Hilarious photos show a 17-year-old pro soccer prodigy's 'slightly unfortunate' experience watching her team's boozy championship celebration from the sidelines
Portland Thorns midfielder Olivia Moultrie won her first National Women's Soccer League title this year.
At 17 years old, the NWSL's youngest-ever player also became its youngest-ever champion.
Moultrie told Insider about her "slightly unfortunate" experience watching her team's boozy locker room party.
Olivia Moultrie had a lot to celebrate one Saturday night in October.
The 17-year-old Portland Thorns midfielder had just won her first-ever National Women's Soccer League Championship. After helping the Thorns take down the Kansas City Current 2-0 at Washington DC's Audi Field, Moultrie was able to add youngest-ever NWSL Champion to her long list of accolades, which already included youngest-ever NWSL player and youngest-ever NWSL goalscorer.
But one peculiar aspect of her status as a prodigy showed itself after Portland's big win; Moultrie couldn't fully join her teammates in their postgame booze fest.
"That was slightly unfortunate," Moultrie told Insider with a chuckle. "But obviously I wanna be with the team. Just seeing how excited everybody was, obviously it was cool either way."
The Thorns locker room — which was covered in plastic tarp and prepped with booze courtesy of NWSL sponsor Budweiser — looked like any other championship team's after winning a title. Players were popping bottles of champagne, guzzling beers, and spraying everyone and everything with their victory libations.
That is, everyone and everything except for Moultrie, who is still four years away from legally being able to purchase or consume alcohol in the United States.
"Obviously heading back to the locker room, I'm not thinking any which way about it," she told Insider. "I'm like, this is awesome — I know what's gonna happen when we get in there, you know?"
Moultrie was a good sport about it all. Photos show her laying low inside the locker room, where she stayed close to the walls and observed as her teammates — some of whom are more than twice her age — had the time of their lives.
"And I'm like right smack dab in the middle of it 'til somebody has to come pull me aside and be like, 'Uh, we don't know if we can have you in the photos,'" Moultrie said with a laugh. "Literally I wasn't even thinking about it for two seconds, but obviously there are people worrying about that aspect of things, which I completely understand."
"But obviously I'm not gonna be the one thinking about that after winning a championship," she added.
Without further ado, let's go Moultrie spotting in the Portland locker room:
The Portland Thorns won the 2022 NWSL Championship.
And they celebrated accordingly.
Booze was flowing in the Thorns' locker room, which was covered in plastic tarp and prepped with beer, courtesy of NWSL sponsor Budweiser.
And some bubbly made its way into the party, too.
There were champagne showers and beer baths for all who stepped foot on the premises.
All except one — Portland's 17-year-old wunderkind, Olivia Moultrie.
Moultrie is the youngest ever player, goalscorer, and champion in NWSL history — all accomplishments worth celebrating.
But she was still four years shy of legally being able to imbibe alongside her teammates.
Even still, she made an appearance at the festivities, where she mostly stayed close to the walls and observed her teammates' revelry from afar.
At first, Moultrie told Insider she was "right smack dab in the middle of" the party. But then a Portland staffer had "to come pull me aside and be like, 'Uh, we don't know if we can have you in the photos.'"
At some points, she looked genuinely concerned for folks in the room.
And in other moments, she took on the "slightly unfortunate" role of judgy younger sister.
Either way, Moultrie told Insider she enjoyed the championship experience.
"Even though I was just sitting there, I still just got to bask in the fact that we had won," Moultrie told Insider. "It was awesome just [having] my eardrums being blown out and things spraying everywhere — it was obviously very fun."
Moultrie added that "taking pictures with the trophy and everybody wanting to get in on that... was just a really cool moment."
Now, she says, her focus in on winning "six more" championships.
Olivia Moultrie says the beauty of winning an NWSL championship at age 17 is that she has time 'to try to get 6 more'
Read the original article on Insider