Alex Morgan’s final game on Sunday was a showcase of the legacy she leaves behind after a storied 14-year career, one in which her on-field accomplishments were matched by her relentless advocacy for women’s sports.
The day was a spectacle laden with tributes across the NWSL and on site at Snapdragon Stadium, where she started for the San Diego Wave in their regular season clash against the North Carolina Courage. The praise was just the first part of a sendoff worthy of a player of Morgan’s stature, who lived up to her promise as American soccer’s most hyped youth prospect and leveraged her on-field success by pushing women’s soccer — and the NWSL in particular — forward.
Morgan was partnered not just by her teammates on Sunday but also by her four-year-old daughter Charlie, who has become a constant companion in the latter stages of her career as the two-time World Cup winner became an advocate for mothers in sport. The 35-year-old also played her final game while pregnant with her second child.
Here are the sights and sounds from Morgan’s final match.
A family matter
Morgan arrived at Snapdragon Stadium in a familiar fashion, holding hands with her daughter Charlie. The World Cup winner rocked a green three-piece suit, a ribbon in her hair with the print of a soccer ball and a soccer ball bag, sold by Kate Spade New York. Charlie wore the Wave’s 2024 home kit with her mother’s name and number, which served her well as she walked onto the pitch with Morgan for the pre-game festivities.
Tributes on arrival
The rest of the league joined in with tributes with videos coming in from some of the league’s top players, including former national team colleagues like Trinity Rodman and Sophia Smith, the latter of whom said, “We wouldn’t be here without you.”
Morgan’s teammates at the Wave, meanwhile, turned up at Snapdragon Stadium with t-shirts reading “SAN D13GOAT,” referencing the player’s iconic No. 13 and her status as the greatest of all time, which the club is now selling to the public. Fellow Wave forward Maria Sanchez, meanwhile, sported a custom t-shirt with a selfie she took with Morgan when she was a child rocking braces, a picture they recreated this year after Sanchez was traded to San Diego. A handful also sported the pink pre-wrap headband Morgan has iconically worn her whole career.
The Wave also honored Morgan shortly before kickoff by welcoming the player’s loved ones onto the field and providing her with a club jersey that sports the number 63, in honor of her 63 matches for the club.
13 minutes for No. 13
Morgan played just 13 minutes in her final game, a nod to the No. 13 she wore for the majority of her career. It may have been a short finale, but it was an eventful one with two goals taking place and one missed penalty.
The Courage began to play spoiler in the fourth minute when Haley Hopkins scored off a header and forced the Wave to play from behind. The hosts had a great chance at an equalizer just six minutes later, when a handball meant they conceded a penalty that could have offered a fairytale sendoff for Morgan. She stepped up for what could have been her final goal as a professional but Courage goalkeeper Casey Murphy made the save.
The Wave finally found their equalizer, aptly in the 13th minute when Kennedy Wesley scored a header. Wesley’s goal allowed Morgan to celebrate a goal for one final time as a professional before coming off directly after the goal.
Morgan then walked off to a series of hugs, large cheers from the crowd and tears from a handful of her teammates. The crowd quickly began to chant her name as Morgan walked towards the touchline, coming off for Amirah Ali and then receiving another batch of hugs from the bench before taking her seat.
Making history
A crowd of 26,516 filled Snapdragon Stadium for Morgan’s final game, many of whom acted quickly to celebrate the star. The Wave sold more than 11,000 tickets in the 24 hours after Morgan announced her retirement, while some of those at the stadium were not locals — some signs spotted on the broadcast indicated that fans traveled from North Carolina and Alaska to see the player’s last game.
It is a far cry from Morgan’s first game at the club level in 2011 as a rookie for the Western New York Flash in WPS, the NWSL’s now-defunct predecessor. Just 2,164 filled Sahlen’s Stadium in Rochester, N.Y. to see a team that included Marta and Christine Sinclair, thankfully an unfamiliar sight for Morgan in her final years as a professional. The national team regularly plays in front of large crowds now, while the Wave average around 20,000 fans a game this season, one of the strongest markets in the constantly-growing NWSL. It felt appropriate that the league made some of its own history on Sunday, too — the NWSL surpassed 1.5 million fans in attendance for the first time during the regular season and is on pace to hit the two million mark by season’s end.
It was not the only groundbreaking moment on Sunday, either. Morgan’s final game was simulcast on CBS Sports Network and Paramount+, ESPN2, Amazon Prime Video and NWSL+, which marked the first time multiple media companies in the U.S. would jointly air a women’s sporting event. Again, it reflects the progress women’s sports have made during Morgan’s career. She quipped during her pre-game press conference on Friday that she found out she was drafted to the Flash from the USWNT’s press officer because the event was not televised and social media coverage was scarce.
The simulcast, though, speaks to Morgan’s unrivaled status as the face of women’s soccer as the game started to chart exponential growth. She rarely took that privilege lightly as she raised standards across the sport, something she vowed to continue in retirement.
