Carli Lloyd - The Workhorse
SOCCER - USWNT - NJ/NY GOTHAM FC -
FORWARD & MIDFIELDER
ARCHETYPE: THE WORKHORSE
Day 117/135
Athletic Accomplishments
Carli Lloyd has been a staple of the U.S. Women’s National Team since 2005, playing midfield and forward for the most dominant team in the world. She currently plays for NJ/NY Gotham FC in the NWSL.
A product of South Jersey, Lloyd grew up as a multisport athlete who loved to compete in anything: roller hockey, football, basketball, softball, volleyball, swimming—whatever got her outside and playing. She excelled at soccer, leading the Philadelphia Inquirer to name her High School Player of the Year in 1999 and 2000. She continued her career at Rutgers, where she was the 2001 Big East Rookie of the Year. She earned First-Team All-Big East honors for all four seasons, was a three-time All-American, and was named 2004 Big East Midfielder of the Year. She left Rutgers as the leader in points (117) and goals (50).
A WPS and NWSL “journeywoman,” Lloyd has played for seven pro teams in her career. But her real claim to fame is with the USWNT.
Lloyd has won two Olympic gold medals (2008 and 2012), two World Cups (2015 and 2019), and has twice been named FIFA Player of the Year (2015 and 2016). In the 2015 World Cup, she won the Golden Ball Trophy as the best player of the tournament. With six goals and one assist, Lloyd also took home the Silver Boot.
Lloyd has over 300 caps with the national team, ranking third all-time, and she’s not done yet. In June 2021, at age 39, she became the oldest goal scorer if USWNT history, with a goal over Jamaica in the opening 23 seconds of the match. Ultimately, Lloyd’s age-defying fitness, competitive edge, and nose for the goal earned her a spot on the roster for the Tokyo Olympics.
Character Archetype: The Workhorse
Carli Lloyd just made an Olympic roster for the fourth time. At 39 years old, she’s already the oldest goal-scorer in U.S. Women’s National Team history. This summer, she’ll become the oldest U.S. Women's National Team player to make an Olympic team. How do you earn that honor? A lifetime of hard work.
Lloyd is intense. When you hear her speak, it feels like the only things on her mind are soccer and winning. Her interviews always sound like she’s been personally attacked. But whatever works man, because it seems as though she processes any doubt, negativity, or criticism that she’s received into fuel. That lights a fire in her, and I ain’t even mad at it.
In a 2021 interview with Fansided, Lloyd said, “They want to actually think that they know who you are and I think for so long for my entire career I have been completely misunderstood and that’s great. I have marched to my own beat, I’ve done things differently, I’ve gone against the grain, I’ve never wavered from anything but my true authentic self. I live it, I breathe it. It’s a switch that has remained on every single year every single day and I think it’s great.”
Lloyd is positively dripping with competitiveness and a relentless drive to make the roster, earn the starting spot, score the goal, win the game. So what if she’s not bubbling over with personality… Lloyd is still a winner.
In the 2015 World Cup final, Lloyd scored a hat trick in the first 16 minutes of the match. Was she possessed? In the zone? No. She had just worked her ass off to get to that point, and she was going to make it count. That’s how you become a two-time World Cup champion, a two-time FIFA Player of the Year, and two-time Olympic gold medalist.
This summer, she’s going for a third. Will her hard work pay off? I don’t know… it kinda feels like it already has, doesn’t it?