Kristine Marie Lilly Heavey (; born July 22, 1971) is an American retired

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

player. She was a member of the United States women's national team for 23 years and is the most-capped football player in the history of the sport (men's or women's), gaining her 354th and final cap against Mexico in a World Cup qualifier in November 2010. Lilly scored 130 goals for the US national team, behind Mia Hamm's 158 goals, and

Abby Wambach Mary Abigail Wambach (born June 2, 1980) is an American retired soccer player, coach, and member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame. A six-time winner of the U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year award, Wambach was a regular on the U.S. women's nati ...

's 184.

Early life

Lilly was born in New York City and attended

Wilton High School Wilton High School is a public high school in Wilton, Connecticut, U.S., considered "one of Connecticut's top performers" in various measures of school success in 2007,Cowan, Alison Leigh, "Play About Iraq War Divides a Connecticut School", ' ...

Wilton, Connecticut Wilton is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. As of the 2020 census, the town population was 18,503. In 2017, it was the sixth-wealthiest town per capita in Connecticut, the wealthiest U.S. state per capita. Officially reco ...

. While still attending high school, Lilly became a member of the United States women's national team. She was recruited by the

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United State ...

University of North Carolina

Lilly competed as a student-athlete, playing for the university's North Carolina Tar Heels women's soccer team from 1989 to 1992. During her time there, she won the NCAA Women's Soccer Championship every year she played. She won the

Hermann Trophy The Hermann Trophy is awarded annually by the Missouri Athletic Club to the United States's top men's and women's college soccer players. History In 1967, Bob Hermann, the president of the National Professional Soccer League (NPSL) and th ...

as a junior in 1991. As a senior, she won the

Honda Sports Award The Honda Sports Award is an annual award in the United States, given to the best collegiate female athlete in each of twelve sports. There are four nominees for each sport, and the twelve winners of the Honda Sports Award are automatically in th ...

as the nations's top soccer player. To honor her time with the school, North Carolina retired her #15 jersey in 1994.

Club career

Lilly began her career with

Tyresö FF Tyresö Fotbollsförening is a Swedish football club in Tyresö, a municipality in Stockholm County. The club was founded in 1971 and is primarily known for its main women's team, which competed in the top-tier league Damallsvenskan in the 2010� ...

of Sweden in 1994. She spent one season with the club before returning to the United States. On August 20, 1995, Lilly joined

Washington Warthogs The Washington Warthogs were a professional indoor soccer team in the Continental Indoor Soccer League (CISL) from 1994 to 1997. They played their home games in the USAir Arena in Landover, Maryland, an arena they shared with the Washington Bul ...

of the now-defunct

Continental Indoor Soccer League The Continental Indoor Soccer League (CISL) was a professional indoor soccer league that played from 1993 to 1997. History In the summer of 1989 Dr Jerry Buss, the owner of the Los Angeles Lakers and California Sports, told his executive Vice Pr ...

. She was the only woman in the all-male professional indoor league, following in the footsteps of Collette Cunningham and Shannon Presley who had played in the league sparingly in 1994. Lilly joined W-League side Delaware Genies in 1998. With the club, she appeared in four games, scoring five goals and providing two assists. February 2001 saw the formation of the world's first women's professional soccer league in which all the players were paid.

Women's United Soccer Association The Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA) was the world's first women's soccer league in which all the players were paid as professionals. Founded in February 2000, the league began its first season in April 2001 with eight teams in the Un ...

(WUSA) had its inaugural season in 2001. Lilly was the team captain and a founding member of

Boston Breakers The Boston Breakers were an American professional soccer club based in the Boston neighborhood of Allston. The team competed in the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). They replaced the original Breakers, who competed in the defunct Women's ...

. In her first season with the team, she appeared in all twenty-one matches and played every minute of the season. She led the league in assists with eleven and added an additional three goals. For her performance, she was named First Team All-WUSA. In 2002, she started in a further nineteen games. She increased her point total for the season, scoring eight goals and assisting on thirteen others. She was again named First Team All-WUSA and was a starter on the WUSA North All-Star Team. In 2003 Lilly started all nineteen games in which she played, chipping in three goals and four assists and again being named to First Team All-WUSA, the only player in the history of the league to do so. Following the 2003 season, the WUSA ceased operations. Following the termination of the league, Lilly followed former Boston Breakers head coach

Pia Sundhage Pia Mariane Sundhage (, born 13 February 1960) is a Swedish football manager and former professional player. She is the head coach of the Brazil women's national team. As a player, Sundhage played most of her career as a forward and retired as ...

to Sweden to play for Damallsvenskan club

KIF Örebro DFF KIF Örebro DFF is a Swedish women's football club based in Örebro. Founded in 1980 as the women's football section of multi-sports association Karlslunds IF, the club's first team currently plays in the Damallsvenskan, the top level of the wom ...

in 2005. There she was joined by fellow USWNT teammate Christie Welsh as well as USWNT and Boston Breakers teammate,

Kate Markgraf Kathryn Michele Markgraf (; born August 23, 1976) is the General Manager of the United States women's national soccer team and a retired American professional soccer defender. She previously played for the Chicago Red Stars in the WPS, the B ...

. In late-2006 and early-2007, the formation of a new women's league took shape under the name of

Women's Professional Soccer Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) was the top-level professional women's soccer league in the United States. It began play on March 29, 2009. The league was composed of seven teams for its first two seasons and fielded six teams for the 2011 sea ...

(WPS). On September 16, 2008, Lilly was allocated to

along with USWNT teammates Angela Hucles and

Heather Mitts Heather Mitts Feeley (born Heather Blaine Mitts; June 9, 1978) is an American former professional soccer defender. Mitts played college soccer for the University of Florida, and thereafter, she played professionally in the Women's Profession ...

. The inaugural

2009 Women's Professional Soccer season The 2009 Women's Professional Soccer season served as the inaugural season for WPS, the top level professional women's soccer league in the United States. The regular season began on March 29 and ended on August 9, with the postseason being hel ...

saw Lilly appear in all twenty games (playing every minute) and score three goals with three assists.

International career

Lilly made her debut for the United States national team in 1987, when she was still attending high school. During her international career, she surpassed the previous women's world record of 151

caps Caps are flat headgear. Caps or CAPS may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters * Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Ja ...

, held by

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of ...

's Heidi Støre, on May 21, 1998. On January 30, 1999, she surpassed what was then the men's record of 164

, held by

Adnan Al-Talyani Adnan Khamis Mohammed Obaid Al-Talyani Al Suwaidi ( ar, عدنان خميس محمد عبيد الطلياني السويدي) (born 30 October 1964) is a retired footballer from the United Arab Emirates who played as a forward in the UAE Foo ...

of the

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (Middle East, The Middle East). It is ...

. Lilly has participated in the

1991 File:1991 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Boris Yeltsin, elected as Russia's first president, waves the new flag of Russia after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, orchestrated by Soviet hardliners; Mount Pinatubo erupts in the Phi ...

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake str ...

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A ...

, and

2007 File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple Inc., Apple's first iPhone (1st generation), iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakis ...

editions of the

FIFA Women's World Cup The FIFA Women's World Cup is an international association football competition contested by the senior women's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the sport's international governing bod ...

. She is a two-time World Cup champion, winning in 1991 and 1999; during

extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played only ...

of the '99 Final against China, Lilly, standing on the goal line, blocked a Chinese shot which had passed goalkeeper

Briana Scurry Briana Collette Scurry (born September 7, 1971) is an American retired soccer goalkeeper, and assistant coach of the Washington Spirit . Scurry was the starting goalkeeper for the United States women's national soccer team at the 1995 World Cu ...

- since the tournament took place with the

golden goal The golden goal or golden point is a rule used in association football, lacrosse, field hockey, and ice hockey to decide the winner of a match (typically a knock-out match) in which scores are equal at the end of normal time. It is a type of sud ...

rule in effect, the game would have been over if China had scored - and in the ensuing

shootout A shootout, also called a firefight or gunfight, is a fight between armed combatants using firearms. The term can be used to describe any such fight, though it is typically used to describe those that do not involve military forces or only invo ...

, she scored the goal which would give the US the lead. When she played against

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...

on September 11, 2007, in the

2007 FIFA Women's World Cup The 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup, the fifth edition of the FIFA Women's World Cup, was an international association football competition for women held in China from 10 to 30 September 2007. Originally, China was to host the 2003 edition, but th ...

, she became the first woman (and only the third player overall) to participate in five different World Cup Finals; by scoring a goal against

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

on September 22, 2007, she became the oldest woman to score in the World Cup. Lilly has also competed in the

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 800, causing the plane to crash and killing everyone o ...

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from S ...

, and

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight ...

editions of the

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a multi ...

. She won a gold medal in 1996 and 2004, and a silver medal in 2000. She missed the

2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and also known as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes from 204 Nat ...

due to the birth of her child. Unlike several of her longtime teammates (among them

Joy Fawcett Joy Lynn Fawcett (; February 8, 1968) is a retired American professional soccer player. She earned 241 caps with the United States women's national soccer team (WNT) and retired from the WNT in 2004 as the highest scoring defender for the U.S. ...

Julie Foudy Julie Maurine Foudy ( ; born January 23, 1971) is an American retired Association football, soccer midfielder, two-time FIFA Women's World Cup champion and two-time Olympic gold medalist. She played for the United States women's national soccer ...

, and Mia Hamm), she did not retire after the team's "farewell tour" which finished on December 8, 2004. On January 18, 2006, Lilly made her 300th international appearance in a game against

. In the same match, she equaled Michelle Akers for second place on the team's all-time goal scoring list with 105. Lilly was named as a finalist for the 2006 FIFA Women's World Player of the Year. She finished second in the voting to Brazil's

Marta Marta may refer to: People * Marta (given name), a feminine given name * Märta, a feminine given name * Marta (surname) : István Márta composer * Marta (footballer) (born 1986), Brazilian professional footballer Places * Marta (river ...

. After the birth of her daughter, Lilly returned to the national team in December 2008. Her last match for the national team, representing her record 354th

cap A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. Caps typically have a visor, or no brim at all. They are popular in casual and informal se ...

, was a World Cup qualifying loss to Mexico (1–2) on November 5, 2010, in which she played for six minutes as a substitute.

International goals

Coaching career

Lilly has been an assistant coach for the

since 2012.

Personal life

Lilly grew up in

, and lives in

Medfield, Massachusetts Medfield is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 12,799 according to the 2020 United States Census. It is a community about southwest of Boston, Massachusetts, which is a 40-minute drive to Boston's fina ...

. She is married to

Brookline Brookline may refer to: Places in the United States * Brookline, Massachusetts, a town near Boston * Brookline, Missouri * Brookline, New Hampshire * Brookline (Pittsburgh), a neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania * Brookline, Vermont See ...

firefighter A firefighter is a first responder and rescuer extensively trained in firefighting, primarily to extinguish hazardous fires that threaten life, property, and the environment as well as to rescue people and in some cases or jurisdictions als ...

David Heavey, a former hockey player and golfer at the

University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from H ...

. Lilly gave birth to her first daughter Sidney Marie Heavey on her birthday, July 22, 2008, and her second daughter Jordan Mary Heavey on September 2, 2011. She appeared in the HBO documentary '' Dare to Dream: The Story of the U.S. Women's Soccer Team''. Lilly helps run a soccer camp with Mia Hamm and Tisha Venturini-Hoch.Wahl, Grant, "Seeing Stars", ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence tw ...

'', July 4, 2011, p. 101.

Career statistics

Club

Matches and goals scored at World Cup and Olympic tournaments

Kristine Lilly competed in five

: China 1991, Sweden 1995, USA 1999, USA 2003 and China 2007; and three

Olympics The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a vari ...

Atlanta 1996 The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta ...

Sydney 2000 The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from 1 ...

, and

Athens 2004 The 2004 Summer Olympics ( el, Θερινοί Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες 2004, ), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad ( el, Αγώνες της 28ης Ολυμπιάδας, ) and also known as Athens 2004 ( el, Αθήνα 2004), ...

; altogether played in 46 matches and scored 12 goals at those eight global tournaments. With her USA teams, in eight world cup and olympic tournaments, Lilly had 39 wins, 3 losses, and 4 draws; finished first place with her teams 4 times, second place once and third place 3 times.

Honors and awards

References

;Match reports

External links

* * * * * * * *
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lilly, Kristine 1971 births Living people United States women's international soccer players Footballers at the 1996 Summer Olympics Footballers at the 2000 Summer Olympics Footballers at the 2004 Summer Olympics 1995 FIFA Women's World Cup players People from Wilton, Connecticut Sportspeople from Brookline, Massachusetts Women's Olympic soccer players of the United States Olympic gold medalists for the United States in soccer Olympic silver medalists for the United States in soccer North Carolina Tar Heels women's soccer players Continental Indoor Soccer League players Washington Warthogs players Women's United Soccer Association players Boston Breakers (WUSA) players Boston Breakers (WPS) players FIFA Century Club American women's soccer players 1999 FIFA Women's World Cup players 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup players 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup players 1991 FIFA Women's World Cup players Tyresö FF players FIFA Women's World Cup-winning players KIF Örebro DFF players Damallsvenskan players Expatriate women's footballers in Sweden American expatriate sportspeople in Sweden Women's association football midfielders Women's association football forwards Medalists at the 2004 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2000 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1996 Summer Olympics National Soccer Hall of Fame members Hermann Trophy women's winners Wilton High School alumni Women's Professional Soccer players

Early life

University of North Carolina

Club career

International career

International goals

Coaching career

Personal life

Career statistics

Club

Matches and goals scored at World Cup and Olympic tournaments

Honors and awards

See also

References

Further reading

External links