Tierna Davidson

Pure chaos.

I loved that in the summertime.

I'd be wearing my little cotton Mia Hamm shirt into the ground, washed a hundred times, stickers baked into the fabric, mystery stains that had long since become part of the design.

That shirt was basically a second skin, and I was not taking it off for anyone.

And that's what sports do.

They create core memories.

When I was a kid, I'd go to Stanford games and stand shyly at the fence to wait for autographs from players like Kelly O'Hara and Kristen Press.

Then I became the player at Stanford signing girls' shirts and posters.

Then I was lining up alongside those same players

I'd looked up to on the national team.

There's something surreal about morphing into your own role model, but it's an honor and I don't take it lightly.

Getting to hear how my teammates and I have touched people's lives, the stories that find their way back to us, that never gets old.

I'll leave you with this.

In 2015, I was watching the World Cup final from home when Carly Lloyd had her hat trick and the US won.

A friend of mine called and left me voicemails narrating every big moment in real time.

Four years later, I'm in Paris.

My coach pulls me aside before my first World Cup start against Chile and says, this is just another 90 minutes of soccer.

How many times have you played 90 minutes of soccer?

You hold on to that.

You tell yourself there's nothing new here.