That Time of Year

It's around this time of year I really start thinking of my childhood.  Summer dwindling down, school starting soon, and the beginning of soccer season.  To be specific......the St. Sabina Maroon & Gold Classic.  St. Sabina has taken its lumps over the years.  The school is closed.  The church is barely hanging on.  The good ole days are gone.  But the soccer fields remain.  And they should be the last thing in ALL of Florissant to disappear.

St. Sabina itself has produced some legendary athletes, none of whom I can think of at this point.  They've also bought a few here and there, especially fast black kids who lived much too far away for anyone to believe that they were actually a part of the parish.  Sabina's talented teams, as much as that pains me to write, were a huge reason for the popularity and longevity of the tournament and its success.  Their teams found ways to be big in big moments.  And there were many big moments, especially on those fields.

It is on those fields that young boys become giants.  They learn to survive the heat.  They learn to survive the schedule.  They learn that their parents' sacrifice their whole weekend to be a part of the history of the greatness of the tournament.  It is at the Sabina tournament that a boy can plead with his dad/coach to just once, just ONCE, let him play goalie.  After hearing that the only way he would be allowed to play goalie was by scoring at least 5 goals there was hope.  Then, after 32 minutes, glory!  Put the mitts on kid, you're going in goal.  Never touched a ball with my hands that day.  Our Lady of Loretto wasn't a great team in 1st grade.  We beat them 8-0.  Didn't matter.  I had the goalie jersey (bright orange with black lettering) and the goalie gloves (had to be 4 sizes too big).  Totally worth it.  Sweating your ass off, sitting on the 18 yard box, bored as hell.....basking in the glory of being a goalie.

I didn't get to do that too often after that.  It would be about 20 years until I finally realized the dream of being a goalie, playing for an over 30 men's league, and seeing 40 shots a game because of a Swiss cheese defense.  But nothing can compare to the memories of the Sabina tournament.....even if they had to cheat to win.