When compiling a list of the biggest moments in U.S. soccer this year, the failure of the men’s national team to qualify for the 2018 World Cup belongs not only at the top, but in the next 99 slots, too.
Nothing else that transpired over these 12 months comes remotely close to the disastrous result in Trinidad and Tobago. You could isolate individual moments in that match (or in the home defeat to Costa Rica or other shortfalls) and justify cataloging them here.
However, for practical purposes — and for the sanity of American soccer fans — we need to embrace more than the epic failure.