June 28, 2023 • 21 mins
Ron welcomes former US National Team goalie Briana Scurry to the podcast.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Ron Barr, and this is today's edition of
Ron Barr's Sports Byline USA podcast on the eight Side Network.
Brianna Scurry joins US on Sports Byline. Of course. She
was the starting goalkeeper for the United States women's national
soccer team in the World Cup and the Olympics, and
she's won two Olympic gold medals and a World Cup
tied on Her career total of one hundred and seventy
(00:22):
three international appearances is second among female soccer goalkeepers, and
she was elected to the National Soccer Hall of Fame
and is the first woman goalkeeper in the first black
woman to be awarded that honor. The last time you
and I talked, Brianna, you were overcoming a concussion issue
and it had gone on for a long time. What
(00:43):
did you learn about yourself going through that process.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Oh, that's a fantastic question. You know, I learned that
I can overcome just about anything if I'm willing to
accept help. I was at a very very bad place
there for a while, at towards the end there where
I wasn't sure if I was going to make it.
And then, you know, luckily for me, help came and
(01:12):
the cavalry came and helped me out. And not only
was I finally able to get the surgery that I needed,
and then I was able to get the therapy for
an entire year of therapy I went through to get
myself back to a place where I thought I was
more like me And so, you know, my life is
(01:33):
absolutely fantastic, you know, in a way that I couldn't
have possibly imagined.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Was there a particular moment when you didn't know which
way you were going to go? And what was it
that brought you through to the positive side.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yes, there was a moment. There was a time frame
there in twenty thirteen when I was living in New Jersey,
when I did not recognize who I was anymore. I
just felt like I was sliding deeper and deeper into despair.
I was depressed. I was suicidal. You know. I contemplated,
(02:08):
you know, what would happen if I just stopped living,
if I didn't wasn't here anymore. And it was a
very real, a very real feeling in my bones. And
it was sad for me because I'm naturally a very
optimistic person. And what made made it through to me
finally to turn the tide was the thought of someone
(02:34):
having to tell my mom that I was gone, and
how she would feel and how that would affect her,
And that truly, that that feeling and that vision of
that still got me through and it made me hang
on for one more day. And it was shortly thereafter
that that the cavalry came and I was able to
(02:55):
get the help I needed.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
One of the things I know from having talked to
my other professional, highly skilled sports fans, is they have
faced things like this during the course of their career,
and it's the vulnerability of a highly skilled athlete that
is kind of scary for them. And I'm just wondering
whether that factored into your thinking at the time that
made it difficult at the end of your career to
(03:19):
deal with something like that.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
I think it did. I think it did factor in,
you know, because I was always seen as someone who
had the mental side of things together. That was one
of my greatest weapons in my arsenal in terms of
being able to play soccer at the heights and the
levels that I played at and able to gain, you know,
(03:43):
just a great level of success. And so it's really
difficult to admit that I was on my knees, you know,
And I feel like there is a stigma there when
it comes to high level athletes that your bulletproof, and
sometimes we ourselves buy into that stigma, which is not true.
(04:07):
We aren't. We are human beings that have exceptional abilities'
that's what we are, and we can also, I think,
because we are able to go to such lofty heights,
can go to incredibly low lows as well. I think
it's a two sided coins and you can have, you know,
really really dark times, and I think that especially with concussion,
(04:30):
Oh my goodness, you got to be careful, you know,
because you can truly, you know, exaggerate the downfall because
of the lofty heights that you reached as a professional athlete,
and it can really seem like you can't get back
to even in the dark times. And so it's important
to remember that you are human. Humans do have difficult times,
(04:55):
and you know, to reach out for help and try
to make it one more day because eventually someone you
will run into that can help me.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
One of the things I've always found interesting, Brianna, is
the fact that athletes invariably retied a relatively young age,
and you being forced into kind of retirement because of
this injury and everything. How did you deal with that?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well, my runway for retirement was roughly around forty years old,
which is what I was planning. So another two year
or two after I actually did end up having to
stop playing, and as much as I had had fantastic
success in the past, and I was preparing to move
on and to you know, embark on something new. Because
(05:45):
of the abruptness of which my ending came, you know,
literally in a split second, I wasn't prepared. And the
other factor for me that was so difficult was it was,
you know, my number one ability, my superhero, my superpower
was my mind and that was what was broken. And
(06:06):
so it became incredibly difficult for me to make that transition,
even more so than your average athlete at that point,
because the way I would go about doing it would
be you know, you know, learning something new and executing
that plan, and I just couldn't. I just couldn't do it.
For three years, I barely could you know, think or
(06:28):
learn or retain information or retrieve it or anything. And
so it was just really difficult for me to make
that transition.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Yeah, the abruptness is what I was talking about because
there is no way to prepare yourself for when it
does end. And I think most athletes hope or at
least think that their career is going to go on
for a long long time. Reinventing yourself after you were
finally able to get to a point to think about
it and do something about that. Take me through that process.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
So what happened towards the end of t ME thirteen.
I finally was able to get the surgery I needed,
and that was the occipital nerve surgery, which at the
time was experimental, and I was finally able to get
that completed and then start on my one year of therapy.
And in that one year therapy period, I decided that
(07:21):
I wanted to be an advocate for concussions and not
just someone who you know, was a survivor. And so
I began that that path down that way, and I
think the advocacy really helped me not only be relevant,
but also it really helped heal me, you know, my
(07:41):
ability to be able to help other people. And I
decided I was going to be very, very vocal and
very open and honest about how bad it got. And
I think that was a breakthrough for me, and I
think that was really not what was happening in the
concussion space at the time. You know, to to a
lot of men credit you know, they're very strong, and
(08:03):
football was the main, you know, arena where concussions were discussed,
and it's hard for those guys to be vulnerable, like
we said before, and emotional, and I was willing to
be vulnerable and emotional, and through that advocacy, I was
truly able to become relevant again in space to really
help people and talk about it. And then things just
(08:24):
really started to turn around. And that was the foundation
on which I built rebuilt my career. And then I
was able to, you know, start to talk more about soccer,
not just about how I was no longer playing it.
So it really started to go in the right direction.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Do you remember that aha moment in that process, Brianna.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I do I do? When doctors, organizations and other people
started to open up and welcome me and invite me
to come in speak to them, and TBI survivors groups
wanted me to speak to them. I started to realize
(09:06):
that the moment that previously had been the most detrimental
to me actually ended up being a lifeline. And it
was literally, you know, in twenty fourteen where I realized
mid twenty fourteen that I, you know, I realized I
was meant to get that concussion because this is what
I'm meant to do. I'm meant to be an advocate
(09:28):
and help other people in this way. And I really
was able to turn that you know, detrimental event into
an asset and into this very day. You know, we're
you know, seven years on now. Since then, I'm still
doing that, and so I'm very grateful now that I
actually got concussion, because I really wouldn't have half the
(09:49):
amazing things I have in my life now that wasn't
for that.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
We only have about thirty five seconds left before we
have to break. I've always found it interesting also athletic vulnerability.
Think you know what I'm talking about, Uh, did you
go back and reflect on that? Did that reveal something
to you through what you went through?
Speaker 2 (10:09):
It? Did? It did? And I didn't want to be
your run of the mill advocate. So nowadays I talk about,
you know, being willing to tell the truth about how
bad things are for you, whether it's a head injury
or substance abuse or you know, depression, or whatever. You
you are a god on the pitch or the court
(10:31):
or the field, but you are a human being every
other time. And if you're going through something bad, it's
okay to be vulnerable, it's okay to talk about it,
and it's okay to get help to get yourself back
on the right track.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Brianna Scurry is with us again. She has been inducted
and elected to the National Soccer Hall of Fame. We
will talk about her career and women's soccer as we
continue across the country and around the world. We have
you on Sports Byline. You're listening to Ron Bars Sports
Byline USA podcast. Brianna Scurry is with us here on
Sports Byline USA. We're talking about her life and also
(11:07):
about our career. You grew up in Minnesota. You're the
youngest of nine children, with three brothers and five sisters.
Tell me a little about a bit about life and
your family.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
You know, it's interesting. So those numbers are are huge,
you know, nine youngest of nine. But the truth is
I am nine years younger than my next closest sibling.
So my mom and dad were very you know, long
in the truth if you will. When they had me.
My mother was thirty seven years old when she had me,
So I literally grew up in a household with my
(11:41):
mom and dad and one or two other siblings, depending
on where they were in the stages of their lives.
So it wasn't a you know, eleven people in the
house at one time, like it may sound. But I
felt like I was very fortunate to have the family
that I had, to be born to parents that were
so understanding and caring and did, in fact have a
(12:03):
lot of training in parenting. I think they did a
really good job with me.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Interesting you grew up in Minnesota, of course, they went
to high school there. You ran track, you played floor
hockey and softball, but it really was basketball that was
your first love, was it not?
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Absolutely? Basketball to this very day is still a bigger
love of mine than soccer. I know a lot of
people think that's crazy, but I actually think that's kind
of common actually with a lot of athletes. They just
played the sport professionally that they were better at, but
it wasn't necessarily the one they liked the most. And
so that's true for me. You know, playing soccer was
(12:42):
going to get me to college on a scholarship, and
It's what got me to Olympic games as well. But
basketball I miss it sometimes, you know, just watching the
game on TV. And I really was a big fan
of basketball, but unfortunately the opportunities to go to college
through basketball were a lot fewer in soccer.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
One of the things I was interested in is you
you know, players gravitate towards certain positions, no matter what
the sport may be. Why goalkeeper for you.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
You know, my foray, it's goalkeeping was not exceptional. I
was the only girl on a boys team, and they
thought that it was a good idea to protect the
girl by putting her in the goal. Now, if you
think about that, personec and it's actually the opposite the
(13:31):
place for anyone. So you can imagine this little twelve
year old, you know, girl with with you know, her
little hair in braids, you know, in the goal is
trying to you know, wrestle to get the ball before
all these other boys are like kicking at me. Tried
to get it before me. You know, It's just not
necessarily the safest place. But it did become a passion
(13:54):
of mine. Goalkeeping within the game of soccer is what
I truly love to do. And you know, it just
happens to also work out with basketball, and playing goal
and playing basketball are very similar.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Yeah, well that tells you something about the male intelligence,
doesn't it.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I love all my coaches and I appreciate that that's
inclination they had, but I'm not so sure it made
a lot of sense. Really.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Let me ask you about also the fear factor, because
being in that position, you got somebody bearing down on you,
You got somebody, especially at the level you play, kicking
the ball very very fast. How long did you get
comfortable with the speed of soccer?
Speaker 2 (14:37):
You know, it's interesting, there's a huge like you said
that when you when you graduate from one level to
the next, there's a huge jump. So for example, going
from high school to college was a huge jump. College
to pro and national team. It really takes a little
bit of time when you start to enter that new
level of playing. And so for the national team my
(14:57):
first camp, you know, I felt like I all I
was doing was bigging the ball in the back of
the net because the likes of Michelle Akers and Christine
Lilly and media Hamm and this slamming balls passed me
left and right, and I felt like I was a
fish out of water and I go. But apparently they
liked what I was doing, so they kept inviting me back.
But you know, over time, you start to see the
(15:20):
ball better and I think the body, the human body
and mind, like I said earlier, is just an amazing thing.
And in time, you know, it started to slow things down,
and so I was able to not only you know,
make saves, but also anticipate where I thought about might go.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And what about appreciation of this style and the competence
of playing women's soccer at the level that you played it.
Do you remember when you said, hey, wait a minute,
this is something special and we've got something special with
this team.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Yes, I do remember that. I remember nineteen ninety five
when I had been on the team for a little
over a year and we were gearing up for our
World Cup in nineteen ninety five in Sweden, and even
though we unfortunately came in third during that World Cup,
we were truly you know, unified as a group. And
(16:16):
I tell you what, when it comes to, you know,
women unifying for a purpose, which was essentially redemption for
us because we got third that World Cup and we
went into that phase where we were going to now
have two major tournaments back to back in the United
States in ninety six and ninety nine. We truly turned
the corner and decided that we were going to do
(16:37):
everything we could do to win and elevate not only ourselves,
but our games and women also. And so I think,
oddly enough, losing in nineteen ninety five was truly a
turning point and something that brot us closer together enabled
us to then catapult off of that loss and really
(16:58):
do some amazing things in front of the US fans,
which I think helped grow the game of soccer over
the decades.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
I have talked to my friends who are coaches of
women's basketball, particularly at the college level, whe whether they're
a male or female, and they all have said one
thing within the interview, Brianna, and that is that the
women are more coachable than the men. I'm not trying
to put you on the spot on this, but there
is something about the attitude that you just talked about
in the approach to a team concept that makes it
(17:27):
a little bit easier to coach and probably gets better
results as well. Can you help me define what that is?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
You know, I get that a lot people say, you know,
I'm so incredibly culturable and my teams are. I feel
like part of that might be a desire to just
truly express and to have success and great achievement and
to you know, really play with passion. I think women
(17:57):
might be just more receptive to taking information and there's
not as much ego, you know, getting in the way
of somebody trying to tell them how to do something differently.
I I've always been the kind of person who likes
to incorporate that which somebody else tells me, and then
I use it, and then if I don't think it's helping,
(18:19):
then I disregard. But I'm always open and willing to
absorbing it initially. And you know, a lot of people
have told me I'm coachable in a lot of different ways,
not just on the field, just in a lot of
different things I do. And I feel like, why not,
you know, integrate, you know, tidbits that people give me
and use them. And I think, maybe you know, whomen
(18:42):
I'm more open to doing that.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Winning a World Cup and a couple of Olympic gold medals,
It's not like just another match that you win along
the way. There's something about it. I mean, the Master's
golf tournament is certainly different than a PGA event, an
you know, a number of baseball regular season games different
than the World's Series. Tell me what it was like
for you and the other women to win both those events,
the Olympics two times and the National Cup Championship World
(19:09):
Cup Championship.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
It is a dream come true. If you can imagine
the one thing in your life that you want more
than anything else and you toiled for years over getting
it and fine tuning your skill set, and then multiply
that by a thousand. That's that's what it feels like.
I mean, there is truly very few feelings on Earth
(19:33):
that rival winning a World Cup for an Olympics, and
I think the reason is because, a you have spent
so much time, so much thought, so much energy, years
and years of those things combining with twenty other people
doing the same at the same time, and you are
(19:54):
climbing up this mountain together and you are finally at
the top. And when you have that Epics all for
a final, I mean, it is truly something to behold.
And so when you do finally achieve victory and you've
basically left it all out there, you know, there really
is very few feelings that are as impactful and as
(20:18):
deep as doing that, because you really have given your
heart to something for amount of time. And also with
in addition to the level of achievement and excitement, is
a level of relief. A feeling of relief is actually
also mixed in there, which a lot of people are
surprised by because you you know, in your mind and
(20:42):
in your heart you were hopeful and when you actually
were able to do it, and so that's where the
relief comes from.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
In about thirty seconds, what's that moment that you'll never
forget that's engraved in Brianna Scurry's mind about her life
and her career.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
I will say that I will never forget standing on
the podium in two thousand and four in Athens, hearing
that anthem and getting that medal put around my neck
after my father had passed away two months before that,
and seeing my mom there watching me to achieve something amazing,
and knowing my dad and helped me do that. And
(21:18):
it's in this spirit and so that was for me,
you know, the best experience I could have possibly had.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
Brianna Scurriy, thank you very much. Brianna Scurry of course
the starting goalkeeper for the United States women's national soccer team,
winning a World Cup championship and two Olympic gold medals,
and now she is a member of the National Soccer
Hall of Fame. We continue with more of you in
Sports Byline. You have been listening to Ron Barr's Sports
Byline USA podcast on the eight Side Network.
Hi, I'm Ron Barr, and this is today's edition of
Ron Barr's Sports Byline USA podcast on the eight Side Network.
Brianna Scurry joins US on Sports Byline. Of course. She
was the starting goalkeeper for the United States women's national
soccer team in the World Cup and the Olympics, and
she's won two Olympic gold medals and a World Cup
tied on Her career total of one hundred and seventy
(00:22):
three international appearances is second among female soccer goalkeepers, and
she was elected to the National Soccer Hall of Fame
and is the first woman goalkeeper in the first black
woman to be awarded that honor. The last time you
and I talked, Brianna, you were overcoming a concussion issue
and it had gone on for a long time. What
(00:43):
did you learn about yourself going through that process.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Oh, that's a fantastic question. You know, I learned that
I can overcome just about anything if I'm willing to
accept help. I was at a very very bad place
there for a while, at towards the end there where
I wasn't sure if I was going to make it.
And then, you know, luckily for me, help came and
(01:12):
the cavalry came and helped me out. And not only
was I finally able to get the surgery that I needed,
and then I was able to get the therapy for
an entire year of therapy I went through to get
myself back to a place where I thought I was
more like me And so, you know, my life is
(01:33):
absolutely fantastic, you know, in a way that I couldn't
have possibly imagined.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Was there a particular moment when you didn't know which
way you were going to go? And what was it
that brought you through to the positive side.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yes, there was a moment. There was a time frame
there in twenty thirteen when I was living in New Jersey,
when I did not recognize who I was anymore. I
just felt like I was sliding deeper and deeper into despair.
I was depressed. I was suicidal. You know. I contemplated,
(02:08):
you know, what would happen if I just stopped living,
if I didn't wasn't here anymore. And it was a
very real, a very real feeling in my bones. And
it was sad for me because I'm naturally a very
optimistic person. And what made made it through to me
finally to turn the tide was the thought of someone
(02:34):
having to tell my mom that I was gone, and
how she would feel and how that would affect her,
And that truly, that that feeling and that vision of
that still got me through and it made me hang
on for one more day. And it was shortly thereafter
that that the cavalry came and I was able to
(02:55):
get the help I needed.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
One of the things I know from having talked to
my other professional, highly skilled sports fans, is they have
faced things like this during the course of their career,
and it's the vulnerability of a highly skilled athlete that
is kind of scary for them. And I'm just wondering
whether that factored into your thinking at the time that
made it difficult at the end of your career to
(03:19):
deal with something like that.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
I think it did. I think it did factor in,
you know, because I was always seen as someone who
had the mental side of things together. That was one
of my greatest weapons in my arsenal in terms of
being able to play soccer at the heights and the
levels that I played at and able to gain, you know,
(03:43):
just a great level of success. And so it's really
difficult to admit that I was on my knees, you know,
And I feel like there is a stigma there when
it comes to high level athletes that your bulletproof, and
sometimes we ourselves buy into that stigma, which is not true.
(04:07):
We aren't. We are human beings that have exceptional abilities'
that's what we are, and we can also, I think,
because we are able to go to such lofty heights,
can go to incredibly low lows as well. I think
it's a two sided coins and you can have, you know,
really really dark times, and I think that especially with concussion,
(04:30):
Oh my goodness, you got to be careful, you know,
because you can truly, you know, exaggerate the downfall because
of the lofty heights that you reached as a professional athlete,
and it can really seem like you can't get back
to even in the dark times. And so it's important
to remember that you are human. Humans do have difficult times,
(04:55):
and you know, to reach out for help and try
to make it one more day because eventually someone you
will run into that can help me.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
One of the things I've always found interesting, Brianna, is
the fact that athletes invariably retied a relatively young age,
and you being forced into kind of retirement because of
this injury and everything. How did you deal with that?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well, my runway for retirement was roughly around forty years old,
which is what I was planning. So another two year
or two after I actually did end up having to
stop playing, and as much as I had had fantastic
success in the past, and I was preparing to move
on and to you know, embark on something new. Because
(05:45):
of the abruptness of which my ending came, you know,
literally in a split second, I wasn't prepared. And the
other factor for me that was so difficult was it was,
you know, my number one ability, my superhero, my superpower
was my mind and that was what was broken. And
(06:06):
so it became incredibly difficult for me to make that transition,
even more so than your average athlete at that point,
because the way I would go about doing it would
be you know, you know, learning something new and executing
that plan, and I just couldn't. I just couldn't do it.
For three years, I barely could you know, think or
(06:28):
learn or retain information or retrieve it or anything. And
so it was just really difficult for me to make
that transition.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Yeah, the abruptness is what I was talking about because
there is no way to prepare yourself for when it
does end. And I think most athletes hope or at
least think that their career is going to go on
for a long long time. Reinventing yourself after you were
finally able to get to a point to think about
it and do something about that. Take me through that process.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
So what happened towards the end of t ME thirteen.
I finally was able to get the surgery I needed,
and that was the occipital nerve surgery, which at the
time was experimental, and I was finally able to get
that completed and then start on my one year of therapy.
And in that one year therapy period, I decided that
(07:21):
I wanted to be an advocate for concussions and not
just someone who you know, was a survivor. And so
I began that that path down that way, and I
think the advocacy really helped me not only be relevant,
but also it really helped heal me, you know, my
(07:41):
ability to be able to help other people. And I
decided I was going to be very, very vocal and
very open and honest about how bad it got. And
I think that was a breakthrough for me, and I
think that was really not what was happening in the
concussion space at the time. You know, to to a
lot of men credit you know, they're very strong, and
(08:03):
football was the main, you know, arena where concussions were discussed,
and it's hard for those guys to be vulnerable, like
we said before, and emotional, and I was willing to
be vulnerable and emotional, and through that advocacy, I was
truly able to become relevant again in space to really
help people and talk about it. And then things just
(08:24):
really started to turn around. And that was the foundation
on which I built rebuilt my career. And then I
was able to, you know, start to talk more about soccer,
not just about how I was no longer playing it.
So it really started to go in the right direction.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Do you remember that aha moment in that process, Brianna.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I do I do? When doctors, organizations and other people
started to open up and welcome me and invite me
to come in speak to them, and TBI survivors groups
wanted me to speak to them. I started to realize
(09:06):
that the moment that previously had been the most detrimental
to me actually ended up being a lifeline. And it
was literally, you know, in twenty fourteen where I realized
mid twenty fourteen that I, you know, I realized I
was meant to get that concussion because this is what
I'm meant to do. I'm meant to be an advocate
(09:28):
and help other people in this way. And I really
was able to turn that you know, detrimental event into
an asset and into this very day. You know, we're
you know, seven years on now. Since then, I'm still
doing that, and so I'm very grateful now that I
actually got concussion, because I really wouldn't have half the
(09:49):
amazing things I have in my life now that wasn't
for that.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
We only have about thirty five seconds left before we
have to break. I've always found it interesting also athletic vulnerability.
Think you know what I'm talking about, Uh, did you
go back and reflect on that? Did that reveal something
to you through what you went through?
Speaker 2 (10:09):
It? Did? It did? And I didn't want to be
your run of the mill advocate. So nowadays I talk about,
you know, being willing to tell the truth about how
bad things are for you, whether it's a head injury
or substance abuse or you know, depression, or whatever. You
you are a god on the pitch or the court
(10:31):
or the field, but you are a human being every
other time. And if you're going through something bad, it's
okay to be vulnerable, it's okay to talk about it,
and it's okay to get help to get yourself back
on the right track.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Brianna Scurry is with us again. She has been inducted
and elected to the National Soccer Hall of Fame. We
will talk about her career and women's soccer as we
continue across the country and around the world. We have
you on Sports Byline. You're listening to Ron Bars Sports
Byline USA podcast. Brianna Scurry is with us here on
Sports Byline USA. We're talking about her life and also
(11:07):
about our career. You grew up in Minnesota. You're the
youngest of nine children, with three brothers and five sisters.
Tell me a little about a bit about life and
your family.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
You know, it's interesting. So those numbers are are huge,
you know, nine youngest of nine. But the truth is
I am nine years younger than my next closest sibling.
So my mom and dad were very you know, long
in the truth if you will. When they had me.
My mother was thirty seven years old when she had me,
So I literally grew up in a household with my
(11:41):
mom and dad and one or two other siblings, depending
on where they were in the stages of their lives.
So it wasn't a you know, eleven people in the
house at one time, like it may sound. But I
felt like I was very fortunate to have the family
that I had, to be born to parents that were
so understanding and caring and did, in fact have a
(12:03):
lot of training in parenting. I think they did a
really good job with me.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Interesting you grew up in Minnesota, of course, they went
to high school there. You ran track, you played floor
hockey and softball, but it really was basketball that was
your first love, was it not?
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Absolutely? Basketball to this very day is still a bigger
love of mine than soccer. I know a lot of
people think that's crazy, but I actually think that's kind
of common actually with a lot of athletes. They just
played the sport professionally that they were better at, but
it wasn't necessarily the one they liked the most. And
so that's true for me. You know, playing soccer was
(12:42):
going to get me to college on a scholarship, and
It's what got me to Olympic games as well. But
basketball I miss it sometimes, you know, just watching the
game on TV. And I really was a big fan
of basketball, but unfortunately the opportunities to go to college
through basketball were a lot fewer in soccer.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
One of the things I was interested in is you
you know, players gravitate towards certain positions, no matter what
the sport may be. Why goalkeeper for you.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
You know, my foray, it's goalkeeping was not exceptional. I
was the only girl on a boys team, and they
thought that it was a good idea to protect the
girl by putting her in the goal. Now, if you
think about that, personec and it's actually the opposite the
(13:31):
place for anyone. So you can imagine this little twelve
year old, you know, girl with with you know, her
little hair in braids, you know, in the goal is
trying to you know, wrestle to get the ball before
all these other boys are like kicking at me. Tried
to get it before me. You know, It's just not
necessarily the safest place. But it did become a passion
(13:54):
of mine. Goalkeeping within the game of soccer is what
I truly love to do. And you know, it just
happens to also work out with basketball, and playing goal
and playing basketball are very similar.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Yeah, well that tells you something about the male intelligence,
doesn't it.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I love all my coaches and I appreciate that that's
inclination they had, but I'm not so sure it made
a lot of sense. Really.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Let me ask you about also the fear factor, because
being in that position, you got somebody bearing down on you,
You got somebody, especially at the level you play, kicking
the ball very very fast. How long did you get
comfortable with the speed of soccer?
Speaker 2 (14:37):
You know, it's interesting, there's a huge like you said
that when you when you graduate from one level to
the next, there's a huge jump. So for example, going
from high school to college was a huge jump. College
to pro and national team. It really takes a little
bit of time when you start to enter that new
level of playing. And so for the national team my
(14:57):
first camp, you know, I felt like I all I
was doing was bigging the ball in the back of
the net because the likes of Michelle Akers and Christine
Lilly and media Hamm and this slamming balls passed me
left and right, and I felt like I was a
fish out of water and I go. But apparently they
liked what I was doing, so they kept inviting me back.
But you know, over time, you start to see the
(15:20):
ball better and I think the body, the human body
and mind, like I said earlier, is just an amazing thing.
And in time, you know, it started to slow things down,
and so I was able to not only you know,
make saves, but also anticipate where I thought about might go.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And what about appreciation of this style and the competence
of playing women's soccer at the level that you played it.
Do you remember when you said, hey, wait a minute,
this is something special and we've got something special with
this team.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
Yes, I do remember that. I remember nineteen ninety five
when I had been on the team for a little
over a year and we were gearing up for our
World Cup in nineteen ninety five in Sweden, and even
though we unfortunately came in third during that World Cup,
we were truly you know, unified as a group. And
(16:16):
I tell you what, when it comes to, you know,
women unifying for a purpose, which was essentially redemption for
us because we got third that World Cup and we
went into that phase where we were going to now
have two major tournaments back to back in the United
States in ninety six and ninety nine. We truly turned
the corner and decided that we were going to do
(16:37):
everything we could do to win and elevate not only ourselves,
but our games and women also. And so I think,
oddly enough, losing in nineteen ninety five was truly a
turning point and something that brot us closer together enabled
us to then catapult off of that loss and really
(16:58):
do some amazing things in front of the US fans,
which I think helped grow the game of soccer over
the decades.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
I have talked to my friends who are coaches of
women's basketball, particularly at the college level, whe whether they're
a male or female, and they all have said one
thing within the interview, Brianna, and that is that the
women are more coachable than the men. I'm not trying
to put you on the spot on this, but there
is something about the attitude that you just talked about
in the approach to a team concept that makes it
(17:27):
a little bit easier to coach and probably gets better
results as well. Can you help me define what that is?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
You know, I get that a lot people say, you know,
I'm so incredibly culturable and my teams are. I feel
like part of that might be a desire to just
truly express and to have success and great achievement and
to you know, really play with passion. I think women
(17:57):
might be just more receptive to taking information and there's
not as much ego, you know, getting in the way
of somebody trying to tell them how to do something differently.
I I've always been the kind of person who likes
to incorporate that which somebody else tells me, and then
I use it, and then if I don't think it's helping,
(18:19):
then I disregard. But I'm always open and willing to
absorbing it initially. And you know, a lot of people
have told me I'm coachable in a lot of different ways,
not just on the field, just in a lot of
different things I do. And I feel like, why not,
you know, integrate, you know, tidbits that people give me
and use them. And I think, maybe you know, whomen
(18:42):
I'm more open to doing that.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Winning a World Cup and a couple of Olympic gold medals,
It's not like just another match that you win along
the way. There's something about it. I mean, the Master's
golf tournament is certainly different than a PGA event, an
you know, a number of baseball regular season games different
than the World's Series. Tell me what it was like
for you and the other women to win both those events,
the Olympics two times and the National Cup Championship World
(19:09):
Cup Championship.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
It is a dream come true. If you can imagine
the one thing in your life that you want more
than anything else and you toiled for years over getting
it and fine tuning your skill set, and then multiply
that by a thousand. That's that's what it feels like.
I mean, there is truly very few feelings on Earth
(19:33):
that rival winning a World Cup for an Olympics, and
I think the reason is because, a you have spent
so much time, so much thought, so much energy, years
and years of those things combining with twenty other people
doing the same at the same time, and you are
(19:54):
climbing up this mountain together and you are finally at
the top. And when you have that Epics all for
a final, I mean, it is truly something to behold.
And so when you do finally achieve victory and you've
basically left it all out there, you know, there really
is very few feelings that are as impactful and as
(20:18):
deep as doing that, because you really have given your
heart to something for amount of time. And also with
in addition to the level of achievement and excitement, is
a level of relief. A feeling of relief is actually
also mixed in there, which a lot of people are
surprised by because you you know, in your mind and
(20:42):
in your heart you were hopeful and when you actually
were able to do it, and so that's where the
relief comes from.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
In about thirty seconds, what's that moment that you'll never
forget that's engraved in Brianna Scurry's mind about her life
and her career.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
I will say that I will never forget standing on
the podium in two thousand and four in Athens, hearing
that anthem and getting that medal put around my neck
after my father had passed away two months before that,
and seeing my mom there watching me to achieve something amazing,
and knowing my dad and helped me do that. And
(21:18):
it's in this spirit and so that was for me,
you know, the best experience I could have possibly had.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
Brianna Scurriy, thank you very much. Brianna Scurry of course
the starting goalkeeper for the United States women's national soccer team,
winning a World Cup championship and two Olympic gold medals,
and now she is a member of the National Soccer
Hall of Fame. We continue with more of you in
Sports Byline. You have been listening to Ron Barr's Sports
Byline USA podcast on the eight Side Network.
Host
Ron Barr
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