressure comes not only from the weight of the win-or-else mandate, it comes from constantly fighting for your place on a team that has long been labeled best in the world.
“With the national team, it feels like every day you’re on the chopping block,” Rapinoe said.
The next generation slowly is elbowing its way into the frame. Midfielder Morgan Brian, 22, and defender Julie Johnson, 23, could play significant minutes in Canada.
If it feels like Rapinoe broke into the national consciousness just yesterday, it feels that way for her, too. Now she’s the one doling out advice to doe-eyed teammates, taking Brian under her wing.
“It just feels like there are so many ups and downs,” Rapinoe said. “It’s a tough team to break in to. And as soon as you break in, you can’t take a breath. You have to keep going and going.”
Taken together — the long shadow of the 1999ers, the external expectation of ceaseless excellence, the internal battle for roster and starting spots — the pressure seems unbearable. It builds, gathering momentum toward a defining moment every four years. It can inspire greatness or push a team past its breaking point.
All things considered, this team has handled the stress with grace. For most of them, the 2015 World Cup is their last chance to make it all worthwhile.
Whether they will is as unpredictable as Rapinoe on the ball, streaming up the sideline with her blond head up and looking for teammates.