The Big Game

The Big Game

The annoying beep of the alarm clock disturbs me from my slumber yet again, except on this day I don’t press that best friend of mine that I call the snooze button. Today is the day that I have been working towards for three weeks now and now I get to see if those hours that feel like days while my teammates and I feel like we will pass out or puke anytime because of how much Coach makes us run in practice.

As I stumble down the hall like a caveman who walked out of his cave for the first time into the bright sun, I squint to see that my mom made me breakfast. It was my favorite eggs over easy just cooked enough that when you poke it the yoke just oozes out, bacon on the side, some toast, and a large glass of orange juice.

I say to my mother, “Hey Mom what’s the occasion or did you just feel like being great today?”

“O no I just know how hard you have been working and I thought that I might start your day with a good breakfast, now eat up or you will be late for seminary.”

This school day seemed to crawl by slower than the slowest snail on a cool afternoon. Every time I saw one of my teammates I would call to them, “Lets get them panthers.” Every time without hesitation I would hear, “I hear dat.” This was a sort of thing that would get all of us pumped and ready to hit the pitch on the day of the biggest rivalry game of the year against our rivals the Amphi Panthers.

Finally it was 2:15 only five more minutes till school was out, I knew that these seconds would be as if an army battalion was pushing back the second hand of the clock making it go slower than the real time. I looked at the clock and I swear I saw it go backwards. Ding ding ding, Finally this day was over, as I head to the spot where I hang out with my soccer buddies and joke around before the game I was surprised how many people told me good luck at the game, it felt as if I was an actor at a Hollywood premiere, I felt as though everyone knew me. As I get closer I am greeted with the familiar sound of loud reggae ton and the sight of the guys on my team dancing as if they were the pros. We couldn’t wait till our game started, while we waited, my friend Juan on my team said, “Ay essay what you say we all go to the JV game and watch those scrubs get beat.” We all decided that this would be a good idea so we headed over; when we got there my friends started chanting some things in Spanish that I didn’t understand. To all of our surprise the JV team was actually winning the game 1-0, this my teammates excited so there cheers picked up speed the way a train engine does when it goes down a hill.

We know that it’s time to go get suited up when Coach yells, “Hey hooligans how bout you get serious and start getting ready for our game.” This was our sign that it’s time, we have worked weeks for this now lets prove what we have been working on.

As we wait by the locker room door for Coach to come unlock it nobody makes a sound, I swear that if there a feather would have fallen on the table then it would have been heard like a gunshot. Finally Coach gets there and opens the door for us, we hear the click of the lock disengaging and we know that it’s our time. As I enter the locker I am welcomed by the usual cool air with the stale scent of smelly cleats and dirty socks. As I stepped in I saw the familiar sight of little pieces of dried mud with tons of tiny pieces of grass in them. As I made my way to my locker I could feel the excitement growing with each step like rubber band that is about to break. I finally get to my locker but before I open it I call to my team, “Hey what are we going to do to those Panthers today?” My teammate Carlos calls back in a strong Hispanic accent, “We are going to make Panther hamburgers out of them.”

I turn back to my locker and enter the secret combination that will open the door to the treasures that lie inside. When I open it I look inside to see the deep yellow jersey looking back at me. It had the number six on it; this made me fill with joy because I knew that this number was mine. I heard someone turn the music back on and when I turned around I saw Carlos dancing in his boxers to the fast reggae ton beat that I have come accustom to, boom de clap de boom be clap de, over and over moving everyone to their feet to start dancing. Our coach calls out of the office, “Hey guys how bout we get serious now we got a game in an hour.” We all obeyed like dogs that have been trained to listen to their master’s voice.

We all got suited up and headed out to the pitch, as I got out there I was greeted with the all too familiar scent of fresh cut grass. This was my kingdom and I had to prove that no one can take it away. We started our usual stretches when the other team came out, as they passed all of us sized them up to see what we were up against, and they looked tough. We started our warm-up drills of passing and moving in a mesmerizing pattern to get our legs warmed up; this was the biggest soccer game of the year, were we ready?

The starting whistle went off and play started, we took control right away and I knew that we were ready for this. On the first drive the ball soared over the goal only inches from the back of the net. It was the Panthers ball, they proved that they were ready as well as on their first drive they scored, now we were down 1-0 and we had to come back. About twenty minutes into the game tempers were growing, as my team was down still, I had just lost the ball and in an attempt to regain posetion I executed a hard tackle, one that you would find in a fundamental video, except I went into it a little bit hard and dirty and I got caught, the ref called me over and when he got to him he dug into his pocket and flashed the yellow card for everyone to see like the shining ensign of a lighthouse to a ship on the stormy seas. I was out; Coach took me out so that I could calm down and so he could talk to me. He called me over and told me, “Nathan we need you out there, don’t let little mistakes get to your head and set off your temper, now go sit down you will go back in at the half.” I obeyed him and sat and watched as my team scored the tying goal. That should have been me out there and I wanted to score so badly.

Half came and we huddled and Coach went over the line-up. He sent me to the center forward position; I knew that this was my chance. Then he told us the strategy, he told us to keep controlling them on defense, but a new strategy on offense. This new strategy was to get it in the air to me in the middle then I was supposed to flick it outside with my head, and then follow up the middle for the cross from the outside so that I could put it in.

The half started and the other team had the ball, we gained possetion rather quickly, then the ball came to me, in the air like Coach had instructed us to do, I flicked it out to the right side, and then followed up the middle. Carlos the right forward got passed one guy then two guys like they were cones set up in a practice drill for dribbling, then when he got to the corner he crossed the ball in and I was in perfect position for a header, I took it and it sailed into the back of the net, I had done it, I scored the goal to put us ahead.

In the last ten minutes things were getting as tense as a criminal that has committed a crime and was waiting for their sentence. I was going for the ball, I made the decision to do a slide tackle, but I missed the ball and got the other player who was forced to the ground in pain. The ref called me over again and again he pulled out a yellow card, followed by a red card that signified that I was out of the game. I went over to Coach yet again this time he said, “See I told you that you need to control your temper, now go sit and because of your little stunt I can’t play you in the next game.”

I obeyed and watched the rest of the game with the hope that we could be victorious. The final whistle blew and it was the sign of success, we had done it after weeks of practice and preparation we had come out victorious over our rivals. This was a huge success that may lead to others; only the time will tell how this season will be after this opening game victory.