NEBRASKA SPORTS / SOCCER / WOMEN, GENDER, AND SEXUALITY
The Sisterhood
The 99ers and the Rise of U.S. Women’s Soccer ROB GOLDMAN For legions of soccer fans, the players on the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team are the game’s standard-bearers. Together their accomplishments include four World Cup titles and four Olympic gold medals. Within five years of their inaugural match in 1985, the team was the best women’s soccer team on the planet. But its rise was neither easy nor harmonious. The national team came onto the scene when team sports for women were in their infancy. The players were paid little and played to sparse crowds on marginal pitches and carried their own equipment and luggage. They faced discrimination and unequal treatment, most notably from their governing bodies, FIFA and U.S. Soccer. The Sisterhood is the story of the first and second generations of national team players, known as the 99ers, who were the driving force behind the rise of U.S. women’s soccer and who built the foundation for the team’s enduring success. Rob Goldman takes the reader onto the pitch and into the minds of the players and coaches for the team’s greatest victories and most heartbreaking defeats. Among those featured are players Michelle Akers, Julie Foudy, Mia Hamm, and Brandi Chastain, as well as coaches Anson Dorrance and Tony DiCicco. When the team won the ’99 World Cup in front of more than ninety thousand fans at the Rose Bowl, it was the largest crowd to ever attend a women’s sporting event. After Brandi Chastain’s winning penalty kick beat China, everything changed. These women’s soccer players were no longer outcasts; they were hard-nosed players and leaders who not only transformed women’s sports but led a cultural revolution. They were trailblazers, role models, and selfless best friends. Their story, told here largely in the voices of the players and coaches who were there, is epic and inspiring.
“The Sisterhood includes some of my favorite stories from the badass women whose DNA and gritty mentality are the inspiration and legacy of today’s world-dominating U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team.”—Michelle Akers, National Soccer Hall of Fame
Rob Goldman is the author of two baseball books, Once They Were Angels and Nolan Ryan: The Making of a Pitcher, and the novel Hauling Time. NOVEMBER 320 pp. • 6 x 9 • 34 photographs $32.95T • hardcover • 978-1-4962-2883-3 $42.00 Canadian / £25.99 UK
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member, Olympic and World Cup champion, and FIFA Female Player of the Century “In The Sisterhood, Rob Goldman vividly captures the 99ers’ personalities, mentality, and our love for the game and for each other. I lived this story and became a better player and person because of these women. The Sisterhood shows you why.”—Kristine Lilly, National Soccer Hall of Fame member, Olympic gold medalist, and 1991 and 1999 World Cup winner “A phenomenal story of how an extraordinary group of women built the foundation for one of the most dominant teams in sports history. A fantastic read that takes you along on the journey with players who formed more than a team. They formed a sisterhood.”—Kevin Baxter, Pulitzer Prize–winning sportswriter for the Los Angeles Times university of nebraska press 1
