It would be fair for U.S. women’s national team forward Jaedyn Shaw to feel some ownership over the pitch at Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego, Calif. The 19-year-old forward has called it home for nearly all of her matches as a professional player with the San Diego Wave in the NWSL. It’s where she scored her first USWNT goal last October. There’s a lot of pride on that pitch.
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Things changed on Wednesday night, amid rain-soaked conditions that marred the majority of the USWNT’s win against Canada on penalties in the W Gold Cup semifinal.
“I’m not gonna say I was embarrassed,” Shaw said. “I was a little like, ‘Can’t claim this field right now. Sorry guys, it’s usually pretty nice.’”
She playfully feigned pseudo-embarrassment as she spoke after the team’s turbulent win. She ducked her head beneath her hand as if to shrink back from the inevitable question of who could have approved a game of soccer on a pitch like that, where even routine passes were made impossible.
The steady drizzle that had fallen through much of the previous semifinal, played on that same pitch, greeted the teams during pregame warmups escalated to a heavier downpour and quickly flooded the pitch. Pools of water were scattered all over the grass and glinted beneath the lights by the time both sides emerged from the tunnel for their national anthems.
“It was honestly insane,” Shaw continued. “We had such a good warmup, and we were so pumped for it. The ball was moving really fast, and we were excited to just play and have a really intense game, and then we came back out and we were like, ‘What’s happening?’”
Just as rain can cleanse its surroundings, though, absurdity has a way of clarifying reality. The pitch quality was questionable at best — and at worst, rife with threats to players’ safety as they skidded, splashed, and trudged through the field. But they played on, and somehow those unpredictable, desperate circumstances laid the groundwork for the U.S. to show just how gritty it can be.
This was not a game of aesthetics. It was a game that frayed the nerves and gnarled many players’ straight-haired ponytails, leaving them matted by halftime. Winning commanded raw might and a willingness to get a little ugly, two elements the U.S. has endeavored to make regular ingredients in their new era. In that sense, this game, was necessary, though it arguably should not have been allowed to take place.
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When asked about the safety of the pitch and whether she believed the game should have happened, U.S. national team interim head coach Twila Kilgore said, “Probably not,” but noted that the decision wasn’t in either team’s control.
“It is solely at the discretion of the referee as to whether the field is safe and playable,” a CONCACAF spokesperson told The Athletic. Another CONCACAF representative said the only protocol they had been given prior to the match was that if lightning occurred within eight miles of the stadium, they would delay the game for about 30 minutes.
In the fourth minute, match official Katia García ran the ball over to the sideline to show someone — likely the match commissioner functionally responsible for deciding whether to delay the game — that the field conditions were unplayable. The ball barely rolled before stopping dead in a puddle.
“Technically and practically by law, it is always in the ultimate decision of the referee to make that decision,” professional referee and CBS rule analyst Christina Unkel said during the halftime broadcast. “That being said, practically speaking, there is a match commissioner at each of these CONCACAF matches. As we saw within the first minutes of this game, the referee went and demonstrated that the ball was not in fact rolling when she went over to near the fourth official station, which is where the match commissioner stands. It was very clear from her demonstrative showing that she does not necessarily think this is a safe condition, but is being told to continue this match by that match commissioner.”
Rules expert, @ChristinaUnkel breaks down the regulations behind tonight's waterlogged pitch and the decision to move forward with this semifinal match🙃 pic.twitter.com/kVvfNDuvkC
— Attacking Third (@AttackingThird) March 7, 2024
The players were also left wondering whether they would have to continue to play through the rain.
“I think all of us on the bench were kinda looking at the fourth (official) to see but there were conversations happening the whole time but nothing really came of it,” said forward Sophia Smith, who entered the game in the 65th minute. “I think then we knew the game’s gonna happen.”
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The U.S. adjusted and found a way. Shaw took advantage of the condition to test Canadian goalkeeper (and her Wave teammate) Kailen Sheridan, intercepting waterlogged passes and firing off early shots. Her efforts materialized in the 20th minute when she pounced on a backpass that died in a puddle from Canadian defender Vanessa Gilles, tapping it into the back of the net past a stranded goalkeeper.
“I feel like we recognized where the puddles were and the tendencies of their backline, it just helped us know instinctually, going and running after the ball,” said Shaw, whose goal catapulted her into lone territory on the national team — she is now the only player to have scored each time she’s earned a spot on the starting roster, four and counting.
But while the conditions were a major story to come out of this game, it wasn’t the only one, especially as the pitch got marginally more playable through the second half as the rain eased up and the grounds crew used halftime to sweep some water off the field. Canadian striker Jordyn Huitema equalized with a fadeaway header in the 82nd minute, dragging the excruciating match into extra time. That’s when Smith reintroduced herself, feeding off a miraculous header from Rose Lavelle that fell cushioned in the penalty box for her to run onto with a neat finish.
Before Wednesday, Smith had scored just once in eight previous appearances since the USWNT’s World Cup round of 16 loss to Sweden last summer. She was one of three players who missed their spot kicks in the defeat that sent the U.S. home the earliest it had seen in World Cup play.
Typically, Smith offers a lowkey goal celebration, but this time was different. She fell to her knees and was dissolved in her teammates’ embrace. Kilgore mentioned she teared up at the end of the game.
“It was an emotional goal,” Smith said afterward. “I haven’t scored in a while and have just been kind of on an emotional rollercoaster since the World Cup, so that was a big relief and it just felt really good. And obviously, as a team, it put us in a position to win this game, and that’s more important than anything.”
In keeping with the absurdity, of course, the story didn’t end there. Next came a penalty awarded to Canada in the dying minutes of the final extra time half, converted by golden boot leader Adriana Leon, following a foul by goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher in the box. Then penalties, highlighted by three saves and a converted attempt from goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher, whose performance on both sides of the ball might be as close as we get to a balm from the team’s heartbreaking World Cup loss.
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Naeher was uniquely challenged when she had to face Leon immediately after her extra-time penalty during the shootout. Psychological gymnastics were at play on both sides.
“She has to decide if she’s gonna go back to that spot or change it up, and I think there’s always that side of it in a shootout in general” Naeher said, “but I think definitely in that moment, it’s mind games for both of us.”
Asked whether she’d like to take more shots herself in those moments — as she did during the World Cup — she said, wryly, “I’ll leave the goalscoring to the professionals.”
In the final on Sunday, the U.S. will face a strong opponent in Brazil. Kilgore briefly lamented the loss of strategic preparation in a match as unprecedented as that one but argued it offered its own valuable lessons nonetheless.
“Would I have wished we had an opportunity to work on some of the things that we thought we’d work on in terms of game plan and all those things? Absolutely,” Kilgore said. “But sometimes life and the game go in a different direction and you have to adjust and that’s part of it too.”
(Top photo: Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images)