Lauren Holiday Recalls Joy Of Career Upon Induction To National Soccer Hall Of Fame

Former United States’ international, Lauren Holiday, whose final game for the women’s national team saw her score in the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup final victory over Japan is this weekend set to be inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in a ceremony at the Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas.

Established in 1979, membership of National Soccer Hall of Fame, considered to the highest honor within the sport in the United States, is open to any player retired within the last decade with at least 20 international caps and who has played at least five seasons in the country’s top flight. Holiday is one of three player inductees in 2023 alongside DaMarcus Beasley and Landon Donovan.

Speaking to the media, she looked back on her stellar career which she ended at the end of the 2015 season, aged just 28. Within a year, Holiday, who is married to Jrue Holiday an NBA point guard now playing for the Milwaukee Bucks, announced she was having a baby. However, during her pregnancy she was diagnosed with a brain tumor, which was successfully removed a month after she give birth to their daughter, Jrue Taylor.

Despite being an ex-player by then, Holiday revealed how one former team-mate provided invaluable support to her. “When I had brain surgery in North Carolina, Heather O’Reilly was always there. She was my first outing when I had my baby, I went to her house. When I had radiation, I actually lived at Heather’s house.”

“Heather was playing for Arsenal so I stayed at her house with Dave, her husband. Dave would drive me sometimes to radiation and he would take care of JT. So I feel like when people say the women’s national team are a family, we truly are. I feel like that never goes away.”

Alongside several former members of the United States women’s national team, Holiday is an investor in National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) franchise Angel City. As a player whose career straddled the collapse of the Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) league and the birth of it’s NWSL successor, she appreciates the strides the women’s game has made since she hung up her boots.

“To be a part-owner of Angel City, where we are selling out 25,000 tickets a game, to see that growth, it’s honestly emotional for me. I sit on the field watching these women play and I’m like ‘you guys are living the dream’. I like to see that growth, I just can’t wait to see what’s it like in five years!”

“It’s huge, but it’s huge for the next generation. I remember growing up and I was obsessed with Michelle Akers and Shannon MacMillan, watching Mia Hamm. I got to watch that, I got to be a part of that. I felt like a part of a community. It’s really big for our next generation. I think that women’s sports in general are going to keep growing and in women’s soccer, I’m honored, I feel like we’ve kind of taken the lead.”

Then Lauren Cheney, Holiday won the second of her two Olympic Gold Medals in front of 80,207 spectators at Wembley Stadium. In 2012, crowds of that size were an outlier, but in the past couple of years, women’s games selling out the biggest stadia in the world is becoming more commonplace.

With attendance records regularly being smashed throughout Europe, Holiday told she cannot resist occasionally engaging in a little trash talk with Jrue. “I tell my husband all the time, yeah, your stadium sells out, awesome, there’s 18,000 people there. When you go to a real sport, there’s 72,000 or 90,000. I remember when we played at Wembley, just the incredible atmosphere.”

Holiday was part of the United States team which lost the 2011 Women’s World Cup final to Japan on penalties but four years later, they blitzed the same opponents in the 2015 final rematch in Vancouver. After two quick-fire goals from Carli Lloyd, Holiday put the result beyond doubt as early as the fourteenth minute with a textbook volley after the ball ricocheted high into the air off a Japanese defender.

Explaining to me what went through her mind as the ball looped into her stride, Holiday said “you know when baseball players say the ball’s coming and it looks like it’s as large as a melon as it gets to the bat when they hit the home run? I feel like that is how it was. As the ball was dropping, I feel like the ball just kept getting bigger. The timing was perfect. I couldn’t believe it.”

“Also, how many times do you practice that, the ball coming out of the air and getting a clean strike? Obviously it feels really good. Yeah, I feel like I re-live it. Looking through my highlights, it brings me back to think ‘man, that strike felt good’ when you hit a ball clean, it always feels really good, especially in a World Cup final.”

Yet, for all the world champions United States players she lined up alongside, Holiday picked an Englishwoman as the best she played alongside. “In Boston, the highlight of my career was playing with Kelly Smith – world-class – I learned so much from her and Alex Scott. Just the bond I got to have with them and the closeness that our Boston Breakers team had.”

“Playing under (coach) Tony (DiCicco), he taught me so much about being a professional. If people know me, I go against authority in all ways. That’s just like my personality. As much as I challenged Tony, I feel like he challenged me right back.”

On Saturday, Holiday will be center of attention as she picks up her Hall of Fame accolade in Frisco. With the Milwaukee Bucks out of the NBA play-offs, she will be accompanied by her husband who, together with her mother, surprised her in November by announcing her induction at the Bucks practice facility during what she was led to believe to be a Thanksgiving drive. Holiday recalls, “I don’t like the spotlight, that’s not where I’m most comfortable so I told all the girls who set me up, ‘I’m going to kill you!’

“I never played because I wanted the recognition, I played because I truly loved the game and thinking about what I was going to say when I go up and receive the award, all that came to me was joy and gratitude. When I think back to my career, I have so much joy. The relationships that I built, the games that I won, the way that I challenged myself and overcame obstacles.”

“I feel like I have so much gratitude and so much joy from the time that I played that it’s carried me through into my post-career where I can view sport, as such a catalyst not just for change in all of those things, but for true joy and internal happiness. For that, I feel like the game gave me way more than I can ever give it.”