Junior Year Box Set

Rita and Halle planned to depart for LA tonight, while I would leave Sunday. I was getting more excited about my trip. I checked the weather forecast in LA, and it was supposed to be in the upper 60s to low 70s all week. That sounded much better than the 34 degrees it was supposed to get up to today.

We all met at the high school. We’d learned some things from our previous trip to State University for last year’s State Championship game. The first was that you had to share a locker room. It was a twenty-minute bus ride for us to get to State. Coach Hope decided we would be taped and get dressed in our home locker room and then wait until the game before ours ended. They made sure there was at least an hour between games. That would give us time to ride the bus, warm up, and do our pregame routine before kickoff.

Coach Hope called for us. It was game time.

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We unloaded from the buses and walked straight to the field. As we left the tunnel to go onto the field, the bright sunlight almost blinded me. The air was crisp and cold in my lungs, and there were just wisps of clouds. I flexed my right hand to make sure the cold wasn’t going to be a problem. I’d decided to go without the gloves because it gave me a better feel for the ball that way.

When our fans saw us enter the stadium, the cowbells began to ring. We ran out and lined up to stretch and prepare for the game. We were decked out in our all-blue uniforms with orange numbers and belts. Unity would be in all-white today. I thought we looked sharp.

 

After we stretched, we began to run drills. All distractions aside, I was nervous. We had a lot on the line. After all, this was the game. This was the one that, when it was done, you would know who the best was. I looked around and spotted two men in Iowa jackets. For some reason, seeing them calmed me. Iowa would regret canceling my visit if I ever played in the Big Ten. I knew that Iowa had only been protecting themselves, and the timing had been awful for them, but I needed my anger for today’s game.

We walked back into the locker room, and Coach Hope had us gather around to hear his pregame speech.

“Repeating as a State Champion is hard. None of last year’s other championship teams even made it to the State Championship game this year,” he said.

Springfield was last year’s champion in the class above ours. They had fallen to Loyola Academy the week before. Loyola was favored to win today against a Marist team that had surprisingly come together at the end of the season.

“I usually don’t like to look ahead, but with the core group coming back, we could possibly be three-time State Champions back-to-back-to-back. There have been a few schools that have two in a row, but we would be the first to win three. I just wanted to tell you that so you can get a feel for your place in history. The key to achieving that history is winning today.

“One of the hardest things to do is to win a game when you’re expected to. Go back to the King game. Think about how you dug just a little deeper to beat a team that everyone said was better than you are. That’s what Unity is doing right now. They’re planning to take away what you’ve worked so hard to accomplish. The difference between the King game and this one is that the winner gets the ultimate prize, the State Championship.

“I don’t know about you, but I don’t plan to just give it to them. I will give everything I have to win this game, and I expect that you will too. No one is going to take what’s ours. Every football field is ‘Our House’! No one will beat us! No one will be given a chance! Our House!” Coach Hope yelled.

That started the chant as we entered the tunnel. I led the way, and instead of running, we walked out as we chanted. Our fans heard it before we could be seen and began to shout ‘Our House!’ along with us. When we left the tunnel, we strolled out as if we owned the place and congregated near where our fans were.

Unity came storming out and gathered at the 50 yard line in a giant mosh pit of excitement. I stepped away from my teammates and threw up. That sent our fans into a frenzy. Word must have gotten out that if I did that, I’d have a good game.

Yuri and Jim and the rest of the seniors followed me out for the coin toss. It looked like Unity sent out their whole team. Unity won the toss and elected to defer to the second half. We took the ball, and Ty got us out to the 30 yard line on his kickoff return.

We lined up in our usual formation with me in the shotgun and Ty beside me, Roc and Jake on the left, and Ed and Wolf on my right. In front of me was Johan at center, Brock and Bryan Callahan at guard, and Neil Presley and Jim at tackle.

Coach Mason had taken my comment about Unity’s tendency to swarm the ball to heart. He’d planned to use misdirection plays like the counter to exploit their hard pursuit. I’d said that every team they’d beaten this year had done the same thing. Against the run, Unity was only giving up two yards per play.