Walking away happy

Wednesday night was the last game of the OSC soccer season; a make-up game on the road against East Lansing.  Last time out we had lost to this outfit 3-1….hoping for better results.

Game was supposed to start at 5:45…to try and get done before it was too dark.  To get the whole picture for this game you need to know a few things

1) the field in East Lansing runs east-west

2) the sun is very low in the west and was going to be a problem for the kid in goal in the east

and

3)  the winds were out of the west-southwest, and they were strong, and I’d bet the gusts were up to 30-40 mph…..if the goals hadn’t been anchored down I’m sure they would have tipped over.

The ref wouldn’t start the game at 5:45; too windy (there’s apparently a test where the ball has to sit still for a minute or something….that ball had no chance of staying in the same place).  The ref agreed to wait until 6 pm and at that point, the winds had died down some and we were able to start.

So, of course, we lose the coin toss and our goalie is going to be looking into the sun in the first half AND have the other team coming at him with the benefit of the big wind.

Strategy:  I had made the decision to switch our ‘shape’ on the field in this last game….we normally play 1-2-2 (forward-midfield-defense) and I’ve found that this shape tends to make the kids abdicate their responsibilities “there’s another person back on defense, I won’t go back” or “one midfield went back to help on defense, I don’t need to”.  At times (especially when we were behind in games) I’d switch to a 2-2-1…..this shape generates more offense and if the midfield and defense decide they aren’t going to play defense we’re doomed.  It’s taken awhile, but I’ve figured out that we’re more successful in the 2-2-1, the back three pay more attention and we don’t have as many dumb mistakes.  We score more, we give up fewer goals. 

So, I had decided no matter what to play 2-2-1 the entire game tonight…..I didn’t care if we gave up 5 goals, I wanted to see how it worked the whole game.

Losing the sun and the wind (especially the wind) ended those plans; told the boys we would play 2-2-1 in the 2nd half but in the first half I wanted defense first….they would get no goals with the wind at their backs. I have one kid who has tinted sports glasses and he’s one of our normal goalies….I wasn’t going to use him in goal today, but, the sun made that decision for me.

Boys were really goofy before the game; first the winds, second the possible cancellation.  Have a quick second to tell them to FOCUS and away we go.

First Half:  The boys play some awesome defense; EL doesn’t really have many real chances and we get quite a few breakaway chances.  And Matthew does something on one of these breakaways that I’m going to have to describe in depth (and I won’t do it justice) and get him to show this on some video soon.

(Edit:  I taped him this afternoon.  The video is here.)

Matthew has been practicing this ‘move’…I don’t think this ‘move’ has a ‘name’; it’s been amazing to watch him practice this move because he’s become very good at it.  Neither of his brothers could be bothered to practice and practice to get the mastery of anything sports related like Matthew has with this move….he’s put in the time and it has paid off.  The move is two parts….he’s dribbling the ball forward and he stops pushing it forward as he does a cross-over with his feet over it.  As the ball slows he is still moving forward at the same speed; at the last moment he takes the back heel of his other foot and kicks the ball straight forward to himself and keeps going forward.  The effect is that it looks like he’s messed up dribbling the ball…that sucks the defender in, and then he passes the ball forward to himself and moves on out of the break.

So, there are about 10 minutes gone in the first half and we’ve had a two-on-one or another breakaway chance and then we get another…the ball is passed up to Matthew and he’s breaking in towards the goal, just one defender in front of him.  The defender comes out AND MATTHEW DOES THIS MOVE, does it right, and it’s just him and the goalie and he puts it away for the first goal of the match.

One of the other Dad’s jumps up, comes over to me, pats me on the back and says “Did you see that?  that’ll be on Sportscenter!”…don’t know about that, but, it was pretty cool.

We hold the fort for the rest of the half and take that lead into halftime.  Get the wind in the second half…woo hoo!

Second Half:  Switch over to our 2-2-1…tell the person who is on defense that he’s under the gun…no mistakes.  Tell the midfielders they have to get back.  Away we go.

We score again (on a rebound of a penalty kick).  We score again (on a rebound).  It’s 3-0 and we are dominating the game…our goalie touches the ball maybe twice in the 2nd half. 

At the end of the game I have Christopher up front as forward….he gets the ball a couple of different times (and has one pretty good chance for a goal that is deflected) and you can hear the EL coach yelling, yelling loud “Ref, that 30, he’s pushing!  He’s pushing!!!!”.   Christopher may not have the moves that his little brother has, but, he is good at one thing, and he’s very good at that…if he has the ball he will put his body between the ball and the other player and you aren’t going to get the ball at that point.  He did that, and the EL coach didn’t like it, and you can hear him yelling clearly from the other side of the field “Ref, He’s doing it again, 30, 30, 30!!!!”….

The kids next to me on the bench ask me what Christopher is doing wrong….I tell them he’s doing nothing wrong, or the ref, who has been alerted by the EL coach to this, would have called it by now.  Told the kids “If I was losing 3-0 and my team couldn’t get the ball out of my own end I’d be yelling at anything and everything too….”

Final 3-0. 

Iphone Photo Dump

Not much here, but, enough for a post I guess

The new home office on Graystone affords me a view of the backyards…..these guys came walking through the other day

Christopher was reading with me (he in his American Chiller book, me reading something else) upstairs when all of a sudden I noticed the breathing sounds were a little bit louder than they had been previously…..

This is the set from “Evil Dead: The Musical”; Kevin and I went to see this Saturday night and it was excellent!  Funny, gory, blood-spattered musical entertainment.  You can see the splatter-zone down next to the stage; if you are lucky(?) enough to sit there you are sure to be wet and dirty from water and blood, etc.

The scariest picture of the bunch…Kevin about to drive us home from the high school.  He’s completed Session 1 of the drivers ed and now has to complete 30 hr of supervised driving with Mom and Dad (ok, with Dad) before he can take Session 2….

Matthew’s best friend Ashton is a huge Colts fan….Mom caved in and bought Matthew this jersey that Matthew had been asking for.  He’s lucky Mom is so nice; Dad would never have done this!

I don’t know this kid and feel as if I have to disown him or perform some sort of ritual cleansing now…..  :)

MSDSL Playoffs

This weekend was the end of the TNT season; the boys (and parents) headed down to Canton for the season ending win-or-go-home playoffs

Game 1:  We were the #2 seed (more on that later) and faced the #7 seed from Livonia.  We’ve played this team twice before this season and pummeled them, two 7-0 wins.

Saturday’s game (and Saturday’s only game) was no different and I really don’t remember the final score, except that it was a number greater than five and Livonia’s was 0.  Matthew had the second goal of the game and continued his passing ways to contribute more than one assist.  I’ll get video of that first goal online soon; he absolutely bombed it into the back of the net after he noticed the goalie was playing way over expecting him to kick it to his teammates on the other side of the goal.

Game 2:  Game 2 of the playoffs began at 10 am Sunday; we faced the #3 team from Canton.  We’ve faced this team twice before too….a 7-3 win and a 2-1 win.  The 2-1 win was a little weird; it has seemed like the Canton team had a player or two that they hadn’t had before (instead of one really big kid they had two, for example)…

Celebrating one of many goals

I don’t think this turned into a shot on goal; I think the other guy deflected it and we got a corner kick out of it.

This time they had only one big kid; and TNT jumped out to a three goal lead and salted it away for a 4-0 win.  I was looking forward to seeing how the coach played the boys during these games; we’ve been winning so convincingly at times it’s been easy to just rotate the pieces-parts and get what you want most of the time.  During this game, the coach had Matthew up front in the first half and then, to protect the lead, shifted Matthew (in his grouping) and one of the other stronger kids (in the other grouping) back to defense to close things out.

These pictures are not mine; another parent grabbed them and put them up on facebook.  I promptly downloaded them.  Love this one.

Celebrating more goals….

Game 3:  We had a 4-hr wait until the championship; went to Ikea, ate lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings, watched the Steelers gift the Dolphins six points to start the game, headed back over to the soccer complex for the finals.

This time we faced the #1 seed, and I’m a bit confused by how they were the #1 seed and we weren’t.  They did beat us, but, had only moved up to our division a few weeks back and while we had easily beaten everyone else, they only had one other game there.  Oh well, no matter, the proof will be found here. 

Our first goal was cheap; one of our defender’s charges across the midline and kicks it straight at, and not particularly hard at, the goalie.  He bobbles it, it goes in, and it’s 1-0.  Feel bad for the goalie no matter what team they are on when that happens.  A few minutes later another defender charges in, absolutely buries his long range shot, and it’s 2-0 and the rout is on.  I think it finished up at 8-2; was 5-1 at halftime.

 

A break before the game starts….

Matthew and Kijae….Kijae was the recipient of Matthew’s passing gifts…..

Matthew was, at least to me, a little out of it at the beginning of this game….he was the forward, but, didn’t seem really involved with the ball and spent a lot of time waiting up front for a pass or a ball that never came his way.  In the second half, he, like the first game, was dispatched to the defense and he really had a nice game back there….he had two awfully nice passes for assists to round out the scoring and did a great job of tracking forward with the ball and then getting back to cut off the other team (who was pressing quite a bit to get some goals to get back in it). 

I think on this goal specifically Matthew sucked in the defense and just pushed it across where a wide-open Kijae buried it…..

Coach, kids, and younger brothers and sisters celebrate the win

 

That’s the end of the fall TNT season; including the tournaments the boys went 10 and 2 and won two championships.  The two teams the boys lost to the boys beat the next time they played them.  Not bad!

Last Football Game

We travelled to Dewitt for Cpher’s last football game; came home with a 20-6 win. 

 

I think Christopher played every offensive snap; he might have been out for maybe 2 plays(?).  He’s always the left tackel, you can see him here lining up before the play starts….

and here he’s getting ready to block somebody….Cpher reported later on that one kid he blocked was as big as him and ‘hard’ but one kid was ‘smaller’ and it was a lot easier….

He got a few, but not many, defensive snaps.  Mom and Dad had talked with Cpher on the way to the game about being more aggressive…we had agreed to implement a dollars-for-tackles approach for this game in the hopes of seeing Christopher move towards the ball instead of hanging back…

Most plays at this age go outside or far outside, so, if you’re the nose tackle, you don’t get much of a chance.  And here, you can see, Dewitt is double teaming him….

He’s getting ready to block here but you can see from where the ball is that the snap was bad and this play has no chance of going anywhere….

Waiting for a defensive play to start….

again, more DL work going on here.  He had a total of two tackles; one on the first kickoff of the game and the second near the goal line.  I’ll have to dig up the video of the second tackle; for the first time all year (that I can tell) you can see Christopher ‘manhandle’ the OL in front of him and shake loose to track the runner down……

More DL work…getting double teamed again…

Of course, when you double team someone, this happens, one person is in your backfield, stopping the play in it’s tracks….

OSC catchup

Three games in 10 days; I need to play catch-up….

Game 5:  Monday afternoon brought the first of the week’s rematches against Western Force; we had travelled to their field and walked away with a 1-1 tie…I was hoping for better results here.

At the end of the half we were up 1-0….and totally did not deserve to be on the plus side of the scoresheet….I thought they really took it too us and the boys sat back and let them do it.  Western’s home field is smaller (quite a bit smaller, actually) than ours and I hoped that would play to our advantage.

Matthew scored in the second half to put us ahead 2-0 and they scored late to make it a 2-1 final.  I thought we were the more aggressive team in the second half, and, in what is a disappointing recurring theme, we just gave away the goal to them that made it closer than it really was in the end.

Game 6:  Wednesday was a rematch with Lansing Soccer Club; they had beaten us 4-2 in our first game on the strength of one kids’ hat trick.  I did not go to the length of assigning a player to shadow this kid (I did consider it) but I did make sure everyone knew that #9 was their best player and to be on the watch for him.

Unlike Monday, we were down 1-0 at the half and totally did not deserve to be on the negative side of the scoresheet; we dominated play but, yet again, did something crazy in front of the goal (we didn’t clear it because we thought Matthew was going to reach down and get it….Matthew didn’t grab it because he thought we were going to clear it….) and had to come from behind in the second half.

We tied it early, they went ahead when the dreaded #9 finally broke through, and were pushing in for the tying goal when….well…let’s just say I didn’t agree with the ref’s call.

On Monday, the ref (a high schooler) was very clear that he was going to be calling the game ‘with advantage’…essentially, if you foul me, but I still have the ball and the possession is to my benefit, the ref won’t call the foul, or will call it later, and let the play continue.  This is pretty normal, but, I appreciate him taking the time to explain it to the boys….

On Wednesday, the ref was a woman in her 30’s (maybe) and I thought, until the play I’m going to talk about, that she had done a pretty good job.  The play in question we are driving in, Matthew and one other boy on a two on one…..the other boy gets fouled but gets the ball ahead to Matthew and Matthew is on the left and does ‘the move’ that I have blogged about before, deke left, ball right, and it is very clearly just him and the ball in front of the net……

“Whistle!”

Referee brings the ball back out to the spot of the foul; I have to call out and ask what the call was….it’s a foul on the other team.  Her whistle took away our great scoring opportunity to punish the other team…….

Yell out “I would rather have had the possession…..” and go back to the sideline.  And that was about it, we kept pressuring but didn’t get the tying goal and lost 2-1.

Game 7:  A new team, East Lansing.  I had heard that again, this team had one really good player and they ran the offense through him….pointed that out to the boys….

Game starts, that boy gets the ball, dribbles past all of our players and scores.

It’s moments like these that make me want to tear my hair out…..

We score, they score, and then we give up another goal right off of a throw-in (they just dribble in while we watch) and it’s a 3-1 final. 

I would have thought that the team would be much better than we are (3-3-2)…..but I think I realize now that we don’t have one player who is going to step up and dominate.  That, and the bizarre refusal to do the basics (I’m still telling them “don’t kick the ball to the middle on defense”….at practice Monday we did it three times….it’s just like handing the other team goals….) really inhibits the amount of success we are going to have.

This team is helping to cement my decision not to coach next year….   :)

Last Weekend’s Sports

I’m behind…mainly because I’ve been waiting for one small little piece of video that I now have.  So, let’s go.

Saturday:  Christopher’s next to last football game; this is the first in almost a month where the weather was acceptable.  In fact, it was probably too good since the sun was still low at 9 am as the game started and you can clearly see all kinds of lens glare in the video.

We won, beating a team from Holt 14-0.  Christopher played well…especially on offense.  There’s one sequence on offense where they are running the play off-tackle right at him…he pushes the defensive end to the backfield and then turns completely around and seals the defensive tackle with the guard as the running back goes by for a nice gain.  I like that he’s picking up on how the game is played a little bit more.

He plays nose tackle on defense and could use a big dose of aggressiveness….he’s more than happy to just stand there and see if the play comes to him (the off. line isn’t moving him…).  Of course, if you’re playing like this, some good things might happen….like being in position to grab the interception when the QB throws up a wounded duck.

Kevin taped the entire game up in the press box, so, I’m looking forward to getting home and seeing that play again.  Go through the video and notice that the video file for that play is corrupted!  Aaaaagh!!!  This happens every once in a while and this is the first time it’s hit a really important piece of video.

Luckily, there was another person taping the game, and I was able to retrieve ‘THE PLAY’ from them. 

You can find the video from the whole game here.  The blocking play I’m talking about is the first play in the sequence of plays here.  The interception is here.

Sunday:  Matthew has a TNT game down in Novi…he’s talking it up before the game about how he’s going to score a goal for us.

Of course, to score a goal you have to take a shot during the game, and, despite having a ton of opportunities to do that, Matthew was the exemplary teammate and passed each and every time.  We won, 4-1 or something like that.  Matthew made a lot of nifty moves and controlled the ball a great deal…..and religiously passed the ball instead of driving into the goal.  He very clearly set up one of the goals, if not another, and had a great game, but, we were joking with him on the way home…..you can’t say you’re going to score and then NOT shoot. 

Driving

Kevin’s started driving lessons; he has about 4-6 hours a week right now of classroom instruction and last Wednesday spent three hours out on the road with 2 other kids.  In the next week or two he will get his little pink piece of paper that will allow him to drive with a passenger on board.

He’s super geeked about all of this; we’ve tried, as much as we can, to point out that driving is the most dangerous thing he’ll ever do.  Not sure our messages were getting home, even though at least 3 teens have died within one mile of our house over the last 5 years (I’ve always intended on taking Kevin, on the day that he gets his drivers license, out to the cross on Hagadorn road where those kids, who did absolutely nothing wrong, were killed because some guy couldn’t wait for a passing lane to pass).

He may not need that reminder anymore though, because it really hit home yesterday.  We were coming back from Matthew’s soccer game in Novi and were going to turn south on US-23 to go to Costco; looked down at 23 from 96 (the exit is after you cross over) and saw how far it was backed up and decided not to go onto the exit…a good thing, we would have been stuck there for a long time.  The backup was because three kids from Okemos had died in an accident (along with 2 others). 

Kevin didn’t know any of them (they had all graduated last year) but the news was all over his Facebook last night.  Another kid is still in the hospital; three children from the other car in the accident are still there also. 

If you’re more curious, you can find an article here.

Catch Up

Been a busy week…I spent less than 18 hours at home this week and sit in my favorite place (Detroit Metro) waiting for a late flight(9:55) that’s already delayed.  Sigh.

Homecoming:  More on this later, but, all went well.

This and That: 

 

The front and back of the freshman t-shirt.

Captured this at…well, it’s a long story, and the takeaway is that Kevin wrote this haiku on the paper tablecloth at Bravo one night.  Wish the focus was better, but, it’s legible…

San Antonio:  Attended a waste conference in San Antonio this week; was a bad(?) boy and instead of going on the landfill tour decided that I needed to go on a real tour and head downtown (we stayed at a just gorgeous JW Marriott that was 40 minutes north of the city):

 

This building sits just north of the Alamo; the Emily Morgan Hotel

This monument sits in Alamo Plaza to the west of the Alamo; you can see Bowie pictured and Crockett listed with the other men

Damn near impossible to get a picture without people in front of it (I waited a while and it just never happened).  So, finally went in, paid for the audio tour, and came back out here to start the tour and listen

and as I moved over to the side I did get the “nobody in front” shot.  Enjoyed the tour…the Alamo really isn’t that big and you’re done pretty quickly….

Walked down to the Riverwalk; had dinner at the County Line BBQ sitting at river’s edge.  Did the ‘loop’ that is the inner Riverwalk and really enjoyed that…wish I could have seen it at night when it is all lit up.

As I am walking back to the car I pass this monument….the last line should read “…county and town AND CATS were named in his honor.”

Other News: 

Cpher:  Tried out for the competitive basketball team and made the team….there were 20 kids for two teams so everyone was going to make it.  In this, of all sports, his size advantage shows up in a big way…there’s another kid who’s maybe a little taller than Cpher and more than one person commented that Okemos teams are almost always small, but, not this year. 

Kevin:  Started driving lessons….will have a piece of paper in a few weeks that will allow him to drive at will (with parent on-board).  Gray hair predicted to increase at that time…

Matthew:  Not much new here, but, the sports front has also been pretty quiet the last few weeks.  No worries, the next 10 days bring 3 OSC soccer games, 2 football games, and a TNT game. 

Weekend Update

Kevin:  Homecoming Dance is tonight…we’ll go into more detail about that tomorrow in a different venue.

Tennis is now over; there were supposed to be two meets last week….one was rained out and the other fell victim to bus incompetence.  Oh well.  There should be a tennis banquet to round out the year at some point.  Kevin has to be nothing but happy about how this year has gone….he really only started playing tennis again seriously in August and by the end of the season was solidly the #3 singles. 

Kevin helped build the float with the freshman class (ok, he wasn’t a big help, he only went to 1 of 3 events, but, he was in tennis during some of them).  Walked along with the float for the homecoming parade….we’ve been in Okemos 12 years and this is the first one we’ve actually gone to see the parade.

Kevin walking with the rest of the freshmen….the class t-shirt really came out looking nice; I’ll have to try and take some pictures of it.

 

The theme for this year’s homecoming was ‘Villians’….the freshman used Davy Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean

The back of the float….Kevin signed the upper right side here…

Surprisingly, shockingly, or, as Kevin says “of course”, the freshman pulled off the upset and were named the best of the four class floats at the game Friday night.

Matthew:  Not much to report here this go round…no soccer at all this weekend!

Christopher:  Since he’s on the football team, he also got to participate….as I dropped him off he wondered how he should act “Should I just be cool, or should I wave” as they went along the route.

 

I think he decided on “just be myself”.  I know he had fun throwing candy to the kids along the route…

Had his fourth (of six) football game this morning; yet another rain-filled affair but, this time, with no thunder so they could just play.  Lost 21-0 to Grand Ledge in a game that wasn’t that close…I have real doubts that we even gained one first down.  It was really raining for a while and there were a ton of fumbles, but, man, I just really wonder about the head coach.  He runs the offense, it’s the first quarter, it’s a driving rainstorm, and we have, for this age level, a great punter (and even if you don’t punt they give you 20 years), 4th down and 7 at our (OUR!) 29 yard line and he goes for it. 

Of course we don’t make it, and two plays later GL is in the end zone and the tone for the game is set.

Christopher’s general ‘grousing’ about football has gotten louder this week….there’s a lot of practice and it’s cutting into his time playing here at home and he doesn’t really enjoy all of the yelling that goes on at the practices.  But, he is doing better week by week and I think had a pretty game today.  GL was big…the biggest team we’ve faced so far and it showed, they just dominated the lines on both sides.  I think Cpher held his own but haven’t looked too closely at the video…I do know that he hardly came out of the game in the 2nd half.