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Inspiration Information
It’s fall in New York. It’s the best time of year. It’s also pretty nice if you happen to be affiliated with the city’s best high school soccer team… ever. It’s been almost a year since I witnessed the deflating loss handed to Martin Luther King, Jr High School in the league championship game. The boys were prostrate on the field, trying to grasp exactly how it went wrong. Tears poured for grief, not victory that day, but they seemed to have gotten over it, considering that was the last time they lost. The playoffs are right around the corner and their aiming to take back what is historically theirs.
Why am I bringing this up now? Well, for starters, MLK always puts a smile on my face for no other reason than to see those kids winning means so much more to me than just about any soccer team, any soccer match. If you read the trilogy I wrote last year as I traveled with the team, you know what I mean. If you haven’t, well read it, and if you have, read this, because it’s another story about winning that transcends the sport, and one that made me remember my time with The Kings of King.
Mr. Koperda’s New York Dash Soccer Club in Utica, New York, is a place not unlike MLK, where the ideals of the American Dream are still shining through the dark clouds of a hateful humanity. And soccer is a big reason why. Bring Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses. And let them play the game they love.
kjersten
on Oct 25th, 2006 - 5:37pm
I’m from the Utica area, and I’d never heard of this Dash soccer club before. I did a little research, and it sounds like an absolutely fantastic program. It’s true - the city is brimming with refugees. I’ve volunteered at the Refugee Center tutoring students in English, and I think that a soccer club is the perfect tool to help the teenagers, who have a lot of trouble settling in, feel accepted.
The thing I have to wonder about is, how come I’ve never heard of this? We’re a small, small area, with little to no news. I’m shocked this program hasn’t received more publicity. It certainly deserves the attention. good post!
joe
on Oct 28th, 2006 - 11:33am
my high school in pittsburgh has an academic program for bantu refugees. in many ways they are ostracized and humiliated by the rest of kids in school. They spend their entire day in a cramped little classroom in the basement learning how to write their names and add. They travel around in a pack, mostly because they dont know how to have a friend and nobody wants to be their friend anyway.
Except for the ones that join the soccer team. you can tell that each day after 7 periods of having been looked at by repugnant eyes, they need an escape. though my somali teammates dont all bring a lot of skill to the table, they do all bring those intangible characteristics that you find in a ronaldinho or a messi. spirit, joy, passion, fire, courage, the list goes on. its great to watch mahmudi with his toothy white smile as he runs after a loose ball, and then see him get the rare chance to flash that smile again when you pass him in the hall the next day.
nice post
tito
on Apr 16th, 2007 - 12:13pm
hope your team is ready cause we got something for you
eldar
on Apr 26th, 2007 - 4:31pm
hay can i play at sommer soccer?
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