Chloe Humphrey: Unfiltered and Unstoppable

No matter the sport, the top-ranked recruit always comes with higher expectations and publicity. It comes with the territory.

But the Chloe Humphrey hype didn’t start when she was tabbed No. 1 recruit in her class, or when as a senior she led high school lacrosse powerhouse Darien to an undefeated season with her game-winning goal in the Connecticut state championship against rival New Canaan.

Interest in Humphrey began to build before she even set foot on the Darien campus as a student. As an eighth-grader in the spring of 2019, Humphrey and her sisters, Nicole and Ashley, became the first trio of siblings to play for three different teams in the Under Armour All-America Tournament. In a sea of talent (and Humphreys), she led her team to a semifinal appearance and earned the MVP honor in her division.

So, by the time Humphrey was named the nation’s top recruit in the class of 2023 — and the USA Lacrosse National High School Player of the Year — the train had long left the station at a speed that felt out of control.

“It was like a bubble was building, building, building,” said Sarah Humphrey, Chloe’s mother. “It was almost insufferable. I’m amazed she didn’t crack under it all.”

But the bubble burst. To an outsider, the pop came when Humphrey learned she had a stress factor in her foot before her long-awaited freshman season at North Carolina. But it was more gradual, starting with her first fall on campus.

“I like pressure, but expectations during the learning stage were the hardest parts,” Humphrey said. “Learning isn’t a straight curve. There are ups and downs. I’m naturally hard on myself. The learning curve and expectations got to me a little bit.”

She would call her mom upset. 

“I’d be like, ‘Today, I feel like I lost all the progress I made,’” Humphrey said. “She was like, ‘Chloe, not every day is going to be perfect. You just need to take a step back.’”

Humphrey wound up forced to take a larger step back from lacrosse than anticipated, redshirting her entire freshman season. She watched and learned as her teammates navigated the highs and lows of an uncharacteristic UNC season in 2024, taking it in stride — and taking notes on all the people who reveled in the Tar Heels’ injury-riddled misfortune.

Humphrey also had to withdraw from consideration to play for the U.S. Women’s U20 National Team that summer. But it would be wrong to say the hype train slowed down. It just took a detour, and the wait turned up the volume on the questions.

“Doubters were wondering, ‘Oh, is she really as good as people are saying?’ Last year, she put a period on that,” Sarah Humphrey said. “Yes. She is. Period.”

It’s not just mom talk. The numbers speak for themselves. Humphrey’s bio page on UNC’s site reads like that of a player who just graduated, not someone with three years left. 

She’s already an NCAA champion. Humphrey broke UNC’s single-season record with 90 goals, also the most ever for a freshman in NCAA Division I history. She became the first Tar Heel and freshman to win the Tewaaraton Award, snagging the honor over a finalist pool that included her sister, Ashley, who snuck a peak at the teleprompter and whispered the result seconds before it became official.

“I hope she wins it three more times,” Ashley Humphrey said.

The success didn’t stop on the Tewaaraton stage in Washington, D.C. Humphrey went on win championships with the U.S. Women’s National Team at the Pan-American qualifier and in sixes at The World Games last summer. At age 20, she’s the second-youngest player on the senior team that will compete in the World Lacrosse Women’s Championship this summer in Tokyo. North Carolina teammate Eliza Osburn is 19.

It begs another question: Has the lacrosse world seen anything like Chloe Humphrey’s 2025 collegiate debut?

“No,” said Jenny Levy, UNC’s head coach. “Australia might say Jen Adams, but as far as a U.S. player, Chloe is special. She’s a generational talent.”

A generational talent whose star power is reaching a different stratosphere sooner in the age of social media. Humphrey has amassed more than 90,000 followers on TikTok and Instagram.

“The volume of people who know who Chloe Humphrey is is different than even Charlotte North,” said Nicole Humphrey, the oldest sister and teammate in 2025. “It’s a new generation of technology, where people had access to her from such a young age and saw the highlight reels.”

Humphrey’s posts — wall-ball sessions, morning runs, USA Lacrosse gear reveals — look effortless and natural. But social media was not her second nature at first.

“I kept it surface-level, just pictures of my friends,” she said. “But being a part of the growth [of the sport] changed my mindset into how social media can build a platform not only for myself but to inspire these upcoming generations.”

It’s not just aspirational content. Her wall-ball fails are almost as popular as her BTBs and twizzlers. Her feed doesn’t look like a mid-2010s Instagram grid of perfectly curated, highly filtered photos that position perfection as attainable. She’s not afraid to show the bloopers — the dropped balls, the missed catches.

It’s not lost on Humphrey that the “We Get To” mural on the wall in a gated narthex of Dorrance Field was painted by former North Carolina goalie Taylor Moreno and bears the mantra of a UNC supporter who died of kidney cancer in 2020.

Gratitude even in defeat.

“It takes an hour and a half to get a 15-second clip,” Humphrey said. “The majority of those videos are failures. It’s important for people to understand that. These girls do wall ball and wonder why it’s not working. I have bruises all over my legs from trying to do a between-the-legs twizzler, because it took so many tries for me to get it.”

Social media can be mentally bruising, too, with critics dishing out cold-as-ice hot takes. But Humphrey isn’t showing up for the doubters.

“I’m trying to stay authentic to myself and post what I feel passionate about,” she said. “That’s something I’ve had to learn. You don’t post for other people’s entertainment. If you stay true to yourself and what you believe in, people will [gravitate] to that. There are some comments that I’m like, ‘Well, we’re pushing boundaries here.’ But I ignore anything that doesn’t resonate with me. I try to stay true to who I am and inspire the next generation.”

Contrary to tropes about Millennials and Gen-Z, Humphrey isn’t always on her phone. She frequently interacts with young girls in person, staying longer than anyone else after games to talk to and sign autographs for young fans.

“Sometimes, I’m the bodyguard. Like, ‘We gotta go,’” said Marie McCool, an assistant coach at UNC and Humphrey’s U.S. teammate. “She’s trying to squeeze in as many autographs as possible.”

McCool has seen the impact of these interactions. Her two nieces, ages 7 and 5, recently started playing lacrosse and came to the NCAA championship last year at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass.

“After the game, they were screaming, ‘I want to meet Chloe! I want to meet Chloe!” McCool said. “She took a picture with them and signed their T-shirts. My sister-in-law said they would not stop talking about it. They were wearing her shirt in the backyard while playing lacrosse, saying, ‘I want to be like Chloe.’ One picture, one autograph goes so far, and it’s important for our sport. She’s handled it with grace and humility on the collegiate and international stages.”

Humphrey has a competitive edge, too. Ask anyone within earshot of a post-goal roar, or her sisters, who were all too eager to pull receipts from the vintage cash register as North Carolina went on its undefeated revenge tour. She has the work ethic to match her ambition. 

“I see Chloe’s car at the facility on off days if I am going to grab something in my office,” McCool said. “It’s the only car in the parking lot.”

And while the question of her talent (“Is she actually that good?”) has already been answered emphatically, those closest to Humphrey say she’s not satisfied with the results.

“No matter how many awards she gets, no matter how many people tell her that she’s great, deep down there’s still a little part of her that doesn’t believe it and wants to continue to get better and just be the best,” Ashley Humphrey said.

Don’t mistake her desire to improve for false modesty, however.

“She’s owning her power,” Levy said. “She knows she’s good. She knows she has worked to be good. She’s earned that.”

Levy, who coached the gold medal-winning 2022 U.S. Women’s National Team, believes Humphrey is poised to become an international sensation.

“People are excited to watch Chloe play,” Levy said. “Looking at the ’28 Olympics, what does it mean to have someone like Chloe, who is hitting the timing just right? She’s not too young, not too old. Those are positive things, not just for her and the brand she’s building for herself and Carolina, but for lacrosse in general. It can capture people’s imagination and what the possibilities are.”

Humphrey did not necessarily have the Olympics in mind as the wunderkind All-American growing up in Connecticut. But the closer it gets to 2028, the realer it gets.

“My dream was winning a national championship at UNC —  that was my ultimate goal,” she said. “But now, having lacrosse at the Olympics has expanded my goals past college. To have that opportunity would be an absolute honor, and it’s definitely something I think about every day. How can I help fuel growth to put lacrosse in the best position heading into Los Angeles in 2028?”

That doesn’t mean Carolina is out of her mind. The Tar Heels are widely favored to capture a second straight NCAA title. If Humphrey has her way, she’ll graduate as a four-time national champion, perhaps with more Tewaaraton trophies in tow.

“Eliza [Osburn] and I always joke whenever we have our rings out, ‘Alright, three more,’” Humphrey said. “It’s awesome to have someone else in that mindset. We’re all in for this, but we want to create a dynasty.”