Sounds like a thriller. You can read about it here.

You know, we had a touring choir reunion earlier this year and it was almost enough to make me think I could do that all over again. I know that if I hear a song from tour, I can pretty much still sing my part along with it, and more, I can remember certain times we sang it somewhere, what the whether was, who I was standing by, how we travelled to get there that day. And this soccer title is a lot the same way. Those players are where we used to be, and when I get a chance to play, I can feel like it wasn’t that long ago, that I could do that again, and just like songs, remember certain games, exactly what the light was like and the color of the uniforms, a goal I gave up, exactly where it went and what I tried to do about it, or one that I actually got my hands on.

You don’t quit playing for a team when you quit playing for them. I was at EMHS a few months back, and it’s a long story, but Coach Martin, in a pre-season talk once, said that goalkeepers have to be ready at all times, and for the whole season and probably until we graduated, Kevin Eshleman and I used to sneak up on each other and attempt to punch each other in the stomach. Got to be ready at all times, right? The upshot being that, I’m 38, walking down the EMHS hallway, and wondering where Eshleman is hiding.

So with this state title, we didn’t win it and nothing we did made it possible for these guys to win it, and they probably don’t even know we ever played. (Some of them probably remember lighting me up in recent summer league games, however.) But I have to think we won, or helped win part of it, somehow. Good for them, regardless.

UPDATE: The Windsock story on the game, with video of the post-game celebrating, is here.