The United States Deaf Women’s National Team (USDWNT) may well be the best team you were not aware of, having won every major tournament they have entered. Yet this is not a story about just silverware.

As captain Kate Ward led her team on to the pitch in Colorado at the start of June to make history as the first US Extended National Team to be televised nationally, the tears were not just about the game against Australia. They came because she had been on a journey that had transformed lives.

“I get teary thinking about it now,” Ward, who joined the team in 2009, tells the Guardian. “We were all crying on the way to the stadium just overcome with: ‘Wow, look where we are now.’ To share that moment with them was once in a lifetime.”

The game, part of a double-header with the USWNT, marked the first time the USDWNT were able to defend their near-immaculate 37-0-1 record on home soil. Despite four Deaflympics and three world championship titles, the team did not compete under US Soccer until two years ago.

For head coach and USWNT World Cup winner Amy Griffin and Joy Fawcett, her assistant and former teammate, the moment proved just as poignant as for the players. “It caught us by surprise,” recalls Griffin. “The players walked out [on to the pitch] with the deaf kids hand in hand. I turned away. I thought: ‘Joy cannot see me crying.’ It was more than I ever expected.

“I’m not deaf and I’m really aware of that. But for that moment, man, I felt like I was one of them.”

When Griffin joined the team in 2016, she decided the fight for recognition that required the support of someone with whom she had been through it all before. “[Joy and I] had been through hell and back on the national team. When we were playing in 1991, it was where the deaf team is right now. Zero awareness, not a whole lot of support, and not very much programming. Nobody knew of us. But that’s how we became really good friends.

“I’ve learned through this team you have to have allyship. You have to have a band of sisters and brothers who see your vision. It didn’t feel too risky because there were a lot of people taking risks with me. I would put all the airline tickets on my credit card and the players would have to pay me back monthly until I had zero balance.”

Until their world championship victory in Malaysia last October, all the USDWNT’s tournaments had been funded through fundraising. While Griffin put herself into debt, Ward was often responsible for the logistics of travel and accommodation.

“When we started, they were asking us to bring white T-shirts and black shorts to camp,” Ward says. “We typically had to raise around $5,000 a tournament.”

Yet just as individual performances might pale in comparison with the progress the team have made in 20 years, the players found a purpose beyond their own struggle because of the sad story of Malia Jusczyk. “She was nine when she came to our camp in 2017,” Ward says. “She wore hearing aids because neuroblastoma had deteriorated her hearing.

“When she was at school, she was not comfortable with her hearing device because people looked at her funny, so she came to camp with her hair hiding her hearing aids. We embraced her and, by the end of camp, her hearing aids were visible for the entire world to see.

“Unfortunately, she relapsed, and in 2023, she passed away. We got a jersey made for her and that jersey was at every game and on every bench with us. Moments like that are really humbling in showing it’s about more than soccer.”

More than providing representation for others, however, the USDWNT have created a space of growth for the players themselves. “For a long time, I just ignored the fact that I was deaf and had a disability,” Ward says. “I just wanted to fit in. I’ve always lived in a grey area. I’ve never quite felt hearing enough and I didn’t grow up in the deaf world.

“When I joined this team, I was around people who completely understood my lived experience and the different struggles I feel in the hearing world. It absolutely changed my development, my confidence, my desire to lead and to make the world a more accessible place.”

Now the USDWNT are intent on growing the game and the increased media attention from their first televised game provided a boost. But with that comes a lot of responsibility. “We do feel a ton of pressure to keep winning because we understand that’s what’s given us the platform that we have,” Ward says. “We’re successful, and America likes winners, so it’s a double-edged sword.”

Griffin, however, wants to see more competition among nations for the sport to progress. For now the USDWNT remain in the clear on the pitch, but they have set a path for the impact teams can have off the pitch, too. “That’s something we told the Australian players,” says Ward. “This is the most special time that you’re going to have. As a team, you get to create the culture and decide how you give back to the community so embrace the journey.”

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