Wednesday, March 24, 2004
Just Like In The Movies
Today was the soccer tournament. After losing every game all season, we beat the other terrible team in the play-in game, leaving us playing the undefeated team from the University of Dayton. Not just some kids from UD, but actual players for their teams. Both women and men have superb teams. UD has 10,000 students, Antioch, about 300 at this point. Their players are on scholarship. And there we are, holding them. It's 3-1. Time is winding down. 11 seconds. We get the ball. I'm wide open in the center, near the two-point line (a quirk of indoor soccer). The ball comes to me. I touch it down, turn, take a half-second, let it roll to the edge of the 2-point line, and shoot a bullet to the lower left corner to tie the game......except for one of their players sneaking a foot onto the ball for a perfect block.
If I had made that shot, we would have been the Bad News Bears, Mighty Ducks, Hickory High, and The Replacements all rolled into one. I am crushed. This team could have run circles around us, but we all, exhaustedly, ran our asses off. Our sociopathic goalie played the best game I've ever seen him play. We, uh, actually played defense. All that was missing was our gruff but caring coach, and some great moral of sportsmanship (and me making that shot) and we would have been the greatest story ever to come out of Antioch. EVER!
You might be saying "But Rowan! I thought you were used to losing!" And I am. It's not the losing that bothers me. See, since I'm used to losing, I set individual goals for myself. If I feel I played well, I'm happy. And having that last-second effort, and not getting it....I'm crushed. I'm gonna be thinking about that for days. A last-second shot to beat the big kids school? Oh, MAN. I would be the coolest kid ever. But for now....I'm just a ragtag misfit.
The Onion reports on our game.
Today was the soccer tournament. After losing every game all season, we beat the other terrible team in the play-in game, leaving us playing the undefeated team from the University of Dayton. Not just some kids from UD, but actual players for their teams. Both women and men have superb teams. UD has 10,000 students, Antioch, about 300 at this point. Their players are on scholarship. And there we are, holding them. It's 3-1. Time is winding down. 11 seconds. We get the ball. I'm wide open in the center, near the two-point line (a quirk of indoor soccer). The ball comes to me. I touch it down, turn, take a half-second, let it roll to the edge of the 2-point line, and shoot a bullet to the lower left corner to tie the game......except for one of their players sneaking a foot onto the ball for a perfect block.
If I had made that shot, we would have been the Bad News Bears, Mighty Ducks, Hickory High, and The Replacements all rolled into one. I am crushed. This team could have run circles around us, but we all, exhaustedly, ran our asses off. Our sociopathic goalie played the best game I've ever seen him play. We, uh, actually played defense. All that was missing was our gruff but caring coach, and some great moral of sportsmanship (and me making that shot) and we would have been the greatest story ever to come out of Antioch. EVER!
You might be saying "But Rowan! I thought you were used to losing!" And I am. It's not the losing that bothers me. See, since I'm used to losing, I set individual goals for myself. If I feel I played well, I'm happy. And having that last-second effort, and not getting it....I'm crushed. I'm gonna be thinking about that for days. A last-second shot to beat the big kids school? Oh, MAN. I would be the coolest kid ever. But for now....I'm just a ragtag misfit.
The Onion reports on our game.