US gold medalist, 2-time World Cup champ announces retirement from soccer

SAN DIEGO — United States women’s national team legend Alex Morgan is retiring from professional soccer, she announced Thursday on social media.

The Olympic gold medalist forward will play her final game on Sunday, when Major League Soccer’s San Diego Wave FC hosts the North Carolina Courage at Snapdragon Stadium.

Morgan, 35, also announced in her retirement video she is pregnant and expecting her second child.

“I’m retiring. I have so much clarity about this decision,” Morgan said. “It has been a long time coming, and this decision wasn’t easy, but at the beginning of 2024, I felt in my heart and soul that this was the last season that I would play soccer. Soccer has been a part of me for 30 years. It was one of the first things I ever loved. I gave everything to this sport and what I got in return is more than I could have ever dreamed of.”

Morgan retires as one of the most accomplished U.S. soccer players in history. She finishes her UWSNT career with 123 goals, good for fifth all-time, and 53 assists, which ranks ninth in U.S. history, according to U.S. Soccer. Her 176 combined goals and assists ranks fifth in USWNT history behind Mia Hamm, Abby Wambach, Kristine Lilly and Carli Lloyd.

Morgan made 158 starts in 224 matches for USWNT, which had a record of 177 wins, 15 losses and 32 draws in games she played. She scored in 86 matches, with the U.S. going undefeated in those games with a record of 76-0-10.

The three-time Olympian played in 16 Olympic matches, scoring six goals and helped lead USWNT to winning the gold medal at the 2012 London Olympics. That same year, Morgan was named the U.S. Soccer Female Player of the Year, an award she again earned in 2018.

Morgan also played in 22 FIFA World Cup matches, scoring nine goals while helping lead USWNT to consecutive World Cup victories in 2015 and 2019. Her last game in a U.S. uniform was June 4, 2024, against the Korea Republic.

Off the pitch, Morgan has been a vocal advocate on behalf of USWNT’s push for equality in women’s sports, including equal pay with the men’s national team. In 2019, Morgan and other U.S. soccer stars including Megan Rapinoe sued the U.S. Soccer Federation for gender discrimination, citing unequal pay. The USSF settled the suit for $24 million in 2022.

“I think an important piece of it was equalizing not only the money moving forward but the World Cup bonuses as well and working with U.S. Soccer and the Men’s Players Association to find a way to equalize that prize money going forward,” Morgan said after the settlement. “This is a huge step and mending that relationship with U.S. Soccer is also a big piece of that and we feel very comfortable and happy and proud with the moment we got to right now because it is a huge win for us, for women’s sports, for women in general, and it is a moment we can all celebrate right now.”

In her retirement video, Morgan said her four-year-old daughter, Charlie, told her she wants to be a soccer player when she grows up.

“And it just made me, look, immensely proud, not because I wish for her to become a soccer player when she grows up, but because a pathway exists that even a 4-year-old can see now,” Morgan said. “We’re changing lives and the impact we have on the next generation is irreversible.”