Out of Bounds Page 6
Hunter checked the numbers. “I guess so,” he said. “But don’t expect us to be that easy on you on Saturday.”
Chapter 16
Nate sat on the grassy sideline catching his breath. He gulped another cup of cold water, crumpled the cup, and tossed it in a nearby basket. He thought back on the first half of the championship game.
The Strikers had jumped out to an early lead when Nate had slipped a perfect pass to Anton, who was unguarded by the far post. Anton had blasted it into the back of the net.
The Monarchs had come right back to knot the score at 1–1 when Hunter leaped high and headed the ball into the goal off a corner kick.
Nate took a few deep breaths, trying to regain his strength. The first half had been the toughest of the season by far. Even tougher than the first Monarchs game. Every ball was contested. Every player was giving 100 percent all of the time.
It was the kind of game Aunt Lizzie was always talking about. Both teams were playing at full strength and playing their best. It was the kind of game Lizzie said you would always remember.
“Heck of a game,” Sergio said, almost reading Nate’s mind. “But I sure hope we don’t tie them again.”
Nate laughed. “We can’t,” he said. “Remember? This is for the championship. We can’t have a tie. If it’s tied after regulation, we have a five-minute overtime. If it’s still tied after that we go to a shoot-out.”
“I don’t want to go to a shoot-out,” Sergio said. “I’d be so nervous I’d be peeing down my leg.”
Nate laughed. “How ‘bout Cam? The keeper is super nervous in a shoot-out.” Nate struggled to his feet. He was already so tired that he wasn’t sure he would last through an overtime. “I guess we’d better beat them now,” he said.
Coach Lyn was already rallying the team. “Okay, same starters as the first half,” he said, clapping his hands. “Let’s go get ‘em!”
As Nate walked back onto the pitch he could hear Lizzie’s voice above all the other cheers.
“Come on, Nate! Thirty minutes. You can do it, Strikers! Just thirty minutes. Give it everything you’ve got.”
The Monarchs came on aggressively right from the start, keeping the ball in the Strikers end and threatening to score. Stevie cleared a crossing pass away from the Strikers net. But it didn’t go far. Luke Jaworski controlled it in open space and hooked a long shot into the far corner of the Strikers net. Cam didn’t have a chance.
Goal!
The Strikers were behind, 2–1.
The Monarchs kept the pressure on for most of the second half, peppering the goal with shots. Only a couple of great saves by Cameron kept the margin at one goal. Time was running out.
Nate waited near midfield for the ball and a chance to score. Less than five minutes to go and the score is 2–1, he thought. I’d take a tie now, that’s for sure.
With just moments to go in the game, a chance finally appeared for the Strikers offense to do something. Sergio won a loose ball and started upfield. He looked for Nate on the right but passed off to Anton to the left.
Sensing a chance, Nate slipped inside of Luke’s defense and rushed toward the net, angling in from the right.
Anton skidded a perfectly timed pass toward the front of the net. Still a half step in front of Luke, Nate slid out his right foot and pushed the ball to the far corner past the flatfooted Monarchs keeper.
Goal! The score was tied, 2–2.
The Strikers were still celebrating when the referee blew her whistle indicating the game was over and going into overtime.
The Strikers gathered around Coach Lyn. The boys were bouncing up and down and bumping into each other as if they couldn’t keep their excitement bottled up.
“Overtime. We’ve got five minutes to make something happen!” Coach Lyn shouted. “Sergio, look upfield. If you get a chance, take it to the goal.” Coach Lyn’s eyes settled on Nate and held up one finger. “Take some chances. Remember, it’s sudden death. One goal wins the game. One play. One play will make all the difference.”
Standing in the circle of players, Nate could hear his Aunt Lizzie’s voice from the stands.
“Come on, Nate. Make a play!
“Go, Strikers!
“Let’s see some hustle!”
Nate’s opportunity came in the opening minutes of overtime. The Strikers controlled play and went on the attack. Sergio bounced a pass to Nate as he angled toward the top of the penalty area. Instead of trying to control the ball, Nate figured he would take a chance. He timed the bouncing ball and volleyed a hard shot toward the net.
Boom! The shot felt strong flying off Nate’s right foot. The quick shot caught the Monarchs keeper by surprise. The ball was headed toward the right corner when it swerved farther right and whistled by the post.
Nate had missed a goal by a few inches!
The Monarch keeper’s long kick put his team back on the attack. A series of sharp passes had the Monarchs threatening near the top of the penalty box. Hunter Thomas gained control with his chest. Then with the ball at his feet and his back to the Strikers goal, he faked left, creating just a sliver of space. Hunter pushed the ball, spun right, and drilled a low shot.
Cameron leaped almost parallel to the ground and stretched out as far as he could. Too late! The ball whizzed by his gloved hands and into the net.
At the instant the ball pushed back the net, everything changed, like a huge wave sweeping away a carefully built sandcastle. Hunter and the Monarchs leaped into the air and into each other’s arms. The crowd burst into cheers. Cam lay facedown on the ground, pounding his fists into the dirt. The Strikers stood shocked and not sure what to do or where to go.
Nate suddenly felt exhausted. His legs could hardly hold him up.
The game was over.
The Monarchs had won.
The Strikers’ hopes of winning the U-14 championship were gone.
Chapter 17
Nate stared at the piece of paper. Some of the numbers and words looked like a foreign language to him.
“What’s ‘tsp’ stand for?” he asked.
“Teaspoon.”
Nate held up two spoons. “So which one is the teaspoon?”
“The smaller one. The other one’s a tablespoon.” Aunt Lizzie reached into the cupboard and pulled out a mixing bowl.
Nate looked at the recipe again.
OATMEAL CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES
Mix together the following ingredients:
½ cup butter
1½ cups rolled oats
¾ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
½ tsp salt
¼ cup sugar
¼ tsp baking soda
Chocolate chips and walnuts
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Place spoonfuls of cookie dough two inches apart on a cookie sheet. Cook for 8–10 minutes or until lightly browned. Use a spatula to remove to a cooling rack until cool.
“How much is a half cup of butter?” Nate asked.
“One stick. See, it says it right here,” Lizzie said, pointing to the paper wrapped around the butter. “I like to melt the butter first. It makes the mixing easier. We’ll just add some extra flour so the mixture won’t get too soupy.”
They started mixing the ingredients together, carefully measuring out the amounts.
“This mixing’s not that easy,” Nate said as he pushed a large spoon around the side of the mixing bowl. “This is a pretty good workout.”
“Wait,” Lizzie said. “Let me get a couple of pictures. Remember? Your mom said she wanted to see you making cookies.” Lizzie grabbed her phone and snapped a few quick shots. “I’ll e-mail them to her. She’ll get a kick out of you mixing the batter.”
Lizzie took a long look at the contents of the mixing bowl. “Do you want to put in some walnuts?” she asked.
“Sure, I like nuts. How many chocolate chips should we put in?”
Nate nodded. “Don’t worry, I remembered everything.” His hands were dusted white with flour. He dropped a glob of cookie dough off a spoon and onto the cookie sheet, then licked the edge of the spoon.
“Hey, don’t eat all the dough,” Lizzie protested, handing him a clean spoon. “Remember, I won the bet. They’re my cookies.”
A few minutes after Nate and Lizzie placed the cookies in the oven, the kitchen began to fill with the sweet smells of chocolate, sugar, and butter. As they waited for the timer to buzz, Nate and Lizzie talked about their soccer seasons.
“I can’t believe you scored three goals in your last game,” Nate said. “You must’ve really wanted to win our bet.”
Lizzie smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ll share the cookies with you.”
“I’m not worried about me, but I promised Sergio some cookies if I won,” Nate said. “He’ll probably give me grief for losing the bet.”
“We’ll save him a few.” Lizzie opened the oven door to check the cookies. “A couple more minutes,” she said, closing the door. “Is Sergio still giving you a hard time about kicking the ball out of bounds?”
“Not really. I think that film link you sent helped,” Nate said. “Anyway, I think he probably just wanted to play the Monarchs for the championship.”
“That was a terrific game,” Lizzie said. “You guys played great. I thought it was your best game of the season.”
“Yeah, but I still wish we had won.”
“You played your best against a good team. You can live with that.” Lizzie checked the oven timer. “Why don’t you check the cookies? They should be done by now.” She handed him the oven mitts. “Come on, you should be doing some of the work. After all, you lost the bet.”
Nate pulled the cookie sheet out of the oven and took a deep breath over the cookies, taking in all their sweetness. He slipped a spatula under one and let it slide onto the rack.
When he had finished transferring the cookies, he started to reach for one.
“Wait, we’ve got to let them cool,” Lizzie said.
“How long?”
“Not too long.” Lizzie looked at Nate. “Is that kid Hunter going to play with you on the high school freshman team next year?”
“Yeah, we should have him and me up front, Sergio in the middle, Cameron in the goal, Stevie and Luke on defense—”
“Whoa, you guys should have a really good team,” Lizzie said. “I don’t think I’ll make the same bet with you next year. With you and Hunter up front, you may score a million goals.”
Lizzie touched the top of a warm cookie. “Ready,” she declared, handing one to Nate.
As he savored the rich, chocolaty taste, Nate thought back on the Strikers season: The wins, the ties. The mile run competition. Lizzie explaining why you should kick the ball out of bounds. The soccer video. The surprise comeback by the Monarchs that got the Strikers into the championship game. The shuttle run race in gym class. The last painful overtime loss. The bet with Lizzie. All the ups and downs.
Nate had started the season wanting to beat the Monarchs more than anything. But now, remembering the great game the Strikers and Monarchs had played, with everyone on both teams giving it everything they had, losing didn’t seem quite as bad as he’d thought it would be.
Nate reached for another cookie. “Things turned out all right,” he said.
“You mean the cookies?” Lizzie asked.
“Yeah, the cookies.” Nate smiled. “And everything else.”
The Real Story
Although it seems hard to believe, the game described on pages 82 and 83 really happened. The match was between AFC Ajax and SC Cambuur during the 2006 season in the top Dutch professional league (Eredivisie.)
An Ajax player, Jan Vertonghen, was returning the ball to Cambuur after the play had stopped for an injury. Vertonghen was too strong with the pass to his opponent and the ball sailed over the shocked Cambuur keeper and ended up in the net. Even though the players had stopped playing, the goal counted.
After the kickoff, to make things even, Ajax allowed Cambuur to score. They stood to the side as a Cambuur forward knocked the ball into the net. The Ajax players didn’t want to win because of an injury and an accidental goal.
There are other instances of exceptional sportsmanship on the soccer pitch. In a 2000 English Premier League match, a West Ham United FC striker, Paolo Di Canio, passed up the opportunity to score the winning goal by catching the ball instead of knocking it into the net because the Everton FC goalkeeper, Paul Gerrard, was lying injured in front of the goal. FIFA, the world federation of soccer, later commended Di Canio for this remarkable display of fair play.
Another part of the story reflected a situation that happened in real life. Just as the Monarchs came back to win a game to save their rival team’s playoff hopes, the United States men’s World Cup team rallied to win a game to keep the World Cup hopes of Mexico, its archrival, alive.
During the 2014 World Cup qualifying rounds, the U.S. had already secured a spot as one of the teams from the CONCACAF (North and Central Americas) region going to the 32-team World Cup in Brazil. The U.S. team would play one more game with Panama at the Estadio Rommel Fernandez in Panama City.
If Panama could beat the United States, they would qualify for fourth place in the CONCACAF region and play a playoff game with New Zealand for a chance to move on to the World Cup. But if Panama lost to the U.S., Mexico would be the fourth-place team and would still have a chance to go to the World Cup. Panama had everything to play for, while the U.S. men did not seem to have any reason to play their hardest. After all, they had already qualified for the World Cup.
With only a short time left in the game, Panama led 2–1. The Panamanian fans at the stadium were on their feet and ready to celebrate.
But the United States team did not stop playing their best. The Americans scored twice in the final few minutes on goals by Graham Zusi and Aron Johannsson to pull out a 3–2 win and break Panama’s heart.
Now it was Mexico’s turn to celebrate because their World Cup chances were still alive. Mexican newspapers the next day ran headlines saying “THANK YOU!” “WE LOVE YOU,” and “GOD BLESS AMERICA.”
Eventually Mexico went to the World Cup and won two out of three games in Group A to move on to the knockout rounds. Mexico lost to the Netherlands 2–1 in its Round of 16 match. (The United States lost to Belgium 2–1 in the same round.)
Examples of good sportsmanship can be found across all sports. Another remarkable story of fair play occurred in a 2008 softball playoff game between Western Oregon University (WOU) and Central Washington University (CWU). Early in the game, WOU trailed 2–1 but had two runners on base. Right fielder Sarah Tucholsky came to the plate and belted the second pitch over the fence for a three-run homer.
The 5’ 2” Tucholsky had never hit a home run in either high school or college. In her excitement, she missed first base. As she turned back to touch the bag, her knee gave way and she collapsed. Tucholsky crawled to first base but could not go any further because of the pain in her injured knee.
Tucholsky and WOU had a big problem. As the WOU first-base coach explained, the rules stated that teammates and coaches are not allowed to touch base runners. The injured player would be called out if her WOU teammates tried to help her. The umpire said the WOU coach could substitute a pinch runner for Tucholsky, but in that case her over-the-fence home run would only count as a single.
Then something surprising and wonderful happened. The CWU first baseman, Mallory Holtman, asked the umpire if she and her teammates could help Tucholsky around the bases. The umpire said there was no rule against it.
So Holtman and CWU shortstop Liz Wallace carefully placed their arms under Tucholsky’s legs. The WOU right fielder put her arms over her opponents’ shoulders. The three young wome
n headed around the base paths. The CWU players stopped and gently lowered Tucholsky to let her touch each base—second, third, and home—with her uninjured leg.
Tucholsky had her home run and WOU went on to win the game 4–2. The CWU team lost its chance to win the conference and to advance in the playoffs. But the CWU players did not want to win because someone got injured on a play. “It was the right thing to do,” CWU’s Holtman said later. “She’d hit it over the fence. She deserved the home run.”
The young women on the CWU softball team understood what Aunt Lizzie tried to teach Nate and the other Strikers: A real athlete does not want to win because they took advantage of an opponent’s injury. Real athletes want to earn the win fairly when their opponents are at their best and playing their hardest.
A real athlete wants to win the right way.
Special Thanks
The author would like to thank the following people for their help with this book:
Steven Goff, soccer reporter extraordinaire for the Washington Post, shared his encyclopedic knowledge of the beautiful game over lunch one day at McGinty’s in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Len Oliver, member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame and longtime leader of the D. C. Stoddert youth soccer league, told me stories about soccer (and other sports) in the 1950s over coffee one sunny afternoon. I can only hope he enjoyed the afternoon as much as I did.
The information about the examples of good sportsmanship contained in “The Real Story” came from articles in the Independent, the London Evening Standard, the Huffington Post, and CBSNews.com.
About the Author
Fred Bowen was a Little Leaguer who loved to read. Now he is the author of many action-packed books of sports fiction. He has also written a weekly sports column for kids in the Washington Post since 2000.
Fred played lots of sports growing up, including soccer at Marblehead High School. For thirteen years, he coached kids’ baseball, soccer, and basketball teams. Some of his stories spring directly from his coaching experience and his sports-happy childhood in Marblehead, Massachusetts.