Every morning, before Yolanda Thomas walks into the Orlando Health Training Ground at Sylvan Lake Park, she sits in her car.
Sometimes for several minutes. Never for less than 30 seconds. It’s a small ritual, a time to think about where the Swedish native has come from, where she is in the moment, and how thankful she is that she gets to do what she does.
“I pull up to the building, I park, I sit, and I go, ‘We have a professional women’s soccer league. I get to do this for a living,’” Thomas told OrlandoPride.com. “That wasn’t a reality some years ago.”
On Thursday, the Pride removed the interim tag she has held the past three months and named Thomas the club’s fifth head coach in team history, also making her the first Black woman to hold the title of head coach in the NWSL in a full-time capacity.
“Overall, very excited,” Thomas said. “Proud to represent this club, and I’ve really enjoyed the time I’ve spent here. I’m super excited to get to stay here and get to lead this club. I feel very privileged for that opportunity.”
From Sweden to Stillwater
The road to that moment started thousands of miles away.
Thomas grew up in Sweden, where soccer was never something she had to find. And because it was Sweden, the weather made sure she found a few other sports.
“Growing up there, or Europe in general, you grow up with a ball at your feet,” Thomas said. “Because it was Sweden, I also played just about every other sport, because the weather kind of forces you. So I played ice hockey in the winters, actually.”
It was her sister, Sasha, who pointed her more toward the game of soccer. One of Thomas’ four sisters, Sasha was a phenomenal forward who went on to play collegiately at FIU, eventually leading the Panthers in scoring records in the early 2000s.
“She’s really the one that inspired me to play soccer,” Thomas said. “I discovered pretty early that I had a knack for it, so then grew that love and continued. And then as she progressed in her career, she was five years older than me, I kind of saw what maybe I could do, and ended up outdoing her just a little bit.”
By her teens, Thomas was making her debut in Sweden’s top league and with the youth national teams. Her next move was to look across the Atlantic and into collegiate play. Originally she was committed to North Carolina, "to the best collegiate program in the country," however, NCAA rules kept her from going at the time. After reaching out to a friend of a friend, she sparked a connection with Oklahoma State's soccer program, and the following year she was off to Stillwater.
“When I walked on campus as a freshman, nobody even knew we had a soccer team,” Thomas said. “They actually assumed I must be a basketball player. But by the time I left there, I couldn’t walk across campus without someone hollering, ‘Hey, Yo how’s it going? How’s soccer?’”
Over the course of four years in Oklahoma, Thomas helped build the Cowgirls into a powerhouse. She led the Big 12 in goals as a senior and left Stillwater as a two-time Big 12 Player of the Year, a three-time All-American and a finalist for NCAA Woman of the Year. More than the honors and accolades, though, the experience shaped her into the kind of leader she wanted to be in the future.
“It defined me as a leader. I learned lessons that I carry with me, and it really kind of solidified leaving a place better than you found it,” Thomas said. “It’s something I’ve carried with me since then to try and leave a mark that exceeds my tenure there.”
Finding a New Purpose
After college, Thomas returned to Sweden to play professionally, but injuries, including a back injury that required surgery, ended her playing career far sooner than she expected.
“It was hard because you grieve what you thought you would enjoy,” Thomas said. "I started playing at such a high-end senior level, so early that by the time I was 22, 23, it felt like I'd been doing it for a decade. So I quickly was able to transition from a really deep place of grief, to a place of: 'man, I've really sowed a lot.'"
What kept her grounded and looking forward was a lesson from home. Her father Victor, who grew up in rural Kenya, went on to earn a doctorate from Virginia Tech after starting with almost nothing. For her, the legacy was to "make something out of your life beyond you and your dreams."
She earned a degree in international business and spent about nine months in that world. Then, soccer came calling again.
“I was like, ‘I am not a civilian. I need to get back in soccer,’” Thomas said.
The way back was her college coach, Colin Carmichael. Thomas returned to Oklahoma State to earn her master’s degree, and Carmichael made room for her on his staff. They won the Big 12 championship that year, and Thomas discovered a love for passing on knowledge and helping others succeed.
“I knew I enjoyed it, but really that year was defining for me because I discovered that the fulfillment I felt from helping someone else reach their goal was actually bigger than what I felt when I reached my goals,” Thomas said.
There was still a learning curve for Thomas in the early days. As a player, Thomas could play and see the game in ways others couldn’t. It would just come naturally to her. The part that took the most to learn for her was trying to explain things that she could do that others may not be able to.
“There was a gap between what I knew and could see versus what I was able to teach,” Thomas said. “That took a humility to admit that and to be willing to then work on myself.”
In order to go through that self-improvement, she took every opportunity she could find to get better: youth soccer, the high school team at Edmond Memorial, an assistant job at the University of Tulsa. It meant a buy-in at every level in order to improve.
“I think you can do that even if you’re working like I was for a period, with 10-year-old second-team kids,” Thomas said. “You can still commit to your craft and be the best that you can be.”
Then came her first head coaching job. When the position at Rogers State, a Division II program in Oklahoma, opened up, then head coach Scott Parkinson, who now leads the Seattle Reign in NWSL, called Thomas before he left.
“He said, ‘Mate, I’m leaving. You should take my job,’” Thomas said. “It was further away and lower level than I was working at. But the opportunity to lead and be a head coach was important to me, and I took it and really enjoyed it.”
The opportunity with Rogers State came with some lessons. While it was a chance to be the decision-maker for a program, it also meant getting creative with finding solutions. DII schools don't always have the same resources as DI schools, meaning Thomas was tested in figuring things out for her team herself.
“I think it’s underestimated sometimes to work in environments where you don’t have all the resources, because it forces you to be creative and be collaborative and find solutions,” Thomas said. “We didn’t have a nutritionist, but we did have a professor of nutrition on campus. So how can we use the resources that are there that may not be specific to the program? Pushing me to think about how I can solve problems outside of the resources I have really defined that period.”
Reaching the Highest Level
In 2023, the next step in her career journey brought her to Orlando as an assistant coach. Coaching at the highest level had always been the dream and even as Thomas became a mother during the time she was pursuing that goal, it was still attainable through her determination.
“The pipe dream was always there that I wanted to coach at the highest level,” Thomas said. “I’m a mother of three, and that kind of slowed my own career down because I also was building a family, which allowed me to be better prepared when I then took the step.”
The jump to the NWSL, she says, felt smoother than expected. Partly because of all her preparation, but it was also thanks to a saying that a former colleague used to tell her.
“I say something that a coach I used to work with always used to say: They just get taller,” Thomas said. “Whether it’s seven-year-olds or 20-year-olds or 35-year-olds, they just get taller. They love football. They enjoy it. But if you keep the basics, the basics, they want to learn. They want to be prepared, and they want to have fun while they do it, and they want to be challenged. You keep that the same, then you'll be all right at whatever level."
Things then took another big turn for Thomas and the Pride just one year into her tenure.
2024: a historic year for the franchise, one that saw the Pride lift both the NWSL Shield and the first championship in Club history. A season filled with records broken, historic moments and silverware.
“That was a ride. I don’t know that anyone will ever have a year like that again,” Thomas said. "We had a really close-knit group and staff, and once you start winning, though, if you can ride that wave, you can ride it. It was really fun. Probably the best way to describe it. We worked really hard, but we really enjoyed working."
Building Winners
Throughout her journey to the Pride, and over the last few years, Thomas was involved in the Youth levels for the U.S. Youth National teams, becoming the head coach of the U.S. U-23 Women’s Youth National Team for a number of camps in 2025 and early this year. For someone who has coached as long as Thomas has, it also meant getting to see the pipeline come full circle.
“It’s actually kind of neat when you go back and you coach as long as I’ve coached to realize, ‘Oh, I had so-and-so in a U14 camp, and here they are in the NWSL,’” Thomas said. "It's cool to see the pipeline for yourself and to think about what we said back then those players were coming up, what we thought back then, what we anticipated, and then see how that actually materialized.
"It's so enriching and It's been an incredible blessing. I'm really thankful to the club for supporting that while I was an assistant coach here. It allows you to learn more and then take that back and try to inject some of what I've learned into our environment, which was really valuable, and I think helped our group as well."
Taking the Reins
Then, this fall, things changed once again. On Aug. 31, with eight matches left and the Pride on the outside of the playoff picture, the Club made a coaching change, thrusting Thomas into the role of interim head coach.
Once again taking on the role of leader, she stepped in, looking to inject some faith and energy into the players and staff.
"I wanted to acknowledge where we are and that this is hard, but how can I inject some faith, some hope, some belief, and a little bit of joy, because when you're grinding like that, like it's not fun," Thomas said, "But we had to also check ourselves and separate some of the joy we bring every day from the results, because if you're a professional athlete in any sport and your joy is only connected to the number of wins you get, you're not going to last very long."
Even so, there was quite a bit of joy shared after Thomas' first match as head coach. After just a week in charge, on Sept. 6, the Pride beat the Houston Dash 3-1, with the players all celebrating the win with Thomas, showering her with water in the postgame huddle.
With all the staff having grown with Thomas over the past few seasons, they had seen how much work she put in, how much she cared about them, making that win all the more special for the group.
After the first win was in the books, it was time for Thomas to work on adding her own stamp to the team.
“I sort of had a laundry list of what I wanted to do, knowing that probably a fraction of that was only going to be accomplished,” Thomas said. “But they were so hungry and ready to listen, and so supportive of what I was asking of them, that we actually were able to cover a lot more than I expected.”
The support wasn’t limited to just the players in the locker room. For her, the way the building rallied around the team stood out in a difficult stretch for the club.
“The way people can rally around in hard times, that means a lot, and we did, not just the soccer ops staff that I interact with daily, but even our front office staff and people at the stadium, high-fiving and like, ‘We’re with you, we’re here,’” Thomas said. “I made a conscious effort to try to build bridges and try to make people who may not interact with the team every day feel like what they do matters for the performance of the team, because ultimately, when we come in on game day, that’s everybody’s celebration day.”
As Thomas was continuing to lead the group and guide them through the rest of the season, the interview process for a new head coach was starting behind the scenes. As the Club did their due diligence in the hiring process, the board would bring Thomas to interview as a candidate. Considering she already knew them over the past few years, it made those conversations seamless.
“It was easy, and it was kind of funny because I’m also in the duty of an interim head coach,” Thomas said. “So we’re having a call one day about regular updates, and then two hours later I’m interviewing. It’s like, ‘Hey, guys, here I am again.’ But it was a thorough process, and I was glad we did it that way because I also wanted to go through the process, not as a current employee, but rather as someone potentially being recruited and someone sussing out whether this is where I want to be.
"It was very open and friendly conversation because I know them, they know me. There's a level of respect for what I've already poured into the Club, so it didn't feel very formal. It was very honest conversations back and forth about we need to define who we want to be outside of just a football club. What are we defined by? We all know we want to win, and here's the plan for how we're going to win. But also, who are we? That was a lot of the conversation we had."
A Place in History
Now, the interim tag is gone, and in its place is a line in the history books that Thomas wasn’t sure she would ever see.
“I didn’t know if we were going to see this day,” Thomas said.
She remembers the first time she saw a path. Thomas was playing for Sweden’s U16 national team against England when she looked across at the other bench.
“Hope Powell was a coach on the other side, and I didn’t even know who she was at the time, but I just looked over and she looked kind of like me,” Thomas said. “I had dreadlocks at the time, so did she, and she’s my complexion. And I said, ‘Maybe I could do that, because if I can’t play, then I can coach.’”
It took years for that thought to resurface, just as she started her coaching journey. A moment as she was coaching a girls academy team during a summer camp in Oklahoma brought that moment full circle for her, re-igniting a passion for doing what she does now.
“I was coaching, I think it was a U11 academy team, and I pull up to the field in the summer, and we’re doing like summertime big camp,” Thomas said. “The whole club is there, and this little girl runs up to me, looks kind of like me, and her smile from ear to ear. And she goes, ‘Are you my coach?’ And I didn’t even know who she was. I didn’t know if I was her coach or not. But I said, ‘You know what? I need to be out here. I need to be seen because I need other girls like her to see me, so that they can also believe that they can do what I’m doing.’”
That moment instilled a message into Thomas, one that she carries through to now, never forgetting those moments that shaped her into doing what she does now.
“If you can see her, you can be her,” Thomas said. “So if my presence inspires someone to be what they previously thought they couldn’t be, or do what they previously thought they couldn’t do, that’s invaluable.”
That feeling extended when she was named interim back in September. The outpouring of support texts and messages of support meant so much to her in her journey to that point.
“It’s a big thing. It’s a big deal, and for others to see me, even when I was named interim, I got bombarded with messages of, ‘We’re supporting you. We’re rooting for you. So proud of you. We know the sacrifice it’s taken for you to get here,’” Thomas said. “That had nothing to do with any results that we get, it had everything to do with paving the way for others.”
A Life Bigger Than Soccer
That sense of purpose started at home. Her father is from Kenya, and he earned a scholarship to study in Sweden, where he met Thomas’ mother, who was a human rights activist and politician. Early in Thomas' life, her mother would open the family’s home to battered women, refugees and asylum seekers. Thomas would sit in the hallway, away from the kitchen, listening to the conversations that her mother would have with these people, giving her a very early perspective on life.
“It marked me in the sense that if you just provide a kitchen table where people can come and talk, you can really make a difference in people’s lives,” Thomas said. “So it was important for me to make sure that my life means something beyond me and both my parents definitely inspired that. There was this understood expectation that what you do with your life is not just about you, it’s about the legacy you leave and the doors you open for others.”
That mission now includes a family of her own. Thomas and her husband, Philip, have three children, all she says she couldn’t do any of what she does without them.
“My husband’s my biggest supporter. Like, everyone needs a Philip in their life,” Thomas said. “He does it all. He reminds me often, ‘You’re a pioneer. Pioneering is hard, but you can do it.’”
The sacrifice has been felt across the whole family. When Thomas first came to Orlando, she arrived about three months before the rest of them so the kids could finish school. Her youngest child was only 18 months at the time, making those first few months away incredibly hard.
Now, however, the kids are seeing the other side of it. Her son has fully caught the soccer bug.
“My son is gung ho about football, and he’s like, ‘Can you get a job in Europe? I want to go to an academy.’ Slow down, we’re staying in Orlando,” Thomas joked. “To see them now recognize the benefits of the life that football has brought them versus just the sacrifices is a blessing.”
Being a mother has shaped how she leads, too.
“The mama bear comes out. It does, and it doesn’t matter how old the players get,” Thomas said. “I think the players feel it in the sense that it’s a genuine care for them as humans, and that’s probably the greatest benefit to my leadership, that my care for them is not contingent upon their performance, and that being a mother made me better at that.”
The Person Behind the Coach
Away from the sideline, Thomas describes herself the way she describes her work.
“I always say that I coach people who happen to play football. I’m a coach of people, and that’s actually in life as well,” Thomas said.
“I’m a dedicated wife and mother, I’m a believer, and it colors how I see the world. I care about my community. I care about the little person. I usually find myself standing up for people who can’t stand up for themselves. It is what was modeled to me, so it’s kind of what I do.”
The balance takes some planning. Thomas recharges on her own rather than in big rooms, and says she and her husband sometimes have to schedule that time around the kids. Much of it happens at the facility.
“I usually get up early. I’m at the facility early, and I’ll work out. I’ll go for walks. I know all the trails around the facility. I send my location because there’s also bears and alligators and whatever else,” Thomas said.
And Philip doesn’t always get a vote.
“I’m active. I make my husband go on hikes that he doesn’t want to go on,” Thomas said.
The Next Chapter
Now that the team's reins are hers to maneuver, Thomas has the job of bringing a new vision to the team. Not just for this year, but what she hopes is setting the club up for years of success.
“I think just a fresh start, a fresh start for the club, the group, kind of a relaunch of Orlando Pride,” Thomas said. “It’s a bit of a blank canvas, and we’ve got really good artists. So for all of us to get to work together and put that painting together, that’s exciting.”
It's been a theme throughout her life. From Sweden to Stillwater and now Orlando, Thomas has always tried to leave places better than she found them.
And every morning, as she sits in her car in front of the training facility, she spends those quiet moments to herself appreciating the journey and how fortunate she is to have the opportunities she has so rightfully earned.
“We get to do this,” Thomas said. “So if that’s our starting point, we can find joy. We can still be upset that we didn’t win on the weekend, but we can find joy in the things we do every day.”