One Great Game by Don Wallace

Author:Don Wallace
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 1998-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

Fourteen

THE SHORTEST SEASON

On Thursday, the tension that has been building on the Poly fields breaks loose like an earth tremor. Yesterday’s sideline circus was big; today’s is bigger. Fifty people are in the bleachers watching practice and socializing: parents, brothers and sisters, students, Pepettes and cheerleaders and members of the Spirit Guard, members of the band. Two Long Beach policemen, former players, come by to watch. The LBPD helicopter that circles the campus every day when school lets out slides over and hovers above the field. Norm Zink, a 1967 grad who owns a sporting goods store and supplies Poly’s equipment and uniforms—everything at cost, for years and years—is here to hear any problems players have about their helmets and shoes. Philip Turner, an alumnus and local businessman who was Dr. Dre’s and Snoop Dogg’s Pop Warner coach (“Dre was a good linebacker, Snoop a wide receiver, but his real game was basketball”), shows designs for the T-shirts he’s going to have printed up for the game, with proceeds going to the school and program. Reggie Benson, sharp in a black-on-black ensemble, rues the betting line on the game—“twelve points, De La Salle”—but does not dispute it. “They’re undefeated, they deserve that much.” Rob Shock, the tight end coach and head trainer, has a list of people who want sideline passes: 122 names. “This list has grown over the years. There are people who don’t show up for games at the beginning who begin to show up at the end, and then all of a sudden you have a mob scene.” A Poly assistant has responsibility for making sure the rap celebrities—Snoop, Nate Dogg, Dre, Warren G., and others—get their passes; he’ll try to use the opportunity to pass along a freshly burned CD of his original beats.

Coach Lara speaks to the players. “We are not taking backpacks, we are not taking Walkmen, we are not taking radios. We are just going to Vets Stadium to play us a football game. I’ve been waiting to see you play a game since spring.

“A chain only stays strong when it stays together. One guy getting angry in a game, starts yelling, starts cursing, doing his own thing—he breaks the chain. Remember, great teams don’t get freaked out when something goes wrong. In the last four years, our teams have experienced that—something has gone wrong, but the momentum turned. It will turn.

“For this game, Hershel Dennis will wear number twenty-two, Kirk Jones’s Poly number. Rory Carrington will wear number ten, Kirk’s number at UNLV. Before the game, hold your helmet to the side to show the KJ sticker to the TV cameras and the people in the stands. Remember Kirk. Remember what he accomplished. Pray for his family.”

Lara leads the team in a prayer. Parent Bob Veach is firing up a barbecue beside the bleachers for a Booster Club cookout. Two of his sons have played for Poly, and a third is on the way. Ruddy and football-sized, Veach tells me that his son Joe, on scholarship at Portland State, will sit with his De La Salle teammates for the big game.

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