Meet Meila Brewer, the 16-year-old UCLA women’s soccer star

She doesn't have a driver's license. Often does not find references to films. Reminds me of many of my little sisters.

There's always some story or tidbit related to Maila Brewer it will make her teammates laugh or marvel at playing alongside the freshman center back, who is considered the youngest athlete in UCLA story.

Why, not long ago, Brewer confused the rest of the women's soccer team when each player revealed how old they were when the pandemic hit. When almost everyone had completed one year or another of high school, all eyes turned to Brewer.

“Oh,” she announced, “I was in fifth grade.”

That doesn't mean she's easy to recognize. Coach Marguerite Aozasa has developed an informal game in which it asks anyone who asks about the presence of a 16-year-old girl in its squad to select her when scanning players on the field.

Nobody succeeded on the first try.

“They'll point to three or four players,” Aozasa said, “and I'll say, 'No, that's probably the one you least expect.' »

Being one of the taller players on the team at 5-foot-8 provides some cover, but her precocious personality and the skills she developed while training with a professional team and playing for the U.S. Youth National Team give her veteran status.

With no decline in the minors, Brewer is making the most of every moment as fourth-seeded UCLA (11-5-3) prepares to open the NCAA Tournament on Saturday at 6 p.m. at home against Pepperdine (11-6-2).

Okay, maybe a hint of her youth came when she was asked how she felt about playing on college football's biggest stage.

“I’m going crazy,” Brewer said. “Like, when you think about it, I soooo excited is the only way to express it.”

This will be just her eighth game for the Bruins after most recently competing at the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup in Morocco, where the Americans won their group before losing to the Netherlands on penalties in the round of 16.

Her UCLA teammates watched from afar, with one posting a photo in a group chat of herself crying in celebration after Brewer scored in the opener. After the competition ended, Brewer boarded one flight to Atlanta and then boarded another bound for Los Angeles, but a little more than 12 hours later she was back on a third plane to accompany her Bruins teammates to West Lafayette, Indiana, for the Big Ten Tournament.

“Coming back from Morocco, I missed a decent amount of games,” Brewer said, “but I feel like the girls have been so supportive of me, helping me reintegrate and get back into the swing of things just because we're in tournament time and we want to do well.”

Aozasa said she reminded her players that there was a 16-year-old player on the team and that they should behave appropriately. Brewer's roommate, Payten Cooper, is two years older than her, although she is also a freshman. Lexi Wright, a redshirt senior forward, is seven years older.

But that age difference doesn't matter much to Brewer, considering she's already spent a year and a half training with players in their 30s at Kansas City Current, a team in the National Women's Soccer League.

“It wouldn't be surprising that she would be able to jump right in and be successful at this level at UCLA,” said Current's second-team coach Vasil Ristov, who was also a Brewer youth coach, “because she has seen and trained with some of the best talent in the world.”

Getting into UCLA at such a young age was a huge triumph.

Taking on a heavy course load in middle school and her first two years of high school to lighten her course load later, Brewer had reclassified once by the time she attended UCLA last spring. It was then that her love for the place she had long considered her dream school truly took hold, and Brewer felt drawn to the game immediately, even though she still had more than a year of high school left.

“She was like, 'What if I come this fall?' said her father, Austin Brewer, who was also on the trip. “And I was like, 'Well, I don't think it works that way.' »

After checking this out, the family realized it was possible. Maila (pronounced ME-luh) worked non-stop from April until the end of July. She didn't get to attend her high school graduation ceremonies, but she was rewarded with something big—a chance to play for the Bruins.

Her schedule includes almost as many parent visits as classes. Austin and Shelley Brewer regularly call morning, noon and evening, sometimes adding their eldest daughter Sasha, a freshman guard on the University of Miami women's soccer team, into the FaceTime chats.

The classes weren't as difficult as Brewer expected, although she's still trying to decide on a major.

“Going into college,” she said, “I prepared for the worst, so I feel like I was prepared for this.”

On the field, Brewer is known for her physical style, which allows her to disrupt opposing hitters as a defender and smart offensive play. All of these qualities can help her achieve her goal of playing for Team USA.

Always playing at one or more levels on club teams, sometimes alongside boys, Brewer developed a strong sense of self-esteem.

“I once asked her who her favorite player was, who she wanted to be like,” Shelley Brewer said, “and I’ll never forget it—we laugh about it all the time,” she said, “I don’t want to be like anyone; I want to be like myself.” »

In deference to her age and the fact that she is still growing, Brewer occasionally gets tendinitis in her knees. She wants to be just one of the girls, her youth a novelty but not a defining characteristic.

“I want to be seen as an equal on the field or a leader in what I can do beyond my age,” she said. “I just want to stand out because of how I play, not because of my age.”

That's not to say that anyone who doesn't turn 17 until March doesn't have as much fun as everyone else when the topic comes up.

“It's like, 'Oh my gosh, you're just a kid,'” Brewer said, “and I'm like, 'Yeah, I am.' »