Pulisic rescued – Christian Pulisic, Weston McKennie and Alejandro Zendejas were left stranded after a crash blocked their route from the USA’s World Cup hotel near Laguna Beach, forcing an unexpected rescue by a California golf cart business owner.
Christian Pulisic had barely stepped off the World Cup hotel shuttle before Father’s Day turned into a detour—one that ended with the USA stars being hauled back to safety in a plush golf cart.
Pulisic. Weston McKennie and Alejandro Zendejas left the USA’s World Cup hotel near Laguna Beach on Father’s Day. enjoying a rare day off following the team’s 2-0 win over Australia in Seattle. It wasn’t long before the trip to grab pizza took a sudden turn. A nasty crash on the Pacific Coast Highway left them without any obvious way to get home because one side of the road was shut. making it impossible for taxis to collect them.
Walking home would have meant roughly 30 minutes in the Southern California sun—an unpleasant prospect even before you factor in the injury. Pulisic was still recovering from the calf problem that kept him out of the 2-0 win over Australia. McKennie, meanwhile, was stuck in flip-flops.
The rescue didn’t arrive with emergency lights or a hero’s speech. It began with spotting a business. The players noticed SC Carts, a Dana Point company that deals in street-legal golf carts. Their customers include UFC stars Luke Rockhold and Khalil Rountree, as well as Alex Hall from “Selling the OC.”.
The moment they walked in casually—boxes of pizza in hand—Cole Schamber, the owner of SC Carts, said one of his colleagues initially assumed they were “just some local kids that were fascinated by the golf carts and weren’t really interested customers.” Then passers-by started asking for photos.
Schamber described how quickly the situation went from inconvenience to connection. “They actually hopped in one of our golf carts and took a picture with them,” he said. When he returned to the office, he told his colleague: “Yeah, those were people from the United States soccer team.”
The interaction turned practical from there. The players asked about renting or even buying one of the carts—around $9. 000—and shipping it back to Pulisic’s home in Florida. They were looking at the Voyager Patriot and the Bintelli Nexus. with Schamber joking on social media that both were “still available if they change their minds.”.
But the price tag didn’t survive real-world planning for long. Schamber told the Daily Mail that by the end of the conversation, they seemed to realize buying a cart just for the duration of their stay—and while they’d be busy playing—probably wouldn’t be the best financial decision.
Instead, Schamber offered something far simpler: a drive. He eventually took Pulisic, McKennie, Zendejas, and their pizza back to the hotel. Even that part came with the same strange World Cup atmosphere. Schamber said they didn’t even get out of his business’s parking lot when drivers coming from the opposite direction stopped. got out of their car. ran over. and took pictures.
That repeated again when they hit traffic along the back roads of Dana Point. For most of the short drive, the moment didn’t feel like a high-stakes rescue so much as an unexpected chat with elite athletes who were still, at heart, trying to enjoy a break.
“We were talking about the town, Dana Point, and the history. We were talking about myself and how I started my business,” Schamber said.
McKennie told ESPN that Schamber was also showing them the golf cart’s gadgets. “I was talking to them about their upcoming games,” he added.
Schamber said Pulisic and the others were relaxed throughout—no rehearsed stiffness, no distant attitude. “They were really relaxed, it was just like we were conversing as friends and were bros or whatever… no one was standoffish. No one was stuck-up.”
He admitted there’s a small regret in how the day unfolded: he wished he’d asked for a photo. He explained that SC Carts was busy, and he was juggling roles—owner, sales person, delivery person—without the time to switch fully into PR mode.
One of his co-workers’ fathers is a huge soccer fan and has been to a recent World Cup game. He was “ecstatic” after hearing the story. So were many of Schamber’s customers, too.
Now he’s left with the feeling of having done something memorable while still being pulled back into the grind. Schamber. 27. said he wants more downtime to watch the team. but as the business owner. he doesn’t have much room for anything beyond the basics: “I don’t even have time to do anything other than go home and have dinner and go to sleep.”.
If the USA go on to win the World Cup, Schamber says he’ll take his role as a good-luck story—though he’ll also be looking for a little compensation. “I guess I’ll have to try and get some compensation, or maybe they should buy a golf cart,” he joked.
Christian Pulisic Weston McKennie Alejandro Zendejas USA World Cup pizza trip SC Carts Cole Schamber Dana Point golf cart rescue Pacific Coast Highway