Rob Lasso: Episode Three

“Early drinkin’ means quick drunken.” -- Ted Lasso

This is a thing I actually said at practice last Friday: "Ladies, let's not corrupt the freshmen." It amused me when I said it, and it gives me a good chuckle still.

One of the best parts of coaching is watching teams come together, and watching kids build relationships. Before practice, Ab (a senior captain, if you're picking the series up mid-season) was chopping it up with a couple of the younger kids, and I heard her say, "Oh, we're gonna get white girl drunk, are we?" Which is what I was responding to with my gentle admonition.

The mood was lighthearted in practice because we notched our first victory of the season the night before. We played the same team that beat us, 4-1, in the season opener. In that game, the opponent's star striker was unplayable, scoring twice and assisting on both other goals. She's a tall, fast, physical and talented kid who'll be playing at the Division I level next year. Stop her, we figured, and we'd stop them.

That sounds easy in theory.

We asked Breezy to do something she'd never done before - man mark the opponent's start, tracking her everywhere on the field and not giving her room or time. Sixty seconds into the game, it was apparent that Breezy didn't fully grasp the concept, as her mark slipped between two defenders and hit a shot right at Ellie.

But after a bit more explanation, Breezy locked it down. The opponent's talisman was reduced to playing long passes out of the midfield and trying frustrated 30-yard shots. By the second half sanitation break (we're required by the state association to sanitize the soccer balls once each half, in a bit of pandemic theater) Breezy was smiling as she recounted the girl's mounting frustration, expressed both verbally and physically. Breezy just leaned in and made herself a general pain in the ass.

While Breezy executed our defensive game plan, Sid was excellent in the midfield. She got her second goal in as many games, pouncing on a loose ball at the top of the box and popping it into the upper corner of the goal to give us a 1-0 first-half lead. Midway through the second, she pulled a ball out of the air with a sublime first touch, then slotted Kenz through the back line. Kenz has made a habit of shooting the ball directly at the keeper, but she made no mistakes this time, rifling the ball low and hard to the back post for her first-ever high school goal. The freshmen are rampant - they've scored four of our five goals thus far.

Sid is an interesting kid. She's very good, and her game is a confident one. But she's impossibly hard on herself, and when she makes a mistake or loses a ball (as one invariably does in soccer), she's stricken by a look of pain and grief. And one mistake becomes three. I've taken it as a personal challenge to get her to give herself a little bit of grace from time to time. Her mom wished me good luck in that endeavor, as no coach thus far has been able to do it.

After Breezy's performance, the key to our win was Steph's hold-up play at striker. The opponent had more of the ball than we did, so it was vital that we got breathing room when we did gain possession. Steph was excellent in getting control, slowing the game down, making the right pass, and pressuring with purpose if we lost the ball. She didn't score, but she was a difference-maker.

Dutch and Mac had a big task with Breezy - our usual holding midfielder - otherwise occupied, but the stepped up and made every play. Ellie made a trio of excellent saves at key moments and avoided the big mistake that's plagued her, and the kids closed the game out with a well-deserved 2-0 win.

Practice the next day, as noted above, was very lighthearted. Because most of the kids had busy club soccer schedules over the weekend, we kept it low-key, going through a couple of drills before letting them play 'world cup', which is multi-team game akin to '21' in basketball. Sid's competitiveness came to the fore, while the rest of the kids spent 30 minutes shrieking and giggling. It's been easy to forget that despite the fact the some of them look grown up, these are kids. And it was really fun to watch them be kids.

Just don't corrupt the freshmen.