USWNT’s Hayes’ best quotes in 2024 Olympic soccer final run

PARIS — While Emma Hayes has impressed for her strong start as United States women’s national team coach — the Americans haven’t lost in nine games under her — she’s been equally memorable when it comes time to answer questions from the media.

Hayes, who leads the U.S. into the Olympic gold medal match on Saturday, has been at times thoughtful, humorous, analytical, combative and wry when talking to reporters, and it is almost always entertaining. Here is a step-by-step look at the USWNT’s path to the gold medal game, as told through Hayes’s most memorable moments in front of a microphone.

July 25: “If you’d asked me at the beginning of the game, ‘Would you be happy with a 3-nil winner, I’d have probably said ‘No.’ … But I don’t want to be too hard on the girls.”
— In Nice after the U.S. beat an overmatched, 10-woman Zambia, 3-0, in the opening match of the group stage.

July 27: “Very French. Quirky, to say the least. But I like quirk.”
— In Marseille before the team’s second match, after watching the Olympic opening ceremony which featured, among other things, a masked individual carrying the torch and a representation of Marie Antoinette holding her own head in her hands.

July 28: “Can you imagine the adrenaline? That’s probably my biggest concern now is you get so high, the comedown is like any hangover.”
— In Marseille, after the USWNT routed Germany, 4-1, in the second group stage match.

July 30: “I said to the girls before the game that this is a ‘banana-skin game.’ And they said, ‘What’s that mean?’ They said it’s called a ‘trap’ in America, so I said, ‘OK, this is a trap game.'”
— After the New Zealand win, on awkward differences between sports cliches in British-English and American-English.

Aug. 3: “A million percent. And anyone who thought otherwise is naïve.”
— After the U.S. won their quarterfinal 1-0 in extra time, on whether she expected Japan to play such an extremely defensive formation against the Americans.

Aug. 3: “I’m a coach that’s used to winning, so no. It gives you headlines more than it gives me happiness.”
— After the Japan victory, asked whether winning an Olympic quarterfinal was a “big moment” for her.