2 Orange County Soccer Players Join Team USA Olympic Roster: 2024

NEWPORT BEACH, CA — Orange County soccer phenoms Trinity Rodman and Jenna Nighswonger are heading to Paris for the 2024 Summer Olympics. Coach Emma Hayes said both were named among the 18 players on the Team USA Olympic Women's roster.

“Making an Olympic roster is a huge privilege and an honor and there is no denying that it was an extremely competitive process among the players and that there were difficult choices, especially considering how hard everyone has worked over the past 10 months,” said Hayes in a recent news release. “Choosing an 18-player roster plus alternates involved many considerations, but I am excited for the group we have selected and I’m looking forward to building on the work from last camp as we head into the Send-Off matches and then onto France. These are great opportunities for us to continue to show the progress we are making.”

Rodman, 22, of Newport Beach, is a forward on the team. Nighswonger, 23, of Huntington Beach, joins Team USA as a left-back. They are among the nine newest players on Team USA.

This is not the first time Rodman has played on Team USA; last year, she competed in the FIFA Women's World Cup. She is daughter to former NBA star and actor Dennis Rodman, and attended Corona del Mar High School and JSerra High School, where she graduated. She now plays on the Washington Spirit, where she earned Rookie of the Year honors.

Nighswonger is a Huntington Beach High School graduate, and played soccer at Florida State, NCAA Division 1, where she helped win a 2021 national title. She plays in the National Women's Soccer League for the NC/NY Gotham FC, and also earned that league's Rookie of the Year.

Team USA will try their hand at a gold medal, one they have not raised since 2012.

"The USA won the inaugural Olympic gold medal for women’s soccer in 1996 in Atlanta, won silver in 2000 in Sydney and then won three straight golds, standing atop the podium in Athens, Greece in 2004, Beijing in 2008 and London in 2012," according to the release.

The USA fell in the quarterfinals in penalty kicks in 2016 and earned a bronze medal in 2021. The USWNT is 24W-4L-7D all-time in Olympic competition.

Read more on the Team USA website.