Sometimes, all it takes is a one-chance meeting to change the fate of an entire city.
Back in 2013, Tom Sermanni’s life would have a life-altering moment after an innocuous visit to Orlando.
At the time, Sermanni wasn’t looking for a new opportunity. He was happily leading the U.S. Women’s National Team on the heels of their 2012 Gold Medal at the London Olympics. Eleven months into his tenure with the team, they came to Orlando for their final friendly of the year, playing against Brazil.
Players like Alex Morgan, Sydney Leroux and Erika Tymrak, who would all play for the Pride at one point, suited up for the Stars and Stripes in early November as the US side beat Brazil 4-1 in front of 20,274 fans at the Citrus Bowl.
Before that game even happened, Sermanni had decided to come to Orlando a couple of weeks early, in order to do a bit of media touring to promote the game in downtown Orlando.
It just so happened that as he arrived in Orlando in late October, Orlando City — the USL Pro team — was meeting with Orlando City Commissioners to approve funding for a downtown Orlando soccer-specific stadium.
“When I was down doing the media, we kind of did some joint stuff with Orlando City," Sermanni told Orlando-Pride.com. “So that led to my first time meeting Phil and Kay Rawlins.”
Sermanni was introduced to the staff of the USL Lions and ended up hitting it off with the Rawlins’ over the course of his short time in Orlando.
“We ended up doing some of the press conferences jointly, not initially, but we both expressed how it's great to have the national team here, and I kind of expressed how it would be fantastic to have an MLS team here,” Sermanni said. “Over that first weekend I was there, I got on really well with the Rawlins’. You know how some people you meet, and you just kind of get on really well with them in a short period of time? That was Phil and Kay. That weekend probably became the catalyst for everything that followed.”
Fast forward two years. Sermanni had moved on from the U.S. job and was assisting the Canadian women’s national team. Orlando City had gotten its approval for the stadium and made the jump to MLS, having just completed its first season in the league. That was when Sermanni got a call from then City General Manager Paul McDonough.
“He gave me a call and said, ‘We’re starting a women’s team. We’re looking to get a coach in place. Are you interested?’ And I think I said, 'yes,' within a day,” Sermanni said. “Within a few days, we had an agreement, and I was the new coach.”
Sermanni was officially introduced that November of 2015, alongside the Orlando Pride name and branding at an event at Lake Eola Park.
“I remember that day vividly,” Sermanni said. "It was so special, it was just the media presence and the excitement around the team coming in. The thing that struck me was the presence of the team around the city was just huge, and the excitement of the women's team coming in was just fantastic.”
Six days later, Sermanni and the Pride were announcing their first signings of the Club’s existence: Alex Morgan, Kaylyn Kyle and Sarah Hagen.
From that point, the roster building hit full steam in preparation for the inaugural season, just four months later.
“As an expansion team, you generally get stitched up,” he said. “The system back then let clubs protect their 10 best players. So, what you’re left with are players who are injured, retiring, or on the fringes. You're not coming in at an even playing field. So that was the first major challenge that we faced, bringing the team into the league at that time. But the great thing was the excitement surrounding the team.”
Despite the early challenges, the city embraced the new club. The star power of Alex Morgan and Ashlyn Harris brought in the casual interest, but the players that made a name for themselves, like Kristen Edmonds, Toni Pressley and Jasmyne Spencer, helped give fans players to fall in love with in that inaugural season.
The team played their first home game in front of 23,403 fans, a Club record that still holds today, in the very stadium where Sermanni got his first taste of soccer in Orlando: Camping World Stadium.
On the pitch, the team failed to find consistency, but had built a strong backbone in a short amount of time, one they would build on significantly the next year.
“The on-field challenge of putting the new team together made it a challenging year in that regard,” he said, “but it was also a really rewarding and exciting year at the same time.”
Year two brought a fresh energy into the team, and it started with the greatest women’s player of all-time.
A few days before the Pride’s first-ever game at now Inter&Co Stadium, the team inked the legend herself, Marta, to come play for the Pride.
“When you bring in someone like Marta, that’s a game changer for the team and for the club,” Sermanni said. “The interesting thing about her is just her demeanor. As a superstar, she would be the first player on the training field, and she would be the last player to leave. You'd have to drag her off the training field. She just has such a love for the game. People talk to me about how great a player she is, and in those two years that she was with us during my time, I could barely ever remember her making a bad decision on the football field. She became that playmaking catalyst that we needed after the first year.”
From that point on, the team hit a new level. Orlando scored a league-best 45 goals and went undefeated in their final nine regular-season matches. Marta scored 13 goals and added six assists—both club records until Barbra Banda's incredible 2024 season. Morgan added nine goals in just 13 appearances after returning from her loan spell in France that year.
“We got on a run where the team felt like we weren’t going to lose,” Sermanni said. “Everything came together by midseason. Confidence flowed, key players hit form, and it just made coaching easier.”
"Just the whole atmosphere around the game changed [with the new stadium]" he added. "What a phenomenal stadium it is, and it just made you want to go out and play. The pitch was perfect. The size of the stadium was perfect. The noise in the stadium with the crowds that we brought helped inspire the team. So the whole setup around game day became very different than playing at Camping World Stadium, that colossal place that we played at before. So all of those things, I think, made a big impact on the team positively."
The Pride finished third in the regular season and qualified for the playoffs for the very first time. Their run ended in a semifinal loss at Portland, but it felt like the start of something bigger for Sermanni.
Hopes were high in 2018. The club added players like Sydney Leroux, Carson Pickett and Emily van Egmond, while keeping the majority of the team intact from 2017. The roster, on paper, looked deeper than ever, but results proved elusive.
“Honestly, the third year was one of my most difficult years,” Sermanni admitted. “Every game just seemed to be really hard.”
Despite inconsistency, the Pride maintained a level of competitiveness within the league and entered the final month of the season in playoff position.
“We were in third place with four games to go, and then just inexplicably lost them all,” he said. “That was probably the most disappointing thing. We still got ourselves in a good position, but couldn’t finish it.”
The team ended the season in seventh place with an 8-6-10 record. Sermanni, recognizing the rhythm had shifted, decided that it was the right time to step away from the Club he had helped build from the ground up.
“I just felt that it needed a fresh voice in the dressing room,” he said. “There were constraints back then; the draft system, contracts; that made rebuilding hard. But ultimately, it was time for me.”
In his tenure with Orlando, Sermanni coached a number of superstar athletes but also helped mentor young coaches looking to get their starts in the professional game. His first assistant, Khano Smith, is now the Head Coach of Rhode Island FC in USL Championship. He led the team to the league Championship match last year in his first season at the helm.
The other coach he helped on his way? None other than the Pride’s current leader and reigning NWSL Coach of the Year, Seb Hines.
In 2018, Hines had just retired from professional soccer with Orlando City, the MLS side, and was looking for his next career move. At that point, both City and Pride trained at the same facility in Lake Mary, so there was a lot of crossover between the teams. Hines and Sermanni would run into each other often enough in the facility, and,one thing led to another.
“It just kind of happened organically,” Sermanni said. “He may have a different take on it, but for me, it was just about him coming down to training, and we welcomed him in. You have a guy in Seb with a terrific professional background in the game, and already had a real understanding of the fundamentals of coaching. Often, it's not easy to come in as a player, and then you've got to think as a coach. But it came naturally to him. He brings a calmness around the place. He’s so easy to be around. He blended into our environment with great ease, and he became a good sounding board for me, because he's got a great understanding of football. So he was actually hugely valuable for us that year, and hugely valuable for just general conversations that you really value as a head coach.”
Hines spent that 2018 season as a volunteer assistant under Sermanni and quietly learned some tricks of the trade and how to transition from player to coach. After Tom’s departure, Hines remained, through three different staff changes until, eventually in 2022, he was appointed as permanent Head Coach. In the coming years, Hines would take the Pride somewhere they had never been before, on one of the most remarkable runs in NWSL history: a 2024 NWSL Shield and Championship double.
“What Seb's done is he's had a look at all the things that's happened with the Pride, and he's probably taken the good bits and the bad bits out of everybody that he's been under, and he's been able to then put all that together with who he is himself, and turn into this fantastic manager,” Sermani said.
“I spoke to him recently, though I need an appointment now since he’s big time,” he joked. “But from the outside, it’s like he hasn’t changed. He's got that same calm, controlled demeanor, backed up by knowledge, good decision-making, good coaching, and I think also having a good backroom staff. He’s really done an unbelievable job, not just in getting results, but in how he actually runs the team. I see a team, a staff and a group that are really managed well, they’re cohesive, and everybody's on the same page. And that translates to the demeanor around the team as well. So I really think he's done an unbelievable job.”
As time has gone on, Sermanni still remains close to the goings-on with Orlando.
He still follows the Club from afar, as he wraps up his interim tenure with the Australia Women’s National Team. The evolution of the team from his time to now, and seeing the investment in women’s soccer in Orlando, has been one of his favorite things to witness.
“When I see the club now paying $750,000 for a transfer fee, and bringing in a world-class player like Barbra Banda, I just smile,” Sermanni said. “Back in my time, we were trying to trade players and build from scratch. Now, they’ve been able to take that next step forward. It really is wonderful to see."
Sermanni, who has now been away from Orlando for seven years, has had time to reflect on his tenure with the Pride. He’s still given a sense of satisfaction and happiness as he thinks back on those first three years in The City Beautiful.
“Looking back, I feel extraordinarily proud and privileged,” he said. “I'm really privileged that I was part of it, and at a time when the club started. Just to have the privilege of starting a team from scratch, and then to see where the team's gone now, when you've got Seb in charge, and then he's brought in Giles (Barnes) and Scott (Sutter), two other people that have been connected with the club as well.
“For me, all of that stuff is really important, and really fills me with a sense of happiness. I get great happiness and excitement when I see where this team is and what's happening, and I think back and remember that I've been extremely lucky to have been part of it.”
