"One of my favorite stories of my dad, who has believed in me since I was a little kid, is that he used to take my tiny soccer cleats after I was done, as a youth player, and he would take them after I wore them, and he would clean them off, and he would polish them with his work-leather-shoe-cleaner stuff, and he would lay them back out for me the next day.
And sometimes I would come home from soccer at 6 or 7 years old, and my dad would hug me in tears and he would say 'you're the greatest player to ever lace up the boots.' I don't know how he knew that, I was only 7, or what made him say that but he still says that to me today. So, thank you to my dad for believing in me from the beginning.
And you, alongside my mom and the rest of my family, have pushed me to be my best for my entire life, and I think, more importantly, asked me to reimagine what my best actually could be and that meant breaking down barriers."
—Christen Press, Stanford Athletics Hall of Fame, Title IX 50th Anniversary All-Female Class of 2022
