12-year-old deaf soccer players eyes national goal

12-year-old soccer player from California is in Fayetteville this week with a really big goal. So she wants to play in college, and one day she hopes to represent Team USA at the Deaflympics. So our Chris Rosenthal is at camp in Fayetteville this morning. He's joining us now talking about how she's training alongside other deaf players who share her goal. Tell us more about it, Chris. Good morning. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, about 30 of those players from around the country here in Fayetteville training all week here at the U.S. Soccer Deaf Youth Development Camp here. And I'll tell you, I watched them practice here a little bit earlier, and it's really amazing to see these young players practice and play a mix of sign language and a mix of, you know, just normal, what we consider sort of normal coaching here. I don't know about you here, but Just really, really great watching them. And I have one of the players here and her mother. I have Delaney Ann Barden and her mother, Rebecca, here from California. And Delaney has a new cochlear implant, which helps her hear a little bit better out there. But, Rebecca, let me ask you a little bit about... Delaney's journey here with deafness and playing soccer. Yes, Delaney, we discovered that she was hard of hearing at the age of three. And so since the age of three, she's been wearing hearing aids and they've been supporting her for the last nine years. And unfortunately, around the December period, she had a significant drop in what was her good ear, now became her bad ear. And her hearing aids just could no longer support the sound that was needed for her. And so we had to make the decision to move into a cochlear implant. And so she just received her first cochlear implant this summer in July. She was activated in August and she's been thriving ever since. Yeah, let's take a look at it here. I mean, it's even bedazzled USA colors here. Very, very appropriate. Delaney, how does this help you here? It helped me hear a lot with hearing sounds I have never been able to hear with my hearing aids before, like whispers and birds, normally those high-pitched sounds. Yeah, so when you're playing soccer and you're out here, you're even in practice, what's it like? What makes this a little bit different, being deaf, the accommodations you need? Um... I have to learn how to communicate with my teammates because I normally can't hear my coach or my teammates from across the field and it gets a little bit harder so my teammates have to learn how to. Talk to me from across the field by communicating with each other. Sending the message from Coach from the other side of the field. Now that she's moved to the full-size field, it was a little bit more challenging, but what we've started to notice now that she's had her implant this season is that she's starting to pick up on Coach's voice, which is great. It's assisting her in that way. You have to adapt a little bit now that you have this cochlear implant, huh? Yes, I do. Okay. And tell me about your goals in playing soccer. You're 12 years old, but you've got some big ambitions. Yes, I really want to be on the U.S. Women's Deaf National Team and play in the Olympics and play with the older kids and be able to win those Olympic trophies like other players have. Yep. And we have very successful women's national deaf team here. So something to very much be proud of. And hopefully we get to see you playing on that team one day. And you can also follow your journey on Instagram, hearingmyway, right? That's the handle. So yep. So you can also follow her journey as well, playing soccer. So back to you guys. Love it. She's impressive and really cool to have her in Fayetteville training. So good to see this, Chris. Thank you.