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From: "Rev. Cotton Mather" <revcottonmather@hotmail.com>
Subject: {ASSM} RP Playing to Win: Playing the Game II by R.C. Mather 9/41 (mf soccer)
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Date: Sun, 19 Jun 2005 17:10:02 -0400
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Chapter 9...

Sorry about the duplication of Ch. 8.

Rev. Cotton Mather
Senior Pastor,
Church of the Erotic Redemption
http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/ReverendCottonMather/www
http://www.storiesonline.net
www.ruthiesclub.com

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**If I had to do it all over,
I'd do it all over you**

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Welcome to the Church of The Reverend Cotton Mather. This story is
the sole property of the author, and may not be copied or downloaded
for the intent of profit. Permission is freely given for anyone to
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(Copyright 2002, Rev. Cotton Mather)

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PLAYING TO WIN:
PLAYING THE GAME, BOOK II


by Reverend Cotton Mather




- 9 -

NEW TRICKS AND OPPORTUNITIES



My club team had started up again by mid-summer.  Eric and I were
joined by Jorge, who made the team as keeper.  We had practices four
evenings a week, and played either one or two games on the weekends.

At about the same time, the Duane Olchick clinic began.  Olchick was
a Czech player who had been playing for three years in the U.S. and
was scheduled to go back to Europe in the fall to play.  He had a
couple of months of down time before he left, so he was running
clinics in several cities in the Midwest.  He had two weeks scheduled
here for college and high-school players, and the organizers had
announced that he would stay for one more week to work with a select
group of younger players.

Trent, Eric, Mike Evanson, Jorge, Kristina, John Bennington, Tessa
Navarrone, Ashley Horvath, and I were joined by a whole bunch of
players from other schools.  I didn't know most of them, but I was
surprised to see that some of the kids from the All-State team that I
had met at the banquet last winter were attending, including Jesse
Wilhoit and his sister Anna, Spencer Goldman from South High, and
Harlan Corwin from Rock Falls.

"Jesse!" I jogged over to them as they were getting out of their
car.  "Anna!  It's great to see you!"

"Porter!"  Jesse dropped his gear bag and extended his hand.  "Good
to see you, man.  I thought you'd probably be here."

I glanced over at his sister.

"Hi, Sean," she said shyly.  She smiled at me, a smile I remembered
very well.

"Hey," I said, "you got your braces off.  You look great, Anna."
And she did look great.  In the eight or nine months since I had last
seen her, she had filled out very nicely.  She had been a tall, thin
girl with dark hair and braces, seemingly a little awkward, even
though she was a respectable soccer player.  Now, she was even more
attractive, having grown up a little more.  She had been very self-
conscious of her braces, but now, without them, she smiled much more
easily, and when she smiled, her whole face lit up.

We started hauling their gear over by the fields.  "I thought you'd
be at school by now," I said to Jesse.  Jesse had been the only All-
American selection from our state in soccer, and he had a full
scholarship to the University of Florida.

"I leave in three weeks," he said.  "We've got conditioning
workouts, skills drills, and scrimmages the first two weeks, and then
formal tryouts after that.  Our first game is only a week after that,
so there's not that much time."

"Tryouts?" I asked.  "I thought you were on the team."

"Nah," he replied.  "Just because I've got a scholarship doesn't
mean I'm automatically on the team.  It just means that they think
I'll be able to make the team, and even contribute eventually.  But
if I don't make the team, you know that the free ride will be yanked
for the next year, so it's a true motivator.  Besides," he added, "I
don't think I'll have a problem making the team.  Making a starting
position will be a lot more difficult."

There were about 70 soccer players all told at the clinic.  Most of
the players were sitting in the bleachers, and a few kids were
passing a ball around on the field.  I introduced Jesse, Anna,
Spencer, and Harlan to the kids I knew.  Everybody knew who Jesse
was, of course, so he immediately became the center of attention,
until Duane Olchick and his assistants walked over and stood in front
of the bleachers.  One of the assistants blew a whistle, while a
second one brought the kids who had been on the field over to the
bleachers.

When everybody had quieted down and found seats, he began with
introductions.  He spoke with a slight accent that was quickly
forgotten.

"Hello, everybody, and welcome.  My name is Duane Olchick, and I am
happy to be with you for these next two weeks.  These are my
assistants."  As he named each one, they stepped forward and raised
their hands.  "Nicholas Arpente, Yuri Olchick, Anik Olchick, James
Bricker, Katrina Sorenno, and Tasha Wallace.  Yes, before you ask,
Yuri and Anik are my brothers, very good players in Europe.  James
comes to us from Connecticut, where he is their starting keeper, and
he will be working with all the goalkeepers here.  Katrina plays for
UCLA, and Tasha is a coach for the University of Arizona, after
starting for that team for the past four years."

He did a quick head count, and nodded to himself.  "Good.  We are
well represented here.  Now, some of you who have attended clinics in
the past might be wondering why there are both men and women players
here.  After all, most instructors at this level prefer to separate
men and women, because of the differences in the speed of their
games.  My own philosophy about the game of soccer is that the same
skill sets are used by all players, so there is no reason not to
teach all players these skills.  When it comes time to play as teams,
most of the time we will conduct separate men's and women's games,
though we will occasionally play combined, coed if you will, games.
And, you may have noticed that I said 'men and women', not 'boys and
girls'.  Despite how you may think of yourselves, or how your parents
or teachers or other adults think of you, here you truly are men and
women, not little children.  I will expect you to behave as adults,
work like adults, for the next two weeks.  Does this meet with the
approval of everyone?"

There was no dissention from any of us.

"Ya.  Good.  Now, I have seen film of some of the athletes here.
Please raise your hand when I call you, yes?  Jesse Wilhoit."  Jesse,
sitting next to me, raised his hand.  "Ah, yes," continued Duane,
"please stand, if you will.  All-American forward from Planey, going
to the University of Florida in the fall.  A very good player, no
real weaknesses in your game, except perhaps for a tendency to hold
the ball too long.  We will fix that.  Thank you, please sit.  Harlan
Corwin?  All-Stater from Rock Falls.  Also a forward, from the team
that won the state championship last fall.  Good ball handler, but
your shots on goal can tend to be soft.  We will work on that.  Thank
you.  Erica Yost?"  A girl I didn't know raised her hand.  "All-
Stater from North, likes to play sweeper, co-captain of your team,
excellent at anticipating passes and blocking lanes, but your
clearing kicks are sometimes errant.  By the end of the clinic, you
will be rocketing the ball exactly where you want it to go, Erica.
Thank you.  Sean Porter?"  I raised my hand.  "Ah, yes, a classic
defenseman, playing beyond your years, but with a tendency to pass a
little too quickly, whether the situation calls for it or not.  We
can teach selfishness, no?"  He looked around at his assistants with
a smile.  "Yes, I think we can.  Thank you."

And he continued with his performance, calling on every player who
had been chosen for All-Sectional or better honors, giving each a
compliment on their game and pointing out an area for improvement,
impressing us all that he had actually watched so much game film
before the clinic that he could make these points right from the
beginning.  If nothing else, the astounding feat reinforced our
resolve to do our best over the next two weeks.

During the next two days, Olchick and his crew mixed us around with
conditioning drills and ball-handling drills, shifting partners or
groups every 15 or 20 minutes, keeping us moving around the four
fields.  Sometimes we were running sprints without soccer balls,
sometimes we were doing circular relay races with balls, other times
we were doing three-person weaves down the length of each field,
running from one field to the next to the next.

By the third day, we were all fighting through complaining muscles,
but they kept at us, only giving us a couple of quick breaks for
water, until lunchtime.  I had thought I was in shape, from all the
running I had been doing, but Olchick and his assistants quickly did
away with that conceit.  At the end of the morning session, we all
limped toward our cars, panting and sweating, anxious to get to some
air-conditioned restaurant to cool down for a bit.

When we had straggled back to the fields for the afternoon session,
Duane had us sit in the bleachers.

"Good news," he said with a smile.  "You have survived the first two
and a half days of my torture session.  Now, the fun begins."  He
outlined his plans for the rest of the week, which included brief
classroom sessions, watching game films, and playing all-out games.

By the end of Friday's session, I had played more quality soccer
than I had practically all season long the previous fall.  All these
players were better than good, both the guys and the girls.  When
Olchick and his team divided us up into two men's teams, we were so
evenly matched that the scrimmages got more and more intense, until
all of us were playing way beyond our abilities as individuals.  We
played two full 90-minute games every day, one in the morning and one
in the afternoon, and when we weren't playing, we were either
stretching, dribbling, juggling, or watching film, and sometimes we
were doing two of these activities simultaneously.

The film that Duane chose each day was either a tape of one of our
own games, taped by his brothers, or it was a game from the European
Leagues, or a World Cup classic match-up.  He had a tent set up for
us to watch the film, and he put a film of plastic over the
television screen so he could stop the tape and sketch a play or
point out a pattern with chalk.  He showed us how particular plays
developed, and even threw in some bloopers for us, just to see if we
were paying attention.

On Friday afternoon, he had a play that had occurred in our men's
game the day before frozen on the screen.

"Do you see this?" he asked, tapping the image of Jesse Wilhoit on
the television.  "What happens here?"

Jesse answered.  "I took a pass from Hap Stanford, there in the
middle, and I tried to one-touch it back to him on a give-and-go, but
Porter here," and he gave me a shove, practically pushing me over,
"was all over me like white on rice, and I couldn't complete the
pass."

"And why couldn't you finish the pass?" Duane persisted.

"Well, the pass came in front of me, and Porter was dogging me.  It
was all I could do to keep him from taking the ball away from me, so
I couldn't control the ball well enough to touch it back to Stanford."

"Ah," said Duane with satisfaction.  "Exactly.  Now, what would have
happened if you had sped up just a little, so that the pass ended up
behind you?"

"I'd probably have tripped over Porter's big feet," said Jesse,
eliciting a laugh from everybody.  "Aside from that, I would have had
to turn around to get to the ball."

"Really?" asked Duane, a look of pleased surprise on his face.  "But
perhaps not.  I think Nicholas and Katrina can show you something
new, yes?"

With that, he led us all back out onto the field.  He set up Katrina
as passer, Nicholas as receiver, about 20 meters apart.  "Mr. Porter?
If you would be so kind as to be our defender?"  He gestured for me
to join his coaches on the field, while the rest of the students
gathered along the sidelines.  "Now, Sean, defend against the pass
just as you did the other day, please."

Finally, he was satisfied with the preparations, and he blew his
whistle.  Katrina started dribbling down the field, and Nicholas
paced her along the sideline.  I stayed close to him, trying to block
the passing lane to stop the give-and-go.  I saw Katrina pass the
ball behind Nicholas, and I stopped, certain the pass was going to
miss us completely, when Nicholas planted his left foot, swept his
right foot behind his left, and neatly used his heel to redirect the
ball back toward the middle of the field, practically placing it on
Katrina's foot as she ran by us.  It was the slickest move I had ever
seen, and the reaction from the sideline was similar to what I was
feeling.  Duane stood there, a smile on his face, his arms crossed,
as he surveyed the murmuring crowd.

"Ah, I see I show you something new, yes?  Good.  But it takes
practice.  The pass must be good, the timing of the leg sweep is
crucial, the angle of the ball will determine where it ends up after
the pass.  All must go well for it to work, but when it is done
correctly, it is very difficult to stop, no?"  He clapped his hands,
and began breaking us into groups of three to practice the move.
Everybody rotated from spot to spot, so that every player could
experience the angle needed on the initial pass; then the timing
needed on the sweep; and the defensive position that made the back
pass necessary.  Duane was right: it took a lot of practice, and the
opportunities to use it were limited.  When the time was right,
however, there was a group of us who would be ready to try it.

Jesse and Anna had made plans to stay later on Friday, so they could
go out to dinner with Eric, Ashley, Trent and me.  I brought them over
to my house so they could take showers before we went out.  My
parents, along with my younger brother Stephen and my older brother
Michael, were home, and happy to see Jesse and Anna again, having met
them previously at the year-end banquet.

Ashley and Anna, being two of the youngest girls at the clinic, had
naturally found each other, and had become good friends during the
week.  At dinner, they kept up a running commentary on the physical
attributes of many of the boys from the clinic, keeping us amused,
right up until they started in on the four of us boys.

"And Sean's got bony knees, don't you think?" asked Ashley, looking
askance at me to see if I had heard her, as she had planned.

"Very bony," agreed Anna, a twinkle in her eye.  "Bony and angular.
It's a wonder he can run at all, with those legs.  What about Trent?"

"A little old for me, but very hunky," said Ashley, looking over at
Trent as if she was examining an interesting, if flawed, drawing.

"I don't know," said Anna.  "His chin is a little too prominent for
my taste."

Ashley grabbed Trent's chin and turned his face to examine it
critically.  "You might be right.  Too big and clunky.  Now that you
mention it, it's so big it probably weighs him down and gets in the
way.  Now Eric, on the other hand..."

"Mmmm, yes, Eric.  Great buns," observed Anna.

"Thass what Keisha think, too," murmured Eric.  Both Ashley and Anna
blushed a bright red as the rest of us laughed out loud.

"Be very careful, ladies, or we just might start our own comparisons
here," warned Trent with a chuckle.

"You know," began Jesse, steering the conversation to a different
topic, "that heel pass that Duane showed us today got me thinking."

"At least something has finally got you thinking," said his sister
teasingly.

"Oh, don't worry, little sister, I get thoughts," he shot back.
Again, Anna blushed as Jesse continued, "But these thoughts are about
soccer.  I'll bet..."  He paused.

"You'll bet what?" I asked.

He wouldn't answer me.  I had the feeling that he was planning a
surprise for us for next week, and he didn't want to spoil it by
talking about it now.  His idea was soon forgotten by the rest of us
as the conversation veered off once again, until it was time for
Jesse and Anna to start their long drive back home.  We said our
goodbyes outside the restaurant.  I gave Anna a clumsy hug, and shook
Jesse's hand.  Ashley and Anna gave each other a fierce, sisterly
hug, vowing to each other that they would call several times over the
weekend.  The rest of us just stood there, shaking our heads at the
silly things girls thought were important.

What did we know?  Nothing, of course: we were boys.




On Monday morning, we were all back at the fields, ready for another
week of intense drills and scrimmages.  Our schedule called for the
coed teams to play in the morning, and the men's teams to battle in
the afternoon.  When we played coed, the men's goalies played in the
net the first half, and the women's goalies played the second half.
Both Jorge and Tessa were on my coed team, so they alternated in goal
for the first game.  Jesse and I were always on opposite teams, and
usually played near each other on the field, Jesse on offense and me
on defense.  The previous week, he had tallied the most goals of any
of the guys, at 6, but was far short of the top women's scorer, a
girl from downstate named Posey Smith, who had scored 11 goals for
her team, including two goals for her coed team.  She was quick to
the ball, deadly accurate from within 18 meters, and unconcerned if
she was stopped on a particular shot, knowing full well she would get
lots of opportunities to score.  I was glad she was on my coed team,
so I didn't have to try to defend her.  On the other hand, Kristina
was on Jesse's team, and had tallied 8 goals herself, though all
except for one goal were scored during the women's games.  Still, she
was the second-leading scorer of all the players, and I was proud of
her.  We sat together whenever we could, eating lunch together most
days, and choosing seats near each other during Duane's lectures.  I
couldn't call her at her house, but at least we were able to spend a
few minutes together during the clinic.

In the afternoon game on Monday, we were playing at 1-1, and the
clock was ticking down to the last 10 minutes, when Harlan Corwin
passed the ball over toward Jesse.  He trapped the ball and dribbled
up a couple of steps as I closed toward him.  He slowed, almost as if
he wanted to wait for me to get right up to him, when I saw him sweep
the ball with his trailing toe, lifting the ball up behind him.  He
cocked his leg, and whipped it up in back, making contact on the ball
with his heel.  He managed to direct the ball up, in a sweeping arc
over his head, and over mine.  I kind of stood there in shock, not
sure I could believe that he did that on purpose, when he stepped
around me, gathered up the ball as it bounced behind me, and raced
toward the goal, leaving me in the dust.  Jorge came out at Jesse
when he saw what happened, and managed to deflect the ball in a panic
dive, just as Jesse took his shot, saving a goal.  But Jesse's point
was made: he had figured out how to give himself what he subsequently
called an Alley-Oop One-Man Give-And-Go, and he had saved it for an
opportunity to teach me, the youngster, that there were tricks yet to
be discovered.

After the game, we were lined up at the coolers, refilling our water
cups.

"Let me guess," I said.  "Is that what you were dreaming up at
dinner on Friday?"

He gave me a big grin.  "Yep," he acknowledged.  "Anna and I worked
on it at home over the weekend.  I wanted to wait to hit you with it
as a surprise, and I think Anna was going to try it in her game
today, too, if the opportunity presented itself."

"How the hell am I supposed to defend against that move?" I asked.

"I can show you how," said Duane from behind us.  He had apparently
been listening to our conversation with interest.  "I am glad to see
you came up with that move on your own, Jesse.  It is a difficult
maneuver to perfect.  Come over here, men, and I will explain it to
you."  We all followed him into the tent.  "Sean, anytime a pass goes
behind your player, one of three things will happen."  He moved to
the chalkboard next to the television.  "Either a heel give-and-go,
or one of Jesse's Alley-Oops, as he calls it, will be highly
technical moves you could expect.  In either case, a good defense is
to back off a little.  If you think a give-and-go will occur, move
toward the passer to try to intercept."  He drew lines and squiggles
to illustrate his point.  "If you think an Alley-Oop is a
possibility, by backing off a little, you have a chance at a header,
taking away the ball."  He dropped the chalk back into the tray and
looked at me, wanting to make sure I understood his points.

"Okay," I said.  "I understand those defensive positions.  But you
mentioned three possibilities, and you've only described defenses for
two of them.  What's the third?"

"Very good," he said with satisfaction, looking quite pleased.  "The
third possibility is that it truly was an errant pass, or your
opponent is not skilled enough to perform the maneuver, in which case
the ball will go behind the person you are defending, and you will be
in a better position in any case to recover the ball.  Simple, no?"

"Simple for you, I think.  Difficult for me," I said with a smile.

He looked at me shrewdly.  "If you say so, Mr. Porter.  But I do not
think that is so true."





On Wednesday, at the end of the session for the day, Nicholas
Arpente came up to me and touched my arm.

"Excuse me, Sean?  Duane would like to see you for a moment."

He pointed me toward the tent, and turned away to help the other
coaches take down the nets and corner flags.  I walked over to the
tent, and drew back the flap.  Duane was watching a videotape of one
of our games from earlier in the day.

"You wanted to see me, Duane?" I asked.

He whirled around.  "Oh, sorry, I was engrossed in watching this
game."  He paused the tape, leaving an image of the women's teams
frozen on the screen.  "Sit down a moment, Sean."  He indicated a
chair.  "My brothers must return to Europe to rejoin their own teams
this weekend," he continued.  "And yet we have made a commitment to
continue here with another clinic, for the younger players, yes?  So,
I seem to have a couple of openings for assistants for next week.  I
understand you have been working with some of the boys who will be
attending our clinic, yes?"

I nodded.  Davey and Kip were both enrolled, I knew.

"Good.  I have been observing your play.  You have made some
remarkable improvements these past days, and I have conferred with
Nicholas and James, as well as Katrina and Tasha.  They all agree
that you would be a fine addition to our staff for the next week.
Are you interested?"

Was I interested?  Working with Duane Olchick and his crack
assistants?  Teaching soccer and getting paid to do it?  Was I
interested?

"Absolutely," I exclaimed.  "What an opportunity!  Thank you very
much, Mr. Olchick!  Wow!"

"Please," he said with a smile, "I am Duane, not Mr. Olchick.  Next
week, for the children, I can be Mr. Olchick.  But this week, with
the players we have here, I am merely Duane."




(Continued in Chapter 10)
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