The Other Side of The Field

Lori Snyder sent me the article below this week. It was taken from the Truth Project web site at Focus on the Family. You can look at the original ESPN article as well

As we endure the bloated hype of another Superbowl week, hoping the game isn’t overwhelmed in the process, here’s a reminder of what can at the other end of the field.

High school football is big in America. But I suppose there is no place where it is bigger than in Texas. Friday nights there are legend.

The fans scream; the stands are packed; cheerleaders with pom-poms jump and sway to the beat of the school band; parents yell encouragement (mostly); mom's turn their eyes away when their little boys are crunched by the "bullies on the other team who didn't really have to hit him that hard, did he?" and everybody joins in the chants and stomps their feet on the metal stands until you are sure they will collapse.

This is the frenzy of Texas high school football.

However, there is a football team in Texas that is a little different. When they play on Friday night, their stands are pretty much empty, no band, no cheerleaders, no mass of parents or townsfolk wearing the school colors and waving banners and flags. They take the field without anyone cheering them on. When they get a first down, there is no deafening surge from the stands. When they score a touchdown, which rarely happens, there is no wild celebration behind them…only the individual shouts of satisfaction that come from the 14 players and their coach and the 20 or so people that are sitting on their side of the field. All of it seems hollow and muffled in contrast to the tidal wave of roars and drums and chants that come from the opposing side.

They are the Tornadoes of the Gainesville State School, a fenced, maximum-security facility of the Texas Youth Commission. The young men who go to Gainesville State are there because they have made some major mistakes in their lives. But the players who are on the team are there because they have worked hard and have disciplined themselves to meet the "criteria" that gives them the privilege to leave the facility and play football on Friday nights—always an away game for them—always a home game for their opponents—and almost always a loss. They don't have a weight program or training equipment or high-paid coaches and assistants. They don't have a large pool of players to draw from. The school has 275 boys, but many are too old or too young or can't or don't meet the "criteria" to play. And they don't have the support of a town and a mass of parents and family and reporters and bands and cheerleaders.

That is, until November 7th. Something changed. They played Grapevine Faith Christian School.

The way the Gainesville coach, Mark Williams, recounted it for me, it went something like this: Earlier in the week, he had received a call from Faith Christian coach, Kris Hogan, asking him if it would be okay if Faith formed a "spirit" line for his team when they ran on the field. Mark said, "Sure, that would be a real encouragement to the kids." He thought that the line would consist of a couple of the JV cheerleaders, but when they took the field, there were a hundred people in it and it stretched to the 40-yard line, filled with Faith parents, fans and varsity cheerleaders, complete with a banner at the end for them to burst through that read "Go Tornadoes!". And then, those parents and fans sat in the stands behind the Gainesville players and when the Tornadoes broke the huddle and went up to the line they could hear people cheering for them, by name. When they got a first down, "their" fans erupted.

You see, coach Hogan had sent an email out to the Faith Christian family asking them to consider doing something kind for these young men, many who didn't know what it meant to have a mom and dad who cared, many who felt the world was against them, not for them. Hogan asked that they simply send a message that these boys were "just as valuable as any other person on earth."

So half of the Faith Christian fans were now sitting on the visitor's side of the field, cheering for the Gainesville team, and in some cases, against their own sons.
–Cheering for a team decked out in old uniforms and helmets.
–Cheering for boys who wouldn't go home that night and have a smiling dad slap him on the back and feel his mom put her arms around him and say "I'm so proud of you son!"
–Cheering for the underdog.

Though the score was familiar (down 33-0 at half-time), this was a Friday night like no other for the Tornadoes. In the locker room, the players were confused.
"Why are they cheerin' for us, coach?"
"Because, men, they want to encourage you. They want you to know that they care about you…that you have value."
Coach Williams said the boys were stunned. For many of these kids, it may have been the first time that anyone had shown them, so visibly, unconditional love.

Williams then encouraged them to set a goal for the second half: to score a touchdown. And when they took the field again, with their fans cheering them on, they did. Williams said, "Everything started to click in the second half. Our passes started to click. Our sweeps and counters started to click." And they did score. Two touchdowns.

And the fans went wild.

I asked Coach Williams what the bus ride was like on the way home and he laughed and told me that they were all asleep—their bellies were full. After the game, the parents brought a whole bunch of food over to the guys: hamburgers, fries, candy, sodas…and included in the meal sack was a Bible and a letter of encouragement from a Faith Christian player. But then, he said, they formed a line for us out to the bus. And the parents patted them on the back and said, "Nice game" and "Look forward to seeing you guys next time."

The phone went dead at this point. I think Coach Williams was choking back some tears. And so was I.

I asked him one final question: "If you could tell other people one thing about your kids, what would it be?" He said, "Don't be scared of them. Treat them with respect. Yes, they've made some mistakes, but they are trying their best to turn their life around. Give 'em a shot at it."
As they left the field that night, Coach Williams grabbed Coach Hogan and said to him: "You'll never know what your people did for these kids tonight. You'll never, ever know."

When the world looks at a Christian, the number one thing they should see is what was shown on a high school football field last fall in Texas.

Jesus said: "Let your light shine among men is such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

Let us do so.

Thanks to Coach Hogan for caring and sending that email.
Thanks to Coach Williams for his dedication and love for his guys.