Christie Rampone Wants Fans To Know #SheBelieves In Them, Too

Long before Christie Rampone was being interviewed on television, long before she was wowing the fans at Monmouth University and on the fields and basketball courts of the Shore Conference, she was a little girl kicking a soccer ball.

Now, with what is expected to be her final hurrah on the international stage, Rampone is making an appearance on Thursday at Ocean Medical Center in Brick as part thank you, part pep rally as the team prepares to head off to the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Canada.

The tournament begins June 6.

Rampone, the national team captain, and her teammates are spending this week with a celebration focused on their local communities and on young kids. Called “#SheBelieves in her Community,” it is the start of a major effort from the women’s national team to give back to the young fans that support them on the field by sending a simple yet powerful message back: #SheBelieves.

Conceived and developed by the USWNT players, the #SheBelieves campaign is a message to young girls that they can accomplish all their goals and dreams.

“We want everyone to have that confidence on and off the field,” Rampone said. “The #SheBelieves initiative allows us to interact with the fans and encourage them to set high goals and strive to reach them no matter what the obstacles.”

Rampone certainly embodies that. Growing up in Point Pleasant, Rampone played soccer in the Point Pleasant Soccer Club, then starred in three sports at Point Pleasant Boro High School. As a senior at Point Boro, she became the first person to lead the Shore Conference in scoring in soccer, basketball and field hockey and finished with 2,190 points in her basketball career. (Girls soccer was a spring sport in the Shore Conference until shortly after Rampone -- then known as Christie Pearce -- graduated in 1994.) She earned all-state honors along the way, according to an interview published on the National Federation of State High School Associations website.

She went on to play both basketball and soccer at Monmouth University, but it wasn’t until she was called to try out for the women’s national team that she focused on soccer, according to an interview published on the National Women’s Soccer League website. The player who shyly accepted the Asbury Park Press’ Jim Sullivan Award as the outstanding female athlete in the Shore Conference as a powerful scoring threat then switched from offense to defense, over time becoming a critical piece of the U.S. team’s back line.

Rampone now has more than 300 caps -- international game appearances -- in her career with the national team, which began in 1997. She turns 40 on June 24, the day after the group stage of the World Cup is completed.

Thursday’s event, which begins at 4 p.m. at the hospital on Jack Martin Boulevard, will include speeches, autographs and photos and music.

“As a team, we are always excited to be able to positively impact young fans, especially young girls,” Rampone said in a news release about the event. “Our fans have shown us how much they believe in us, and we believe in them, too.”

As part of the #SheBelieves initiative, the team invites fans to share on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram all the ways in which they are working to be the best at whatever they choose to do using the #SheBelieves hashtag.

Read the team’s letter to its fans, attached as a photo above.