To say that my daughter’s love for the game of soccer had faded would be an understatement. Her last year in rec soccer had resulted in a winless season and playing against boys three grades higher than her didn’t help. Then the first year of her middle school career followed the same path. More mercy rules than goals.
Two years. No wins.
I had a front row seat to all of it, serving as her rec league team coach and then as the assistant coach on her middle school team. I vividly remember a point in her seventh grade year, driving home from practice, when I asked her if she wanted to keep playing. After being by her side, pushing her to play a sport I loved, it had finally dawned on me that maybe she just wasn’t into it anymore. And I had reached the point where I was fine with that.
We pushed through the end of her middle school season and the inevitable annual conversation around club soccer came up. “So, do you think you want to try out for Wave this year (Warsaw Wave is our local travel soccer club)?”
Every previous year, the club would put her name on the tryout list and without fail, Harper wouldn’t show up. This past year was different. Even after the last two seasons, Harper was going to try out for the club team because of one thing. Friendship.
Scary things are easier when you do them with a friend. Knowing that girl was going to be there gave Harper the comfort she needed to step onto the field. It turned out to be one of the best decisions we have made as a family.
There are teams you remember for specific reasons. The championship run. The dramatic win. The inside jokes. The lessons that only come from losing. Then there are the rare teams that somehow become all of it at once.
This was that team.
We couldn’t have asked for better teammates her first year in club soccer. Beyond the friend she already had, this group of mostly sixth and seventh grade girls welcomed her into something that had already been built. The only other eighth grader had been on the team in previous seasons. Harper was the new piece.
There was no weird hierarchy. No silent reminder that they had history together and she didn’t.
They passed her the ball. They celebrated her small wins. They pulled her into warm-up circles and post-game laughs like she had always been there. At practice, they worked hard and joked harder. On the bench, they scooted down to make room. When she made a mistake, they picked her up instead of pointing it out.
For a kid coming off two seasons without a win, that kind of environment matters more than any scoreboard.
But the scoreboard did change.
This team won. A lot. They rolled through nearly every opponent on the schedule. The only blemish came against a team from St. Louis, a reminder that sometimes the world outside our small Midwest bubble is just a little bigger and a little faster. Even then, they competed. Turns out, a group of girls from our corner of the Midwest can hold their own just fine.
And with each win, I could see something rebuilding inside her. Confidence. Joy. A willingness to try again. The fear of failing started to fade because she wasn’t carrying it alone anymore.
This team, filled with girls from families who value character as much as competition, and coaches who knew how to support her and push her just the right way, gave my daughter more than a season. They gave her belief. Not just in the game, but in herself.
I watched her run harder. Talk more. Take chances. I watched her become brave again.
She tried out because of one friend. By the end of the season, she had many new ones.
The season is over now. The uniforms are washed and folded. The schedule isn’t taped to the fridge anymore. But something tells me this isn’t the last chapter for this group.
In a few short years, many of these girls will walk the same high school halls as Warsaw Tigers and, hopefully, share the same field again. And when they do, the roles will be different. Harper will be one of the older ones. The one with a little more experience. The one who remembers what it felt like to be the new piece.
And I have a feeling she’ll be the first to scoot down on the bench. The first to pull someone into the warm-up circle. The first to say, “You’ve got this,” after a mistake.
The wins. Even that short-handed loss to St. Louis. The practices where confidence quietly took root. All of it will go with her.
On their own, sports and friendship are good. Together, at just the right time, they can change a kid.
They did for my daughter. And one day soon, she’ll get to do the same for someone else.
