Game-Day Jitters (6 page)

Ben woke extra early on Saturday and quietly made his way down to the kitchen. The floor was cold on his bare feet.

He looked out the back window at the yard. Most of the leaves had fallen from the trees, and the lawn was no longer bright green.

The game wasn’t until nine, so Ben hoped things would warm up by then. He couldn’t wait, even though that uneasy pregame feeling
was haunting him again.
Championship jitters
, he thought. But this time he was sure the nervousness would go away once the game began.

Larry came bounding down the stairs in his green sweat suit. “Feel like running?” he asked.

“I’ll run plenty later,” Ben said. “Aren’t you tired?”

“Coach always says to run the morning after a race.” Larry opened the refrigerator and took out the orange juice. “Otherwise your muscles get stiff.”

Ben stuck his head inside the door, too. He grabbed a container of yogurt.

“Sleep good?” Larry asked.

“Mostly. Woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t stop thinking about the game. It’s tough coming back just two days later. In the regular season, we had a week between games.”

Larry laughed. “And every week, you could barely sit still waiting for Saturday. You said you would play a soccer game twice a day if they’d let you.”

“Yeah. Well, this is different. It’s for the title.”

Larry tied his running shoes and went out the door. Ben stared at the yogurt container, then put it back in the refrigerator. He ate crackers and peanut butter instead.

The soccer field was damp with dew, and the sky was overcast and gray. But the grass had been re-marked with sharp white lines, and a table near the bleachers held shiny trophies for the winning team.

“Can you play?” Ben asked Shayna, who had warmed up with the team but was still limping.

“Maybe some,” Shayna said. “It’s better, but it’s still sore.”

“We’ll use her a little at a time,” Coach said. “Whenever somebody needs a breather.”

That won’t be me
, Ben thought.
This is for the title—I definitely won’t run out of steam
.

The Bobcats had lost to the Rabbits twice. The first loss was in the second game of the season, when the Bobcats were still learning to play like a team. The second time, they’d lost by a narrow 3–2 score. And they’d played that game without Ben, who’d been suspended because of a harsh penalty.

As they took the field for the championship game, he was certain the Bobcats had become the better team.

Ben and Mark were lined up on defense. “Cover the entire field,” Ben said to Mark. The Rabbits played a wide-open style of soccer, bringing all of the players except the goalie
forward when they had the ball. Ben and Mark planned to play the same way.

“Lots of action,” Ben continued. “We have to run like never before.”

Erin, Jordan, and Omar were on the front line for the Bobcats, with Kim in goal. Ben looked over at the bleachers and caught his father’s eye. They pointed at each other and Ben gave a serious nod.

Everyone seemed excited. But things started badly for the Bobcats.

First Jordan tripped over the ball and fell flat on his face when he could have had a breakaway. Nothing like that had happened to him in weeks.

Then Erin made a pass directly to one of the Rabbits when Omar was wide open on her other side.

“We’re in
blue
,” Ben said with a laugh the
next time Erin came downfield. “Those purple guys are Rabbits.”

Finally, instead of clearing the ball up the sideline, Mark made a foolish pass directly to the front of the Bobcats’ goal. After some scrambling around, the Rabbits managed to score.

Mark stood with his hands clasped behind his neck, staring at the sky. “How did I do that?” he asked Ben as the teams lined up again. “That’s one of the first things Coach taught us
not
to do.”

“We’ll settle down,” Ben said. “We’ve been behind before. We’ll get a quick goal and it’ll be like starting over.”

But then it was Ben who made a mistake, getting far upfield on the attack before the Bobcats had moved the ball past midfield. With Jordan dribbling along the sideline, Ben saw an opportunity to overload the offense.
But before he could set up near the goal, the Rabbits stole the ball and quickly took it the other way.

Only Mark was back on defense, and the Rabbits had a three-on-one break. Some rapid passing set up an easy shot, and suddenly the Rabbits had a 2–0 lead.

“Sub!” called Coach Patty. She waved to Ben to come off the field, and Darren ran on to take his place.

“We’re not thinking,” Ben said as he joined Shayna and the coach on the sideline.

“No one’s playing smart,” Shayna added.

“It’s like we forgot how to be a team,” Ben said, shaking his head.

“We don’t seem to have our usual energy,” Coach said. Then she laughed and turned to Ben. “Except for you. You showed a little
too
much energy out there. I’m always glad to see defenders get involved in the offense, but you
can’t leave our end of the field unprotected like that.”

Ben nodded slowly. “Looked like a real chance. Jordan’s usually very reliable.… Didn’t think he’d lose the ball.”

Ben took a seat on the bench and picked up his water bottle. He unscrewed the cap and took a swig, but he wasn’t thirsty yet. He let the water drip out of his mouth into the dirt.

Loop had come over and sat next to Ben. “What’s going on?” he asked. “You guys look like beginners out there.”

Ben kicked gently at the dirt. “I don’t know.”

“Listen, I can see the difference from the bleachers,” Loop said. “The Rabbits are just hustling more. They’re getting to every loose ball.… Guess we took it all out of you.”

Maybe that was it. The Rabbits had played
a rather easy game in their semifinal, but the Bobcats had fought down to the final second of theirs. So no wonder Ben’s team was feeling flat. They’d used up a lot of emotion in their victory.

Ben nodded. “This could get ugly.”

“Yeah, if you guys let them score again, it’ll be out of reach. You need to regroup and start battling harder. Slow them down a little or they’ll keep scoring.”

Loop held out his fist and Ben pounded it with his own. “Can I get back in there?” he called to the coach.

“Next stop,” Coach said. “Give Omar a break.”

On the next throw-in, Ben ran onto the field. “Just like we used to,” he said to Erin and Jordan. “Smart passing, quick moves.”

The Bobcats played better for the rest of the
half, and the Rabbits didn’t score again. But it was still 2–0 at halftime, and the Bobcats hadn’t taken a single shot at the goal.

“Twenty minutes,” Ben said as they walked off the field. “That’s all the time we have left to prove that we can be champions.”

“Man, I haven’t played that badly since the beginning of the season,” Jordan said, shaking his head and adjusting one of his shin guards. He and Ben were sitting on the bench, waiting to take the field for the second half.

Jordan had become a top scorer for the Bobcats, and he was skilled at moving with the ball and passing. But he’d made some big mistakes today.

“We played better the last few minutes,” Ben said. “But we don’t look like champions.”

Jordan stood and stretched. “Well, I’m not going down without a fight. They might have to peel me off the field when this is over, but I’m going to run like crazy for the next twenty minutes.”

“I’m with you,” Ben said. He smiled slightly. “Maybe you’d better give another pep talk.”

Jordan looked embarrassed, but he stood up on the bench and waved the rest of the Bobcats over. He was a quiet kid, but he’d managed to inspire his teammates at halftime of last week’s game with a few choice words.

“The only difference in the first half was that the Rabbits wanted it more,” he said. “They out-hustled us and they out-smarted us. We have to dig way deeper in this second half. It isn’t just energy, it’s
pride
. Do we have enough of it?”

“Yeah,” said Mark.

“Oh, come on,” Jordan said. He raised his arms high. “Do we have enough
pride
?”

“Yes!” they all said.

“Louder.”

“Yes!” they shouted.

“All right.” Jordan stepped down from the bench. “Let’s prove it.”

They ran onto the field and took their spots. Jordan, Kim, and Ben were on the front line. They’d worked well together all season, combining for quite a few goals. They’d have to be at their very best in the second half.

Ben looked across at the Rabbits’ two best players. The boy was the shortest player on the team, but he was one of the best dribblers in the league. The girl with the brown ponytail was tall and fast. She’d scored goals in both previous games against the Bobcats.

Ben put the ball in play, sending a short pass
to Kim. She passed the ball backward to Erin.

Ben broke down the sideline, trying to get open.

Erin kicked the ball high in the air toward the corner. Ben sprinted toward it, arriving at the same time as that shortest Rabbit. They battled for the ball, and Ben took control. He tried to cut toward the goal, but the defender stayed right at his side.

Drop this guy
, Ben told himself.
Fake him out
.

As he reached the corner, Ben turned sharply and tried to drive the ball toward the front of the goal. But the defender blocked the pass and the ball rolled over the end line.

“Corner kick!” called the referee.

Ben ran to the ball and picked it up, placing it inside the corner arc. Jordan and Kim packed in near the goal, with Erin and Mark several feet back.

Ben stepped forward and lofted the ball toward the goal. A flurry of leaping blue- and purple-shirted players darted at it.

Ben ran onto the field, and suddenly the ball was coming back to him. He’d be shooting from a tight angle, but the path between him and the goal was open. He planted his left foot and drove his right one into the ball, sending it on a line drive toward the upper corner.

The goalie jumped and stretched out his arms, catching the ball and falling to the turf. Ben sprinted back down the field.

“Good start!” Jordan called. “Let’s keep up that pressure.”

“Turn!” came a shout from the sideline. Shayna was pointing toward the Rabbits’ goal.

Ben pivoted and shot back up the field. Erin had made a steal and was about to shoot.

The goalie knocked down the shot, but the ball rolled to the corner. This time Ben was
several yards ahead of that short defender, and he got to it first. He kicked the ball with the inside of his foot, lifting it into the air and sending it to the front of the goal.

Kim was waiting. She skillfully met the ball with her forehead, driving it into the net. The Bobcats were only one goal behind.

“All right!” Ben called, racing over. “Great head.”

“Beautiful pass,” Kim said, slapping Ben’s hands.

“Now we’ve got the momentum,” Jordan said. “Let’s keep it up.”

The pace stayed at a high level after that, with both teams working hard to try to score. Ben was sweating despite the cool weather, and his legs were getting tired. But this game meant too much to let up.