It's the inter-tertiary games now, and my floorball girls played today. The team was massively decimated by late withdrawals, and if you know the game of floorball, you'd know that it's a high intensity game which needs frequent substitutions (or lines) to keep players performing at the intensity that is needed to compete. The team has been "also-rans" for the longest time, and the game went the usual way: my girls tried hard but just weren't as technically gifted as the other team. In fact, it came to a point in time when even I got despondent with the score.
I've always been of the belief that as long as the team tries it's hardest, it doesn't matter whether they win or lose. As an educator, I love using sports as a classroom to reflect on the realities in life. There're battles out there that you just can't win, but as long as you try your best, there's nothing to regret. Even if they haven't done their best, what's more important is not that they've lost, but that they are able to learn from their mistakes. There'd be plenty of occasions when they'll be faced with that. Work on your weaknesses, play to your strengths.
Despite coming close to scoring on numerous occasions, we just kept conceding goals until the score became 0-13 in the final period of the game. I texted Kat and told her that it was starting to hurt.. the girls don't deserve the scoreline, but that's the reality. But you know what? Rather than hang their heads (well, one or two of them did, but they were soon back in the game), they kept trying, and hit the post a couple of times. Then they conceded again. Cruel, cruel, cruel.. My girls attacked fiercely again in the last minute.. shot.. and scored! The gallery erupted, and I just let out a big yell of elation. And even before I had time to reflect upon it, they attacked quickly from the restart and shot again, and the keeper fumbled the ball mere quarters of inches away from the goal, and came the final buzzer. Now I had time to reflect.
To be honest, I came close to shedding a tear, not just because we scored, but it was how the goal came about. There wasn't a single moment the girls stopped trying, despite conceding goals after goals. Sure they were disappointed, and it showed on their faces each goal but then it was back to business. They could've easily given up but yet, they persisted and then, they scored. Mind you, I'm not biased when I say that it's no soft goal. The opponents were desperately trying to defend their clean sheet, and the girls could've gotten 2 goals.
I've been in education for a long time, and been playing competitive sports for even longer, and I'm not ashamed to say that tonight, my girls sure taught me a pretty damned good lesson, and I'm proud to have that role reversed on me. They knew that they were a much weaker team than others, but they were playing for each other, and they knew they couldn't let their team mates down. Ok, I turned a joyous post-game atmosphere into a tearful one when I shared with them how I felt. Yeah, the kill-joy that I am.
As I'd told my girls, it's day like these, that I love what I do, and today, it's not what I did for them, it's the lesson THEY taught me. Everyone loves a winner, but I'd take my group of fighting "also-rans" anyday.
