Greensboro doctor relives World Cup memory at U.S.-Turkey match

Dr. Christopher Groat, a Greensboro ophthalmologist, was in Los Angeles for the United States’ World Cup match against Turkey with the same childhood friend who rode along on a family trip to Detroit in 1994. For Groat, the match linked two World Cups and two cities to one family memory that started in North Carolina.

He was 10 years old when his father loaded the family into a conversion van and drove from Greensboro to Detroit for a U.S. match at the 1994 World Cup. Groat still remembers that road trip, along with the childhood friend and youth coach who joined the family on the way. The long drive helped shape his interest in the tournament, turning a single match into something bigger than a day at the stadium.

The 2026 trip carried its own drama. Groat entered four ticket lotteries before finally getting in through a supporter-section allocation his friend won. That ticket decision came down to whether Groat or the friend’s wife would make the trip, adding another layer of family tension to a game that already had personal meaning. Groat said he was looking forward to the atmosphere and to seeing which bench players stepped onto the stage in a World Cup that has returned to the United States.

FIFA lists the Türkiye-USA match in Los Angeles on June 26, 2026, at 2:00 at Los Angeles Stadium in Inglewood. FIFA says Los Angeles will host eight matches there in 2026, along with a FIFA Fan Festival at the LA Memorial Coliseum and 10 official fan zones across the region. Those kinds of host-city amenities are the kinds of places where World Cup attention spills into spending, whether through watch parties, travel, or the youth soccer economy that grows around the tournament.

The scale of the earlier U.S. tournament helps explain why the memory still resonates. U.S. Soccer says the 1994 World Cup drew 3,587,538 fans, averaged 68,991 per match and generated an estimated surplus of about $50 million, money that helped create the U.S. Soccer Foundation. That tournament was spread across nine venues, including the Pontiac Silverdome in Michigan, which made a Greensboro-to-Detroit pilgrimage feel necessary for families who wanted to see it in person.

For Guilford County, Groat’s story is more than nostalgia. It is a reminder that World Cup moments can start with one family road trip and grow into a civic asset, if Greensboro businesses, youth clubs and sports venues are positioned to catch some of the tournament’s attention when the game comes back around.