Rolling into the season's last week, several seniors and juniors -- who had been abused on previous mud days -- wanted vengeance and felt, given what happened to them in the past, they deserved to take out their frustration on the sophomores. I urged them to drop it, but they refused, insisting it was their right. During a rainy afternoon practice, things looked bleak: the only way to stop mud day would be through physical violence. If that's what it took, I and several other seniors, felt prepared for battle. It wouldn't be good for team morale, but sometimes leadership means doing what you have to do.
As Coach Keegan made post-practice comments to the team surrounding him on one knee, I felt disgusted that, as a captain, I'd failed to stop people from wanting to humiliate their teammates by tossing them into the mud. We'd preached team all year, working to include the juniors and sophomores in everything we did -- and their performances enabled us to achieve our surprising success -- but now people wanted to toss all that away. I couldn't stomach that.
When Coach Keegan finished, a pathway to ending mud day appeared: suddenly, things became as clear as, well, mud. Jumping to my feet before anyone could move, I yanked on my helmet, screamed "mud day!" and sprinted across the practice field toward the largest, dirtiest puddle. Launching a 6'3" frame horizontal, I sailed head first through the air, crashing into the muck with a monstrous splash. After a long, brown skid, I pushed onto all fours to see Ondie, Wally, Chopper, Keets, Jack and the rest of the team, plow themselves headfirst into it and the surrounding puddles.
Mud-covered, I smiled while walking toward the locker room alongside Chopper. On the practice field, players willingly threw themselves into puddles, laughing and screwing around with their teammates. On that overcast Ohio early November afternoon, we'd defeated mud day once and for all. We hoped to do the same to Newton Falls in our last game and post a winning record for the season.
In another black-and-blue Northeast Ohio Friday night battle, we drove down the field in the fourth stanza, crossed the goal line and found ourselves trailing 7-6. True to his word, Coach Keegan followed our pre-season recommendation and went for two, calling a pass play to me to cement the victory. This would be the icing on the cake for our senior season. The pundits labeled us the consummate 1-9 losers, but we'd shocked everyone and stood on the verge of a 6-4 finish.
Taking the snap, Tupta, rolled out as I ran a crossing pattern. We'd executed this play for a two-point conversion last week against Southeast; this time it would propel us to victory. Cutting across the end zone, I watched Tupta fling the pigskin. The spiraling ball approached and my hands reached out, ready to grab it, ready to take the lead. This, unfortunately, wasn't a TV movie of the week, it was a hotly contested high-school football game and a defender dove in front of me, knocking the ball to the turf, incomplete.
After the kickoff, our defense rose to the occasion, forcing Newton Falls to punt. With the ball back in our hands, we marched across mid field, scrambling to get into field goal range or, better yet, reach the end zone before the clock expired. Running another crossing pattern, Tupta zipped the ball to me. It sailed high and I leapt, extending my frame as far as possible to grab it and got nailed -- receiving the type of bone-jarring hit I delivered to the opposition with untold glee -- by a rampaging Newton Falls defender. The referees ruled it a completion and a fumble; to this day, I don't remember what happened, except for leaping for the football and the gong ringing inside my helmet when I returned to Planet Earth after a short visit to la-la land.
Shaking off cerebral cobwebs, I stayed on the field as Newton Falls' offense took a knee several times to kill the clock. They handed us a disappointing loss, but we'd given it our all and came up just short. While shaking hands, a guy on our squad spit into the face of a Newton Falls player and all hell broke loose. Fists flew as a massive fight erupted on the field. Given my experience with the Mogadore basketball fiasco -- I was the only person on the football team who participated in that slug-fest as a player -- I turned my back on the chaos, stomping off the field in disgust. We hadn't fought so hard all year long to end our championship season with a brawl. We were better than that, and I knew it.
Post shower, before I stepped on the bus, Newton Falls' coaches came over to shake my hand, congratulating me on tonight's game, but, more importantly, how I'd handled myself during the fight. It took a long time to realize -- in fact, I didn't recognize it until I started coaching teams -- how much that gesture meant. In a gesture to protect our squad from less-than-pleased local fans, a police cruiser, with red and blue lights flashing, escorted our bus out of Newton Falls: who says people aren't passionate about high-school football?
***
At the reunion, our classmates applauded as we finished the horrific rendition of Queen's excellent tune (I believe they cheered because we were done). While we didn't win a league championship all those years ago, we did become champions of a different sort: a rag-tag group of survivors who bonded together and "kept on fighting until the end" to accomplish much more than anyone ever expected.
