Game day for U.S. soccer team: what it looks like

You may be eight hours from landing in a World Cup quarterfinal, which would the second time at such a point in modern times for your beloved land. Your country as a whole has been pinned to the mat a little bit lately, with a sniffling and sneezing economy and an oil spill that just won’t freakin’ quit. So it’s hard to feel very "can do" about it all.

But as a soccer player, you’re on the business end of an effort that is making everybody feel a bit better about things, re-inflating the balloon of national pride a little bit.

Of course, you may also be eight hours from crashing out and disappointing a suddenly interested nation.

What are you doing in the nervous hours before? How are you staying calm in the maelstrom of angst, trying hard to "play the game, not the moment?"

One way to keep some "chill" about it all is through a predictable structure. Game day for U.S. Soccer, in a lot of ways, is all about routine, which creates a predictable exercise. I wrote about it all here at SI.com; it’s what game day looks like from wake-up to kickoff for the U.S. team. Meanwhile, the game preview is here.

Six hours to kickoff …