Two-time Women’s World Cup champion and longtime United States full-back Kelley O’Hara will retire at the conclusion of the 2024 National Women’s Soccer League season with NJ/NY Gotham FC, she announced on Thursday.
O’Hara, 35, helped the USWNT win the 2015 and 2019 World Cups. She also played in three Olympics, including the 2012 London Games, where the USWNT won the gold medal.
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She made 160 appearances for the USWNT and became one of only 12 players in team history to play in four World Cups when she made the 2023 World Cup roster.
O’Hara joins Megan Rapinoe, Julie Ertz and Sam Mewis among recent major USWNT retirements. Rapinoe also played in four World Cups, while Ertz played in three and Mewis starred in the 2019 triumph, but saw her career cut short due to ongoing knee problems.
Professionally, O’Hara won three championships, one in the now defunct Women’s Professional Soccer and two in the NWSL. Her extra-time goal in the 2021 NWSL Championship was the game-winner and clinched a first league trophy for the Washington Spirit.
She helped Gotham FC win its first NWSL Championship last year.
“It has been one of the greatest joys to represent my country and to wear the U.S. Soccer crest,” O’Hara said in a statement. “As I close this chapter of my life, I am filled with gratitude. Looking back on my career I am so thankful for all the things I was able to accomplish but most importantly the people I was able to accomplish them with.”
The 2011 World Cup, where the USWNT finished runner-up, marked O’Hara’s major-tournament debut after a glittering college career at Stanford, where she set multiple scoring records and was named the 2009 MAC Hermann Trophy winner as college soccer’s best player.
O’Hara’s most famous goal — one of only three in a USWNT jersey — came in the 2015 semifinal victory over Germany as a winger off the bench. Four years later, O’Hara started six of the USWNT’s seven games at full-back to help the Americans lift the trophy for the second straight tournament.
Defining traits of O’Hara throughout her 14-year professional career were her versatility and tenacity. She was long known for her elite athleticism and as one of the team’s fiercest competitors who consistently made crunching tackles.
In that 2015 semifinal, then USWNT coach Jill Ellis noticed the game turning in favor of Germany. She famously turned to her assistant coach and said: “We need a b—h, get Kelley,” a moment Ellis and O’Hara laughed about years later on O’Hara’s podcast.
O’Hara scored nine minutes after entering the game, and the USWNT won, 2-0.
Nagging injuries plagued O’Hara at various points of her career, but she largely played through them. She made only 13 appearances for Gotham last year, but was healthy enough to make the World Cup team, a decision that former USWNT coach Vlatko Andonovski said was influenced by O’Hara’s mentality and presence in the locker room.
O’Hara has appeared for Gotham only twice thus far this season as she deals with a knee injury.