Class Of '99 Reunion

The red wagon raced like a fire engine around the Raleigh
soundstage early on the morning of Nov. 21. In one corner
photographer Mark Abrahams was shooting 20 portraits, player by
player, of the U.S. women's soccer team, our 1999 Sportswomen of
the Year (page 46). But an equally revealing snapshot could have
been taken of the wagon's passengers. As forward Shannon
MacMillan pulled the daughters of defender Joy Fawcett--Katey,
5, and Carli, 2--along the slick white floor, the kids threw
back their heads and screamed, "Wheeeeee!"

They were celebrating a reunion: the first time the World
Cup-winning team had been together since it took the victory
stand at the Rose Bowl on July 10. "Photo shoots can take
forever, but this one was fun," said U.S. midfield matriarch
Michelle Akers. "It was a great chance to catch up on people's
lives, play with the kids and give each other a hard time again."

The logistics of putting together the shoot were worthy of a
summit meeting. "When I first heard we were doing this, I
remember thinking, How are we going to get all 20 players
there?" says SI photo coordinator Linda Bonenfant, who spent two
weeks calling agents, reserving hotel rooms and arranging a
charter flight for the occasion. "The players were shocked that
everyone could make it."

The American women weren't the only candidates for our 46th
yearly award, which is being given to a team for only the second
time (the first: the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team). So join us
in saying thank you to Lance Armstrong, for his majestic
cancer-be-damned Tour de France triumph; to John Elway for
concluding a magnificent career by leading the Denver Broncos to
their second straight Super Bowl title; to Joe Torre, another
cancer survivor, for deftly managing the New York Yankees to
their third World Series title in four years; and to Pedro
Martinez, for his awe-inspiring work on the mound for the Boston
Red Sox. Ultimately, though, the soccer players won us over. As
senior editor Hank Hersch says, "It was their ability to create
a moment that will last in a lot of people's memories for a
lifetime--in a sport that gets little attention, by a gender
that gets little attention for sports. That women soccer players
could produce this transcendent an event is amazing."

So we award the American women our highest annual honor, not
just for the way they filled the Rose Bowl with 90,185 fans, and
not just for the way they enthralled another 40 million
Americans on television, but also as a token of our gratitude
for making us feel like Katey and Carli Fawcett on that wagon,
for taking us on a three-week-long joyride that had us throwing
back our heads and screaming as a nation, "We!"

BILL COLSON, Managing Editor

COLOR PHOTO: MARK ABRAHAMS/PMI

"It was a great chance to play with the kids and give each other
a hard time again."