For the Fire, she originally started with her own ’05 age group but soon moved up a year to the ‘04s, immersing herself in a soccer environment that emphasized technical play. She gives credit to her current club coach, Garvin Quamina, for nurturing that part of her game, but the overall competitive environment she found was one in which she felt a natural fit.
“I loved playing soccer with my local club growing up, but once I got to the Fire, something clicked,” said Jackson. “I really found myself thriving in an environment with players who were driven, and my passion for the game just increased.”
A couple of months after she left the field in tears, she got to try out for ODP again, and this time made the Georgia state pool. After joining the Fire, she attended a U.S. Soccer National Training Center when she was 13 but thought she had performed poorly. Turns out, she didn’t. Current U.S. U-17 WYNT assistant Morgan Church was the coach for the event and spied her talent.
In early October 2019, Jackson was one of 59 players – all born in 2005 -- called into her first National Team training camp with the U-15 WYNT in Kansas City, Kansas.
In March 2020, she was called into a 33-player U-15 WYNT training camp in Carson, Calif., that also included four of her current teammates at World Cup qualifying: defenders Savannah King and Cameron Roller, midfielder Mia Bhuta and forward Nicollette Kiorpes. She was thriving with her new club and getting National Team call-ups. Her confidence was growing, and she was off and running.
Then COVID-19 hit. Not only was youth soccer put on hold, but a tour to England with a U.S. Club Soccer Id2 team was cancelled. It would have been her first trip outside the USA. Despite the disappointment, she had set the table to be involved in this U-17 cycle. When U.S. Soccer resumed youth programing in October 2021, she was part of the U-17 WYNT player pool and attended all three training camps before making the 20-player roster for the Concacaf Women’s U-17 Championship. As it turned out, the Dominican Republic would be her first trip abroad.
When she looks back now at that tearful day at ODP tryouts, she smiles.
“I mean, when you’re young, you just don’t know what you don’t know,” said Jackson, who carries herself with a poise well beyond her 16 years. “Other than developing as a player and person, it is so important to embrace the mental toughness and the adversity. Having support from my parents, coaches and friends has helped. (U.S. U-17 head coach Natalia Astrain) always says ‘be a good person first before being a good player,’ so I always try to live by that.”
