DETROIT -- It turns out that not every playoff game is a win-or-go-home scenario. Sometimes they send you to Detroit when your season ends.
That's a reward, by the way.
In fact, as far as Crystal Dunn was concerned, the industrial hub that has seen more prosperous days was a more welcome destination in the aftermath of her team's loss this past weekend in a National Women's Soccer League semifinal than the French Riviera, Maui, Paris or Rio de Janeiro. Although, she may yet earn a trip to that last destination.
The NWSL's Golden Boot winner, and that league's likely MVP for her efforts with the Washington Spirit, Dunn was called to the national team and left most of the goal scoring to Carli Lloyd in a 5-0 win for the United States against Haiti.
Duane Burleson/Getty Images
Crystal Dunn jumps into the arms of Ali Krieger after scoring a goal for the U.S. in the second half of the match against Haiti.
Lloyd's fourth career hat trick for her country, while not as memorable as her third a few months earlier in the Women's World Cup final, was more than enough against an overmatched opponent for which the final score matched the most competitive of five all-time meetings. But as the first player to participate in the ongoing tour who was not on the roster during the World Cup itself, Dunn's contributions were the most revelatory.
"I said to her tonight, do what you've been doing," United States coach Jill Ellis said.
So, naturally, Dunn capped a night that began with two assists by scoring her first senior international goal on a header in the third and final minute of second-half stoppage time.
A crowd of 34,538 came to see Lloyd and the stars of the summer past. They left happy. They also left having seen a potential star of summers to come.
"I think what you saw tonight, the energy, the confidence -- she wasn't always looking to turn and take on and do those types of things with us [in the past]," Ellis said. "Sometimes when you're a younger player coming in with more senior players, sometimes the tendency is to defer a little bit and pass a little bit. I think her personality in the NWSL games grew, and she grew more confident that she was the go-to player."
She isn't the go-to player for this team, but cast Thursday in a variety of attacking roles that began with her wide right, she looked like a heck of a go-through player.
The first five minutes, a small sample size, were unsteady. She closed well on a Haitian player and got her first touch by blocking the same player's hurried clearance. But she also wasn't on the same page as Alex Morgan on a pass the forward tried to send down the flank and then lost another ball out for a goal kick when her touch betrayed her.
For 300 seconds, she looked like someone who not only might be nervous in her return but was also playing alongside these teammates for the first time in months.
Sometimes when you're a younger player coming in with more senior players, sometimes the tendency is to defer a little bit and pass a little bit. I think her personality in the NWSL games grew and she grew more confident that she was the go-to player.USWNT coach Jill Ellis
Then, in the blink of an eye, she did what she has been doing.
Morgan Brian switched play to Kelley O'Hara on the right side. O'Hara slipped a pass toward Dunn that traced the line marking the short edge of Haiti's 18-yard box. It looked for a second as if the pass might have too much weight, but Dunn stretched to corral it without completely halting her stride, took one more touch in open space near the end line and served the ball across the face of goal for Carli Lloyd to head home.
Dunn has played just about every position, save goalkeeper, but admitted in the past the wide attacking role is her bread and butter.
"Playing out wide, it's very natural for me," Dunn said. "I just feel like with so many great headers we have on this team, you're bound to just close your eyes and lump the ball up there and somebody is going to score it."
She added she was happy Lloyd "allowed" her to get the assist.
That's a good laugh line, but it isn't an entirely accurate representation of Dunn's skill. With the game stuck in a one-sided stalemate after the first goal, the United States piling up possession and shots but unable to extend the lead, Dunn again used her touch to bring in a pass and her speed to get to the end line with runners in the box. She didn't just lump the ball toward goal and hope someone else would do the work. She picked out Christen Press making a run to the near post and took something off the cross. It left Press with a little work to do to get the ball in the back of the net for her 25th career goal, but it gave her that chance.
There should be little doubt we've seen the last of Dunn at outside back. Indeed, Ellis took some pains in Detroit to point out her decision to play Dunn higher up the field dated to January, including time on the field there in friendlies in England.
"You start to look at the skill set, look at what the strengths are, no question she's more comfortable higher up the pitch," Ellis said the day before the game against Haiti. "I think, for me, it would be looking at her both high [and] wide, and also central. I think that's where she's most comfortable."
People keep pushing Dunn higher and higher up the field. When she played for North Carolina coach Anson Dorrance as a senior, he joked any NWSL coach who played Dunn in the back instead of in the midfield should be shot. Not only would Washington Spirit coach Mark Parsons survive that firing squad, he said recently he didn't think it was wise to play Dunn in anything less than an attacking role, that she had proved too unstoppable there.
It seems the soccer world is at last on the same page.
"Respectfully, she didn't make the team as an outside back," Ellis added. "We had very little depth in the back, and that's part of why we looked at her there. But I think she is a special player playing in a more attacking role."
In some sense, the only team that had anything on the line Thursday was thousands of miles away and well into their Friday mornings by the time the ball was kicked inside Ford Field. Had it been on the field, Australia would have taken a shot at enhancing a reputation already burnished by a strong World Cup (and perhaps lived up to the words posted on the Australian federation's official website after the two teams met in a group game in Winnipeg, when a writer described the Americans as "rudimentary and "bog-standard," which presumably wasn't a compliment). That game certainly would have been a more competitive challenge for the world champions.
But the Australian players chose a bigger challenge, and inarguably a more important one, by electing not to play in pursuit of a collective bargaining agreement at home that provides them with something closer to a living wage.
The result of that is likely the only thing connected with Thursday that will have a lasting legacy.
And yet it's possible that as lopsided as the game between the United States and Haiti was, it also marked the beginning -- only the beginning -- of the transition from celebration to preparation. It wasn't a game that meant a lot to the United States. It did mean a lot to Dunn.
Dunn attributed some of her struggles in the year leading up to the World Cup to playing through injuries that would have been better served by rest (both she and Parsons have also attributed Dunn's success this summer in the NWSL to improved training). That she didn't take the time to heal in the past was because she felt she couldn't.
There was never any time to lose if she was going to make the World Cup roster. That isn't how she played Thursday. She played less like someone worried about Brazil next summer than satisfied with Detroit in September.
"I had a lot of fun today," Dunn said. "I really didn't stress myself out. I think this is a celebration for the women, what they've done this summer. For me, I'm just happy to be a part of it. ... I stepped into this game stress-free; I was like 'Hey, this is a celebration.'
"I think that's what I need to get back to is just kind of honing in on not over-stressing and just enjoying the game and having fun."
A grinning Abby Wambach helped Dunn up off the turf after the goal; Lloyd was next in line to congratulate her with a smile.
Such is the company Dunn keeps these days and likely for many days to come.
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