"They may go on to be incredibly successful and famous and make a ton of money," Alexi Lalas says, "but they will never forget the home World Cup if they recognize the opportunity and grab ahold of it with both hands."
That's the message from the men who did it first. Thirty-two years ago, just 15 Americans took the field in a World Cup on U.S. soil. This summer, that number more than doubles. And the survivors of 1994 are in no doubt about what's coming for the players who wear the crest at home.
"I hope," Lalas said, "they have some sense of what is coming."
What 1994 actually was — and what it built
The scale of that tournament is worth understanding in full. The U.S. had no first-division soccer league in 1994. European games weren't on TV. U.S. World Cup qualifiers weren't even broadcast live. The national team had played in front of crowds of fewer than 3,000. In the World Cup, they averaged 86,283 per game.
"You do notice the difference," Tab Ramos, who started all four U.S. matches, said drily.
The tournament drew a cumulative global television audience of 32.1 billion across 188 countries. FIFA called it the most-watched soccer event in history. And the Americans — widely expected to embarrass themselves — drew with Switzerland, beat Colombia, and pushed eventual champions Brazil to the 90th minute before going out. Two years later, MLS played its first game. The connection between those two facts is not a coincidence.
"Nineteen ninety-four is really, for me, the rebirth of soccer in this country," Ramos said. "All of the things that happened today go back to 1994."
Cobi Jones — who made his World Cup debut off the bench in the Pontiac Silverdome, not far from where he grew up in Detroit — probably becomes a lawyer without that tournament. Instead, there's a statue of him outside Dignity Health Sports Park. Lalas turned four World Cup starts into a nine-year playing career, front-office roles at three MLS clubs, and two decades as a soccer analyst. "The summer of '94 changed my life forever," he said. "I owe it all to the '94 World Cup."
The pressure the 2026 squad needs to understand
Before 1994, the U.S. had qualified for the World Cup once in four decades. Since 1994, they've missed it once in 32 years. Before 1994, Americans playing for major European clubs were a rarity. This summer, more than two-thirds of the squad have that on their résumé. The infrastructure the 1994 team helped build — MLS, youth participation, the annual summer tours from European clubs drawing 70,000-plus — has delivered a generation of genuinely world-class players.
But Marcelo Balboa's point cuts through the optimism cleanly. "If they do something special, which we think they can, it could turn this country on its feet. Or on its head." He played in three World Cups. He never replicated the weight of 1994.
The 2026 USMNT are better players than their 1994 predecessors by almost every measurable standard. More technically developed, better resourced, playing in elite European leagues week-to-week. None of that guarantees anything in a knockout tournament on home soil, where the pressure is categorically different.
For anyone watching the odds on the U.S. this summer, the 1994 precedent is a useful frame. That team overperformed its talent level significantly — the crowd, the occasion, the weight of what was at stake for American soccer pushed them further than they had any right to go. The 2026 squad has more talent, and the same force multiplier working in their favor at home.
"Enjoy the moment," Balboa said, "because this moment won't come again."
