How a karaoke machine has helped the USWNT prepare for the Olympic gold medal match (2024)

PARIS — A karaoke machine has played a key role in keeping the U.S. women’s national team loose through this Olympics run.

Ahead of the gold-medal match against Brazil here in the French capital on Saturday, through a tournament that has felt like an intentional exercise in suffering, head coach Emma Hayes and team captain Lindsey Horan’s pre-game press conference quickly, and delightfully, derailed into debating who on the team was the best performer on the mic.

“It’s between Mal (Swanson) and Rose (Lavelle),” Hayes said, adding they have “the Taylor Swift moves.”

Lavelle went viral at the first USWNT Players Association year-end ball with her karaoke rendition of Céline Dion’s “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now” two years ago, so she was not necessarily a surprise contender. Horan noted that Lavelle doesn’t even need to read the lyrics off the screen. And for the team’s captain, her vote for best unexpected karaoke singer was Trinity Rodman.

Horan and Hayes couldn’t help but laugh when asked what their own go-to songs would be. Hayes playfully pushed at Horan’s shoulder saying she’d never seen her perform. It’s not in Horan’s plans (without the influence of certain beverages anyway), but her pick was Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You”.

And for Hayes? Vanilla Ice’s “Ice Ice Baby”. An old standby, apparently.

While the debate was a fun respite the day before the tension of a major tournament final, it was more than just refreshing to see. At the previous Olympics in Japan three years ago, the main outside critique was that the U.S. women were playing without any joy.

That has not been a problem this time around.

New coach Hayes, fresh from the club scene with hugely successful English side Chelsea, said the team is together a lot. The players have all built up their bubble at these Games, starting in the south of France with group-stage matches played in Nice and Marseille (twice), before finally passing briefly through Paris for their quarterfinal, then back down south to Lyon for the semifinal. Rodman smiled as she called it a “business trip” on Thursday.

Hayes has been intentional in creating space for the players off the pitch “to breathe and relax and not have everything be so formal all the time,” she said Friday. She said there’s a cultural element for the U.S. players, that there is already a joy there. But it’s also something specific to this team, and specifically a team of women.

“We socialize differently,” Hayes said. “We don’t necessarily want to sit around on the PlayStations. We like to have coffees. We like to get our nails done. Ideally, a hairstylist in there. We like to have karaoke. We like to play Lego. We like puzzles,” she said before adding that center back Naomi Girma excelled at those final two in particular. “We like Polaroid cameras. We want to capture the memories.

“We feel very privileged to be here, but at the same time, you don’t get to be at this level on just talent alone. It’s the combination of things, and I want to build the relationships, build the trust, build a lightness and hopefully that shows in our play.”

Hayes has said many times since starting work as head coach in May the team can’t win by will alone. She said it again on Friday. That combination of things she referenced many times is a product of these past 75 days — and yes, it has resulted in the team having their shot at gold this weekend.

“We’re going to need everything tomorrow because this is a match that will likely be played — if it’s in regulation time — 105 minutes long,” she said referencing the large amounts of stoppage time seen in Brazil’s previous matches at the Olympics. “This is a game that’s going to require strong officiating, like the best. I think the officiating has been good in this tournament and needs to be top tomorrow. The game deserves that.

“We have to be on top of emotional control. This is a game — there’s a lot of stakes, it’s going to test us in a different way. It’s a very, very different game to the opponents we’ve faced so far. … But for us, we want to make sure that in the last game possible that we present something different in ourselves.

“I’m looking forward to watching something else tomorrow from us.”

While many questions revolved around the USWNT’s history, particularly in the Olympics — having won the Games’ first women’s soccer tournament in 1996 and then three times in a row in 2004, 2008 and 2012 — Hayes still hasn’t let herself truly focus on her relationship with that history and her journey to the team. Not yet, anyway. She likes to be present in the moment.

“I’m enjoying the position I’m in, and I feel really calm about it because I’ve got a lot of experience,” she said. “I’ve been here before, regardless of the fact that I haven’t coached international football. It’s football.”

There is one memory she keeps thinking about, though — being in London’s Wembley Stadium for that 2012 Olympic final and a talk she had with her father Sid, who has since passed away. Twelve years on, Hayes said, every time she sees a Paris 2024 sign, she can’t believe it’s her turn, that she gets to do it with this team.

“I don’t think it has quite hit me because, to be honest, I don’t give myself time to think about it,” she says. “All I’m thinking about is the unit meetings (for different sections of the team). I’ve got to get back and do the training session this afternoon,” she said. “The individual clips have got to be done with players. The inspiration videos have got to be prepared.

“Then, most importantly, let them get the karaoke machine out a little bit later. Let them have a sing and dance at the dinner table. And let’s relax and enjoy, because tomorrow we get to play in the game that everybody has worked for their entire lives.”

Recommended reading

• Sophia Smith: ‘This team has a standard of winning on the biggest stage’ as USWNT eyes Olympic gold
• The Olympics have been a coronation for USWNT’s Naomi Girma and her defensive work

(Top photo: Brady Smith/Getty Images)

Meg Linehan is a senior writer for The Athletic who covers the U.S. women's national team, the National Women's Soccer League and more. She also hosts the weekly podcast "Full Time with Meg Linehan." Follow Meg on Twitter @itsmeglinehan