United States Leads World Cup in Post-Game Prayer

Published: July 7, 2026

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS - JUNE 06: Mark McKenzie #22 of the United States controls the ball during the international friendly match between United States and Germany at Soldier Field on June 06, 2026 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

By Mallory Mattingly

The United States Men’s National Team continues to lead the World Cup not just in wins, but in prayer too.

“Heavenly Father, we thank you right now for this day that you have made. We will rejoice and be glad in it. Thank you for the victory,” defender Mark McKenzie prayed after the United States beat Bosnia-Herzegovina last week to advance to the round of 16.

“You deserve all the honor and praise right now. Amen,” he closed.

Mark McKenzie leads the @USMNT‘s postgame prayer after the victory 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/RnI7WgFGIa

— FOX Sports (@FOXSports) July 2, 2026

McKenzie has lead his team in a prayer after matches for a while now, but it first started with him and only a handful of teammates.

“I just popped around to a few guys like, ‘Yo, I’m doing a quick prayer.’ You know, ‘Hey, let’s go pop over to the center circle, and we’ll do our rounds with the rest of the group,” McKenzie said on the “Orange Slices” podcast last month. “It started out with me and like three or four guys and then five or six guys.”

That small group soon burst into the entire team after the United States beat Paraguay in group play.

“Guys were like, ‘What’s going on? What’s going on?’ I said I was just going to do a quick postgame prayer,” McKenzie explained. “So, then I just let the Holy Spirit take over and just let the pastor flow with it.”

Before the World Cup began, McKenzie talked with other players he competes against about making Christ shine on the biggest stage in sports history, like Germany’s Felix Nmecha, who prayed with Curaçao after their match last month.

“Postgame is an intense moment because you have a win, loss or draw,” McKenzie said on the podcast. “Sometimes, it’s great that you win. Sometimes it sucks that you lost, and sometimes you go into a draw and you’re, ‘Oh, we deserved it’ or ‘Ugh, we should have come out with more.’ [The prayer] kind of just gets you back grounded like, no, we’re blessed to even be here. You know what I mean? We’re blessed to even have this opportunity on this stage.”

In an interview with Sky Germany after Nmecha led Germany to a 7-1 victory against Curaçao, he revealed that the prayer was arranged before the match began.

“I know one of the Curaçao players, Kenji Gorré. Before the match, we agreed that afterwards we would come together, regardless of the result, to show that we are brothers in Christ and that there is more to life than football,” Nmecha said, per Yahoo Sports.

“Being able to pray together is something very special. On the pitch you are opponents, but afterwards you are family in Christ. I wanted to thank Kenji and the Curaçao players because this isn’t something you take for granted after a defeat. It was a very special moment,” he added.

By uniting rivals and teammates alike, these moments of faith show that for players like McKenzie and Nmecha, the ultimate victory on the world’s biggest stage is honoring a purpose far greater than the game itself.

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