"That sort of stuff can only happen in America." Folarin Balogun said it with a grin on Friday, and he wasn't wrong. The day before, Mauricio Pochettino — a man who once played alongside Diego Maradona and managed Tottenham, PSG and Chelsea — threw out the first pitch at a Seattle Mariners game in front of a sold-out crowd packed with red-and-white USA soccer jerseys.
It's a genuinely strange and wonderful scene. And it's exactly what this World Cup on home soil has produced.
An identity found in real time
American soccer has spent decades trying to define itself against European and South American traditions. This tournament may have finally answered the question — not by copying what works elsewhere, but by leaning fully into what America already is.
"We're not saying we need to chant like the English chant, or chant like the Germans chant," goalkeeper Matt Turner said. "We're taking on our own traditions and cultures, and I think that's the way it should be. We really needed this tournament in order to find our identity alongside our fans."
That identity looks like Pochettino singing "Take Me Home, Country Roads" with his squad after wins. It sounds like country music playing from his office — specifically Ella Langley and Teddy Swims, apparently. Christian Pulisic caught his manager mid-listening session and found the whole thing "funny to see." The Argentine coach who once navigated the pressure cookers of north London and Paris is now picking up American slang and leading "U-S-A" chants in packed stadiums.
It's working. And that matters beyond the feel-good optics.
Belgium on Monday — and history in reach
A win against Belgium in the round of 16 would be the first time the US has ever won two knockout games at a single World Cup. Their best run in the modern era ended in the quarterfinals in 2002. This group knows exactly what's at stake.
"I want it to be more than just what this moment has created and the hype around it," Tyler Adams said Friday. "If we're talking about the team and the success they've had two years from now, then we've done something right."
The tournament has already captured the country in ways that were genuinely uncertain coming in. Hotel guests huddling in lobbies to watch Egypt vs Australia on penalties. Dallas police officers performing the Viking Row with Norway fans on an airport tarmac. Cape Verde nearly knocking out Argentina. The atmosphere has delivered on almost every front.
Whether US soccer can convert this wave of attention into lasting growth depends heavily on how deep this squad goes. Quarterfinals or further changes the conversation entirely — for the sport's domestic profile, and for the betting markets that have the US priced as live contenders to go further. Pochettino's "Why not us?" isn't just a slogan at this point. It's a genuine question Belgium will have to answer on Monday.
"Even from an outside perspective, he showed us Americans what we're about," Sebastian Berhalter said of Pochettino. "And he really drills that into us."
