Lindsey Heaps was Lindsey Hops, cool from the jump, unsinkable to the last.
Dad?
Oh, man. It took Dad ages to get his sea legs back.
“Seriously, it doesn’t change, no matter what,” Mark Horan, father of the soccer icon, Golden’s own, told me Saturday after watching Denver Summit FC knock off Portland, 2-1, in Heaps’ debut. “You’re always nervous about your little girl out there playing.”
It’s cool, Pops. Really. Natalie Means’ long-distance winner from the right wing in the 86th minute sealed a one-goal victory.
“It’s the full circle for us — we’ve been doing this since she was 5 years old,” Horan chuckled. “And I feel the same way I did when she was 5.”
Like kind of a wreck, basically. But a happy wreck. World Cups. Olympic gold. UEFA championships. Paris. Tokyo. Centennial. Big stages. Same little butterflies that follow him from continent to continent.
“This was awesome,” Horan said. “And the team just played great. The whole group.”
According to Opta, his daughter won all six aerial duels she contested, becoming just the second National Women’s Soccer League player this season to go at least six-for-six in the air. On top of an assist and six shots, a pretty fair day at the office. Especially for your first game action in five weeks.
“She’s got her stuff together,” Dad laughed. “She has a level head. She goes into these things knowing that, ‘I’m going to do everything you can to win.’ That’s how she’s always been.”
The NWSL expansion team christened its temporary home — Summit FC (5-4-5) is slated to move to a new stadium in the Santa Fe Yards district in 2028 — with a victory before a sellout crowd at Centennial Stadium (12,372) that weathered sweltering heat and an early 1-0 deficit.
“We can handle this,” Amy Gallagher of Austin, Texas, told me late Saturday morning before kickoff. “I know this is brutal for you.”
Brutal enough — 85 degrees with 32% humidity at noon. It felt more like 91 degrees. A smattering of empty seats an hour before the start was largely due to fans seeking shade beneath the stands. Some of the rest were stuck in water-bottle refill lines, concurrent queues snaking behind small drinking fountains that created a bottleneck of sweaty humanity around the corners of the new stadium.
Still, as the rockets glared and smoke from pre-match pyrotechnics faded, those seats filled quickly.
“It’s amazing, because you can see from anywhere,” Gallagher said of Centennial Stadium. “There’s no bad seat. It’s amazing. You get these big stadiums, and you can’t see anything.
“And it limits the amount of people that come in — which is not so great for them. But for us, as spectators, being able to see the whole field from every seat is amazing.”
They saw it all Saturday, smiling through thick and thin. Amy’s daughter, Henley, is a massive Heaps fan and a huge supporter of the U.S. Women’s national soccer team that Heaps captains. The pair drove four hours early Saturday to be here from their summer abode in Wyoming.
“We knew Lindsey had moved here and came back — we just didn’t know when her first game was,” Amy recalled. “So when they said the 18th was her first game and she was playing (against Portland forward and Windsor native) Sophia (Wilson), we’re like, ‘We have to go.'”
As the sun beat down, the duo had posted up just outside Section 117, pressed against a metal barrier at the southeast corner of Centennial Stadium, about 90 minutes before the start of the match, hoping to meet Heaps.
“What would you tell her?” I asked Henley.
“I’d tell her she inspires me,” she replied. “And to keep doing what she’s doing. Because she’s great.”
Henley’s got a USWNT wall back home. Posters all over. On Saturday, she sported two small white Heaps signs.
YOU INSPIRE ME!, one read.
“Just by being the captain of the U.S.,” said Henley, who plays striker in her youth league down in Texas. “She puts in so much dedication, and she just inspires me to try and end up like her on the national team. And to just — I really want to be as good as her when I grow up … And she wants to show up, she wants to be a good player. And it just really inspires me like that.”
Henley wasn’t alone. The crowd roared every time Heaps touched the ball.
“I’ve loved every place that she’s gone, but she’s had to build the support,” Horan said. “But here, the support was just here. And I love it. And she loves it. I can’t believe how much support (we) get for coming back here. It’s awesome. It really is.”
In true Tinseltown fashion, the first two goals came via the feet of Colorado natives.
The first NWSL score at Centennial was a penalty by Wilson into the lower right corner in the 25th minute to give Portland a 1-0 lead.
The hosts leveled it in extra time. At the 53rd minute, Heaps flew into the box. Behind her, in the back left corner of the box, teammate Janine Sonis, who prepped at Valor Christian, lofted a cross high into the mountain air and at the low right post. The arc was so pure that it overshot not only Heaps but Thorns goalie Mackenzie Arnold, tickling the back of the twine while the Summit midfielder beamed in jubilation.
“It’s so exciting to see the team play (well),” Dad gushed later, “and for her to be a part of that. I love it. Lindsey’s a great leader. A really great leader. So she’s really good for this team.”
They beat a good team, too. Portland (8-3-5) went into the weekend third in the NWSL table. It’s also a team Heaps knows well — she played with the Thorns for six seasons before moving back to France, winning NWSL MVP honors in 2018 while helping Portland win a league title in 2017. It’s been a long, beautiful journey since those salad days with the Colorado Rush, Heaps’ old club team.
“She was calm (Saturday morning),” Dad said. “Totally calm. Relaxed. Easy. Nothing different.”
“See you at the game. I’ve got your jersey for you,” Heaps told him.
“Same Lindsey?” I wondered.
“No different. No different. Super level-headed.”
As Summit players had passed through the southeast gate and into warm-ups, the crowd pushed closer to the barriers.
“LINDSEY!” they cried.
Heaps, all business, smiled and nodded to the crowd but never broke stride.
Henley got seven or eight high-fives from other Summit players, though. Win-win.
“That’s the closest I’ve ever been to her,” Henley said, almost reverentially. “And it made me really happy.”
And isn’t that the point?
“We will be back,” Amy said. “We’ll get there. We love it.”
Horan has met tons of moms and daughters over the years who want to say hello. To say thanks. It never fails to tug at the old man’s heart.
“We love all of the support and the fact that she’s a role model,” Horan said of the Gallaghers. “I think (what) makes me most happy is when little girls, she’s signing autographs for little girls or hugging them or whatever.”
“(That) makes me super happy. She’s just done so much for soccer. For women. I love my little girl.”
Join the club, Dad. Join the club.
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