It’s startling to hear Briana Scurry get emotional. Throughout her career, from the 1996/1999/2004 triumphs to the 2007 Women’s World Cup controversy, she has always been the calm one. The quiet one, like George Harrison of The Beatles. She didn’t embrace the spotlight like Julie Foudy or Brandi Chastain, nor was she pushed into it like Mia Hamm.

But in announcing her retirement today, Scurry paused and struggled with a breaking voice. The decision wasn’t surprising, but it was clearly difficult for her.

Scurry’s playing days had been winding down since the 2004 Olympics, which she recalled in today’s conference call as a great moment that no one expected outside the players themselves. She took a year off in 2005 and returned to the national team for three games in 2006. In the World Cup year of 2007, she had four starts and one sub appearance before coach Greg Ryan threw her into the fire, starting her ahead of Hope Solo in the semifinals against Brazil. It was an embarrassing moment for the team — Brazil won 4-0, Solo griped with stunning candor, and Ryan lost his job despite losing once in 55 games (45-1-9).

Thankfully, Scurry’s final appearance on a big stage was a win — the USA won the third-place World Cup game 4-1 over Norway. She also won her last start — again a 4-1 decision, over Finland at the 2008 Four Nations Cup. She made four sub appearances the rest of the year, mostly after the USA won gold in Beijing with Scurry’s name listed as an alternate.

When WPS started stocking rosters for its debut season in 2009, Scurry wasn’t among the allocated players. Few people knew of her plans — again, she was the quiet one — until the Washington Freedom drafted her. She explained in the 2009 preseason that she was taking her time in deciding whether to play.

She started the WPS inaugural game, but playing time was scarce after that. Erin McLeod won the starting job for the Freedom last year. This year, she played just 45 minutes. McLeod is out with a knee injury, but Scurry has been hampered by lingering effects from a concussion — a common problem that has put all too many players on indefinite hiatus.

But she said today the concussion was not the determining factor in her retirement. It’s simply time. Yesterday was her 39th birthday — not ancient for a goalkeeper but certainly enough to make anyone contemplate a new direction.

Scurry had two periods of accomplishment that no goalkeeper has exceeded. In the mid to late ’90s, she was simply the best in the world, often unchallenged behind a dominant U.S. team but ready when needed. She and the U.S. team avenged their 1995 World Cup defeat with Olympic gold in 1996 — and yes, she reiterated today that she did indeed run naked through a deserted street to celebrate. Then came the glory of 1999 — the penalty kick save, the World Cup win.

She struggled to get back to form in 2000 and wound up as Siri Mullinix’s backup when the U.S. women took silver in Sydney. But when the WUSA launched the next year, she was more than ready, twice taking the Atlanta Beat to the title game. She was back in the U.S. net for a third-place finish in the 2003 World Cup.

Then came the final run for the great generation of U.S. players — the 2004 Olympics, when the team won gold away from home soil in Greece. That was a final celebration for Hamm, Julie Foudy and Joy Fawcett. (Brandi Chastain and Kristine Lilly, who has inhuman energy for her age, would stay in the game long enough to play in WPS.)

Scurry deserves mention along with that generation. She should one day be in the Hall of Fame along with Fawcett, Foudy, Hamm, April Heinrichs, Shannon Higgins-Cirovski, Carin Jennings, Carla Overbeck and Michelle Akers, who paid tribute to Scurry’s shot-stopping prowess on today’s conference call. (Even with the finicky Hall voters who have yet to get Earnie Stewart inducted, I’d guess Chastain and Lilly will get the call as well.)

Those who thrive on irony will note that Hope Solo, now the Atlanta Beat’s goalkeeper, can keep the Freedom out of the playoffs on Saturday and send Scurry out of the game on a bitter note. Solo won’t have any motivation other than her usual desire to win a soccer game. When Solo visited Washington with the now-defunct St. Louis Athletica earlier this season, she and Scurry smiled and hugged.

The arguments are over. What remains are the accomplishments and the quiet dignity with which Briana Scurry went through her career.