CHICAGO – Chicago Stars FC goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher was voted the 2024 U.S. Soccer Feminine Participant of the 12 months after she helped lead the nationwide squad to win the gold medal in final 12 months’s Summer season Olympics.
Naeher, 36, additionally earned the award after she retired from worldwide soccer. She’s solely the second goalkeeper to win the award after Hope Solo in 2009.
Profitable Olympic gold
The backstory:
Naeher was additionally voted the Finest FIFA Girls’s Goalkeeper of the 12 months for 2024 and chosen to the Finest FIFA Finest Girls’s 11.
She performed each minute of the 2024 Olympics and allowed simply two targets. The USA ladies’s workforce gained all three knockout matches within the Olympics by 1-0 scores, two of which went into time beyond regulation. They defeated Brazil within the gold medal match.
SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA – MARCH 10: Alyssa Naeher #1 of america shouts directions through the first half towards Brazil through the 2024 Concacaf W Gold Cup last at Snapdragon Stadium on March 10, 2024 in San Diego, California. (Photograph by Ben
Naeher turned the primary goalkeeper in ladies’s soccer historical past to maintain shutouts in a World Cup Last and an Olympic Last.
She completed 2024 with a document of 13 wins, one loss and three attracts whereas permitting simply 11 targets in 18 begins.
What’s subsequent:
Whereas she has retired from the worldwide squad, she’s going to proceed her skilled profession with the Chicago Stars within the Nationwide Girls’s Soccer League.
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA – MAY 05: Goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher #1 of the Chicago Crimson Stars appears on towards Bay FC within the first half at PayPal Park on Could 05, 2024 in San Jose, California. (Photograph by Eakin Howard/Getty Pictures)
What they’re saying:
Naeher, who performed her last USWMT sport final month, praised the workforce for his or her accomplishments collectively.
“That is an unimaginable honor, to cap off what has been a really particular 12 months with this workforce. This workforce is made up of a particular group of gamers, coaches and workers and all 12 months you possibly can really feel that vitality and that we had the chance to realize one thing nice. I used to be impressed all 12 months lengthy by my unimaginable teammates; the work we put in, the dedication to the workforce and our targets, and all of their love and assist.”
