Julie Ertz bids a heartfelt farewell to the USWNT and her soccer career

CINCINNATI — As Julie Ertz approached the final professional soccer game she’ll ever play, she had much to reflect on and be thankful for.

But before she moves all the way on to the next phase of her life, one that will be centered on her son Madden, she had a message to send to him.

“It’s not because Momma can’t play,” she said. “Momma can play. She just has adapted my priorities, and I think that just comes with age.”

The zinger landed with the spirit of her crunching tackles or the joyous laughs she shares in the locker room.

Her final rounds of both as a player will come Thursday, when the U.S. women’s national team starts a two-game series with South Africa (7:30 p.m., TNT, Universo, Peacock). Then she will head off to motherhood and to the charity work that she and her husband, Zach, cherish deeply.

» READ MORE: Julie Ertz retires from playing soccer after 10 years as a pro and two World Cup titles

That charity work is likely to bring the Ertzes back to Philadelphia, where Zach became a star with the Eagles and local soccer fans embraced Julie as one of their own. Earlier this year, the Ertz Family Foundation opened the House of Hope facility in Hunting Park, a place Julie called “near and dear to our heart.”

She signaled that they won’t be back here on a full-time basis, and that’s no surprise. The family has settled in Arizona, where her family’s roots are and Zach plays for the Cardinals. But they’ll still come to town.

“Philly has been huge in our career — that’s where Zach and I grew up as a married couple, as people,” Julie said. “Part of the House of Hope is to make an impact not just obviously this year, next year, [but] hopefully for a long time in a community that needs it. I think it’s important for us to go back and forth, but also continue it in whatever community that we live in as well.”

She noted, too, that creating the foundation was rooted in the U.S. team’s long legacy of social activism.

“Seeing the impact that this team has, it’s had a huge impact on me on wanting to start our foundation,” she said. “Because we saw, like, wow, this team does have an incredible platform. And I think that’s just been an incredible space to grow up in, to make you not just a better soccer player, but a better person.”

» READ MORE: The USWNT’s first roster after the World Cup ends two eras and starts a new one

Ertz spoke eloquently about the joy of being a new mother, and how it has impacted her on and off the field. That clearly was a factor in her decision to hang up her cleats at age 31, relatively early for a soccer player to leave not just a national team but the club game too.

“Like anything, this sport takes a sacrifice, and I think time with my family is just irreplaceable, especially with just where Madden is in his age,” she said. “I feel like I’ve been so blessed to have the career that I’ve had — two professional athletes living in a household, and incredible memories. I think it is emotional, but then there’s just some part in your heart that is just like, you just know.”

Right now, she knows.

“I think that is closure enough for me,” she said. “And I think that’s why I’m just so grateful to have this last game to just close the chapter and say bye.”

The next-to-last chapter could have been a novel on its own. Some 600 days passed between when she left the field at the 2021 Olympics and when she returned to it this past April after injuries, pregnancy, and childbirth. She then moved to centerback at the World Cup, and while the U.S. crashed out early, that wasn’t the defense’s fault. Ertz played every second for a unit that gave up just one goal in four games.

» READ MORE: Julie Ertz was grateful for a chance to return to the USWNT, even if the timing was awkward

“This year specifically has been so crazy, so eye-opening, I think especially as a first-time mom,” she said. “Luckily, I’ve been able to be around such unbelievable professional players and play with veterans before me that whatever the expectation is, and the level and the standard that was set, I knew that’s where I had to be in order to compete or be at my best. … I also feel like this year I aged in dog years, it was just so much going on.”

As ready as Ertz is to go, is the U.S. team ready to be without her — not just as it was for 600 days of injuries, pregnancy, and childbirth before a return for the World Cup, but permanently?

Andi Sullivan plays Ertz’s defensive midfield position, but in a different style. Sam Coffey’s game is closer to Ertz’s, but the Penn State product didn’t make the World Cup squad (and some critics would say didn’t get a fair shot to). There’s less than a year until next year’s Olympics, when the U.S. will be out for revenge, and the clock is ticking on hiring a new full-time manager.

Ertz isn’t worried, though, and she gave her successors a vote of confidence.

“I think the next generation is very talented, very hungry,” she said. “Just the sophistication and flair that the next generation has, I think, is really incredible, so I’m excited for them. And yeah, I’m definitely excited for those two [Sullivan and Coffey] — I think the No. 6 position is the best, so I think that I’m excited for them and their future as well.”

» READ MORE: Crystal Dunn looks forward to the USWNT’s next chapter as she returns to the NWSL