How USA's Naomi Girma became 'one of the best defenders in the world' for Olympics

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Naomi Girma is the best of America.

In the literal sense, she is U.S. Soccer’s reigning Female Player of the Year and, at just 24, the anchor of the back line for the U.S. women’s national team. She’ll make her Olympic debut with the USWNT on Thursday, a year after playing every minute of every game at the World Cup.

But it’s the figurative sense that’s even more important. Girma is a first-generation American, the daughter of two Ethiopian immigrants. When she dons the jersey with the U.S. crest on the chest, it’s a reminder of the promise this country holds and proof of how much better we are when we welcome, and celebrate, the melting pot of races and cultures that is uniquely American.

“Diversity and embracing other cultures is what makes us so special, and I think that's what has put us ahead for so many years,” Girma said. “I think that's something that we should continue to do.”

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After all, it’s Girma’s Ethiopian roots that led her to the USWNT.

Her father, Girma Aweke, (in Ethiopia, children take their father’s first name as their last name) was a teenager when he fled Ethiopia during the “Red Terror,” a violent civil war that left more than 1 million dead. Aweke eventually made it to the United States as a refugee and put himself through school by working as a busboy and a dishwasher, becoming an electrical engineer.

Education brought her mother, Seble Demissie, to the United States, and she stayed after she graduated. She worked in banking and met Aweke through the Bay Area’s Ethiopian community.

The two settled in San Jose, where they raised Naomi and her older brother, Nathaniel. Maintaining their heritage was important, however, and Aweke and some friends in the Ethiopian community began a Saturday morning tradition of gathering at a local park. The adults would have coffee and socialize while their kids played in what became known as the Maleda soccer club.

“It became a means to bond. Not everybody plays soccer, but it became, socially, a big thing,” said Wossenseged Goshu, a co-founder of Maleda and a longtime friend of Girma’s family.

“Our kids growing up here, they don’t go to the same schools, they don’t live in the same neighborhoods,” he added. “So this was a way of getting them together and getting them to know each other.”

As in most other countries around the world, soccer has a passionate following in Ethiopia, the equivalent of the NFL here. Still, none of the Maleda parents dreamed these weekend games in local parks would take their kids anywhere. Education was their priority, their own experiences reinforcing the idea that school was the key to the American dream. MIT, Columbia, Penn and Stanford are just a few of the schools where Maleda kids have gone.

But Girma gravitated to the game.

“I was really just playing for fun, and I think that took the pressure off of me a lot,” she said. “I didn't really feel it from my parents, I didn't really feel it from the outside. I was just playing because I loved it.”

Girma and her family didn’t know anything about the pay-to-play system that dominates youth soccer in the United States, powerhouse clubs that have become the main pipeline to college scholarships and the national team.

Even if they had, they wouldn’t have been interested.

“It’s just so stressful. It’s very expensive and we could not do the time commitment,” Demissie said. “I don’t know how many people can do that. Especially if the parents want the kids to still focus on the school.”

When Girma was in second or third grade, however, one of her best friends joined a local club, Central Valley Crossfire, and she asked her parents if she could, too. Demissie said they hesitated at first; both she and her husband worked, and they didn’t know how they’d get Girma to practices.

But other families in the club said they could carpool, and they and Girma’s parents took turns shuttling their girls to practices and games.

Girma was a teenager when she took part in the Olympic Development Program, which IDs players for U.S. Soccer’s youth system. She was selected for the U.S. Under-14 team, and steadily rose through the ranks despite continuing to play primarily for either Crossfire or her high school team.

She did occasionally play with De Anza, one of those high-profile clubs, as a “visiting player.” But unlike most of the top players in the United States now, Girma’s most formative years were spent playing simply for the fun of it.

“Once I got introduced to (the higher levels), I had that background of just playing with joy and freedom and I think that really helped me do that in the bigger moments,” Girma said. “Even playing with the national team, just feeling that freedom and feeling like I'm that kid playing for fun really helps me now.”

Her atypical path certainly didn’t impede Girma's development.

Though she grew up playing midfield, the U.S. youth team coaches shifted her to center back, a spot often reserved for the brainiest on the roster. Indeed, Girma is a cerebral player, with the ability to anticipate how a play will develop and make the appropriate adjustments. She’s also fast and fearless, and her poise calms everyone else on the field with her.

“She’s, I think, one of the best defenders in the world,” said USWNT forward Sophia Smith, who also was teammates with Girma on the Stanford team that won the NCAA title in 2019.

“She’s just so composed. She’s just an amazing player and someone you want on your team.”

After being a three-year starter at Stanford (she redshirted as a junior after tearing her ACL) and a two-time Pac-12 Defender of the Year, Girma was the overall No. 1 pick in the 2022 NWSL draft by the San Diego Wave.

Three weeks before she made her debut for the Wave, she got her first USWNT cap. By the end of the year, she was a regular in the starting lineup. At last year's World Cup, where the USWNT made its earliest exit ever at a major tournament, Girma was one of the few positives. Whatever other problems the team had to solve, director of defense was not going to be one of them.

“Naomi plays well beyond her years,” said Crystal Dunn, who partnered with Girma on the back line her first two years on the USWNT. “I’ve been so impressed with how she's carried herself, how she looks like she's been on the team for a hundred caps.

“She’s a leader by the way she carries herself. How she demands excellence not only from herself, but from her teammates. And she's been quite a bright spot on the team.”

A bright spot to so many others, too.

Girma hopes her unique path to first a Stanford scholarship, then the No. 1 pick in the NWSL draft and now a cornerstone of the USWNT will show kids, and their parents, that they don’t have to play for one of those big-name clubs to be successful.

If that’s what a kid wants to do, great! If they don’t, or if it’s asking too much of the family, Girma is proof there are other ways to get noticed. Her talent, and the support of everyone around her in those formative years, mattered far more than the name on the front of her jersey.

“Naomi’s journey — I’m just so glad. It was perfect,” Demissie said. “The support she got from the club, the parents, the school … Naomi’s success would not have happened without so many people involved. It takes a village.”

By reaching the heights she has, Girma is also an example for all those kids who look like her or are also children of immigrants.

Soccer has, traditionally, been a white sport. Dunn, Smith and Girma all have talked of wondering if they belonged because there weren’t other kids who looked like them when they were growing up. Now the three, along with Mallory Swanson and Trinity Rodman, are some of the USWNT’s biggest stars.

“To be on this team, and to have multiple of us, is so amazing and hopefully is inspiring to a lot of little girls and boys. To be like, 'Oh, I see them there. I can also get there,' " Girma said. “That's what's most important about representation is that until you see it, it's hard to dream it or believe that you can actually be there.”

Now that she is, others know they can follow.

Each year, the Ethiopian Sports Federation in North America holds a festival to bring the Ethiopian diaspora together and celebrate their culture and heritage. It’s centered around – what else? – soccer. Significant figures in the Ethiopian community are honored, and this year Girma was one of them.

She was chosen because she’s a role model for all Ethiopians but particularly those here in the United States, said Yared Negash, a spokesman for the federation.

“It’s monumental. I don’t think words describe it, the pride we all take seeing her on the field, seeing her wearing the jersey,” Negash said.

“(She) opens up doors for the next so many generations, for those who have the passion to do sports,” he added. “Our parents and our people, they’re very strict about you have to be successful through education. … It’s the perfect opportunity for the rest of our people that they can have someone to refer to. 'She did it, I can do it, I’m going to be motivated to do it.' "

For Girma and her family, they’re just happy they can, in a small way, give back to the country that gave them so much.

“Endless opportunity is what (my parents) saw and found here,” Girma said. “Me being in this position is one of those opportunities that they didn't really think of but kind of happened and we're grateful for. It just shows the beauty of this country.”

The very best of it.

Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on social media @nrarmour.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: How USA's Naomi Girma became one of world's best defenders at Olympics