Just three days before the start of training camp for the North Carolina women’s soccer team, Anson Dorrance, who coached the team for four and a half decades, announced his retirement.
Dorrance has become one of the most successful coaches for a female college sport in history, as the Tar Heels won 21 national championships thanks to a legion of legendary players such as Mia Hamm, Kristine Lilly, Carla Overbeck, Tisha Venturini, Lucy Bronze, Tobin Heath, Crystal Dunn, and Emily Fox.
In addition, he found success with other teams than UNC. He coached the U.S. women’s national soccer team from the team’s founding in 1986 to 1994, winning the first FIFA Women’s World Cup along the way. He installed a one-for-all, all-for-one team culture that survives to this day. In addition, he coached the UNC men’s soccer team for 11 years, getting to a Final Four during his tenure.
He won more than 1100 games and adulation from around the sporting and soccer worlds. This includes election to the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 2009.
Now, it has not escaped my notice that the timing of Dorrance’s announcement is a little strange. Usually, a college coach leaving a fall sports program at a U.S. college will do it sometime between the end of the season and the beginning of the next calendar year, to give the university maximum lead time to hire a coach.
Instead, the coach decided to wait until three days before the start of preseason training, which makes one wonder about the circumstances around his departure.
A big, big part of Dorrance’s decision had to have come as a result of a number of departures. On top of graduation, nine players entered the transfer portal, and six others, including the two top picks in the most recent NWSL draft, turned professional. One estimate showed that Dorrance was going to be working with a roster of less than 20 players (the UNC website shows 27 current players, including six graduate students).
But the timing is curious. I’ll be interesting to see how this story unfolds. I have a feeling there’s more to this than a simple departure.
