9-1 with Some Hardware!

If last week was about as anti-climactic as a championship can be, today's game made up for it and some!

This week leading up to our conference championship (and end of the season) looked like this:
Monday - No Practice (Planned, on purpose)
Tuesday - No Practice (Only 5 kids showed up)
Wednesday - Really Poor Practice (Attitude and Effort)
Thursday - No Practice (Rain, rain, rain, puddles)
Friday - No Practice (Planned, on purpose)

So, I really would not say we were as prepared as we possibly could be, but then again I am not sure I could have said that at all this year.

Getting to this game was different than every other game this year in that it was on a Sunday and every kid was responsible for getting themselves to the game. Even though I sent home two letters this past week with date, time, location and directions, I was fielding calls from kids and parents from 7:30 in the morning until, literally, kick-off.

The game was played at our local Lutheran high school so it was equal parts cool and huge. Our opponent was the only team we had lost to this year. (At that game we started with 9 and went down to 8 with an injury, then they scored and then we got back up to 10 players by halftime, but we never could get a serious attack after that.)

The teams were lined up and announced like they do at the World Cup and then the game started. Then 40 seconds later we were down 1-0. It was pretty silly, actually. Our opponent got a decent attack off of the kick-off and their shot on goal was not anything special, it just caused our keeper to dive and then as he caught it he rolled and then lost control of the ball and basically threw it into the goal. Oops.

The rest of the half was some pretty good middle school soccer with both teams getting decent attacks on goal, but both defenses refusing to break. As per usual, our keeper was anywhere and everywhere thwarting several decent chances our opponent had to score.

Also, as per usual we started the game with less than 11 kids. We had 12 kids on our roster this morning, 10 showed up on time, 1 was late because he was riding the city bus to the game and another never showed because she had her mom drop her off at our school and not the Lutheran high school. (This was, interestingly enough, the first game an official took the time to ask me if I knew we only had 10 kids on the field. Probably, because this was our first game with two officials.)

At half time I did not have much to tell the kids other than some spacing and alignment issues. It was obvious that the larger field was having some effect on their stamina. Otherwise, I felt pretty good about our chances, if we could get an early strike. And we did.

Less than 3 minutes into the second half we got a strong attack going down the left side of the field that eventually got crossed and three of our kids ran at the ball bouncing across the front of the goal. Their keeper dived but missed the ball and then one of our forwards got a foot on it and sent it to the back of the net to even the game at 1-1.

The last 16+ minutes of the game were about as exciting as middle school soccer gets. We had a couple serious attacks, they had several. Again, our keeper was amazing. He stole several balls right from the feet of forwards! Both teams were clearly getting tired as the end neared. Our biggest scare came late in the game when one of our fullbacks inadvertently passed it back to our keeper, giving our opponent an indirect kick about 10 yards out. We set up a terrible wall but it was enough to cause him to send his free kick wide right.

When the time ran out, we readied ourselves for two 5 minute overtime halves. In five seasons of coaching middle school soccer, I have never seen a goal scored in overtime. 5 minutes basically allows each team to get one attack going, if you stop that one, you're pretty safe. So, 10 soccer minutes later we were still tied 1-1. Time for penalty kicks. Each team sends out 5 players, whoever gets more goals wins.

We won the coin toss and chose to start in the goal. Their guy set his ball up, backed up and then blasted it right to our keeper- only he hadn't waited for the referee's whistle! No problem though as he set it up, backed up, waited for the whistle and then sent it wide of the goal to the left. Our first guy calmly line his ball up and then buried it in the lower left hand corner of the net, 1-0 us.

Our opponent's next two guys kicked it right to our keeper... as did both of our guys, still 1-0 us. Our opponent then sent out one of their biggest players. He lined it up and sent it over our keeper's outstretched arms and then it hit the top crossbar and bounced down and in, 1-1. Our next guy was our leading goal scorer this year (and only a 6th grader). He has the most soccer experience of anyone on our team and showed it as he easily sent the ball past the keeper to give us the 2-1 lead.

Down to the final shot for both teams. For the PK's they had both teams lined up at midfield and I quickly told our kids if this kick does not score, we win. Their guy lined it up and sent it right to our keeper and off our kids went to mob our keeper!

Our crowd (easily our biggest of the year- which makes sense as it was the first game that everyone had to bring their kids) went nuts (about as nuts as 30 or so people can get)! The field had to be cleared to get the Upper Division teams on for their game, but we moved off to the side for the photos and then the love from the fans. It was great as I got to meet some of the parents for the first time this year. (Imagine their view of me as a coach with only this game to draw from!) It was a blast.

This team was easily the most dysfunctional I have ever coached in any sport, but when it was game time they did what I had taught them to. I liken them to the Allen Iverson of middle school soccer in that they never wanted to practice, but showed up when it was game time. At the beginning of the year- when I couldn't even get the whole team to run two warm-up laps and then spread out for stretching - I joked with our kids about this being the set-up of all Disney sport movies. A bunch of kids who don't really love the sport but just want something to do come out, drive their coach crazy, and almost never finish the season. The only difference was that we did not have a blue chip player transfer in after losing our first few games. Instead, we won all but one and really should have not lost that game.

A very crazy season, indeed. I told our principal that I will always look at the huge trophy we got and just grin about the ride this season has been. At least our kids can grin too, even if/though for other reasons than me.