Alex Cooper has opened up about why she spoke out about the sexual harassment she endured from her college soccer coach, allegations she first revealed in a new documentary about the Call Me Daddy podcast host.
On the latest episode of the podcast Wednesday, and the first since Call Her Alex’s release, Cooper said she didn’t initially plan on coming forward with her allegations against retired Boston University soccer coach Nancy Feldman. However, “towards the end of filming this documentary, new information came to light.”
“I found out that other women had stepped onto that same field and experienced the same harassment I did,” Cooper said. “I discovered the abuse and trauma I had been subjected to at Boston University was still actively happening on that campus in 2025, a decade after I left.”
Cooper added that she spoke to another woman who faced similar harassment while Feldman was their coach. “Everything changed for me that day. It really put in perspective that the harassment and abuse of power was, and is, so much bigger than me. It is systemic and it’s happening everywhere,” Cooper said.
In the film, which premiered at Tribeca Film Festival, Cooper claimed that her then-coach, Nancy Feldman, developed a fixation on her that led to “deeply uncomfortable” interactions, including verbal remarks and physical touch.
“My sophomore year, everything really shifted,” Cooper said in the documentary. “I started to notice her really starting to fixate on me way more than any other teammate of mine. And it was confusing because the focus wasn’t like, ‘You’re doing so well. Let’s get you on the field. You’re going to be a starter.’ It was all based in her wanting to know who I was dating, her making comments about my body, and her always wanting to be alone with me.”
In Wednesday’s episode, Cooper said, “It took me a decade to tell this story, and I’ll be honest even saying the words right now, ‘I was sexually harassed by my college soccer coach,’ I still feel uneasy and uncomfortable and anxious with all of it,” she said, later adding, “I think I’ve hesitated to share my story for various reasons. I think the first obvious is that it’s really painful to talk about, and I think a part of me also feels embarrassed that this happened to me. The Call Her Daddy girl. In coming forward, I was also afraid of retaliation. I also worried people would downplay or dismiss the severity of what I experienced because the abuse wasn’t physical.”
Cooper’s experience under Feldman ultimately left her opting not to play soccer her senior year at Boston despite her scholarship. Feldman retired in 2022 and received the declaration of “Nancy Feldman Day” in Boston on Dec. 11.
“I felt a lot of anger—anger at my coach, anger at my school, and anger at the system that allowed this to happen,” Cooper said in the documentary. “I don’t think anyone could’ve prepared me for the lasting effects that came from this experience. She turned something that I loved so much into something extremely painful.”
