Championship is sometimes one-on-one

Journalism is the activity of writing for news organizations.
We observe and report, and in most cases, we do so with some objective posture. Many times it requires patience, and it almost always requires someone else to be part of the story. I’ll get to why that’s relevant here.
On Monday night I was covering a typical soccer game at Baxter Sports Complex. It was a frustrating game for Hounds' fans. Connections weren’t happening well and the Bloodhound boys couldn’t sustain possessions. A freshman keeper was worked over pretty good with more than a dozen shots on goal in the second half alone, and Fort Madison lost 4-0.
Obviously, its less fun to do a post-game with a coach after they lose a game that, according to records, they should’ve won. But records don’t mean anything on any given night and that’s a message coaches give to kids almost daily.
So why does this typical soccer game get into my Beside The Point? Good question. Glad you asked in your head while coffee smoke wafts up from your cup, or you rolled on your side reading from your phone in bed. Either way, good morning.
This soccer game, to me, was anything but typical. I usually meander around the coach and team after the game as they do a team huddle and recap. Some are longer than others, but most of the time I get a few tips on what strategies worked or failed, and get a sense of where the coaches' heads are at for post-game questions.
This post-game huddle was very short. Just a statement. “It just wasn’t our night.” They huddled and did a “breakdown” and that was that. I walked in to grab the coach and Kevin Wellman’s attention was on something else.
One athlete, who was frustrated and already in street clothes, was headed out. The frustration was legit as this was a game the Hounds wanted to win, but Monday games, especially following prom weekend, can be a little stale.
Wellman stopped this young student athlete, knowing that I was waiting in the wings for a quick interview. I paced around in the grass, and looked at my phone because I didn’t want to eavesdrop, or even to be seen as possibly eavesdropping. I started a conversation with an assistant coach and then I just leaned against a light pole.
I wasn’t listening to their conversation, that would be bush league. I thought a couple times about leaving and just getting some comments from him via email or the phone. But then I thought about something. Who would I be to leave, while he was spending time working with a student-athlete, a kid, who was struggling with something?
I stayed and began to think about what was transpiring.
In Fort Madison, we rarely see championship teams or championship performances. In my time, I’ve seen one. Harlan Steffensmeier. Holy Trinity’s volleyball team always has a sense of something special, Central Lee’s baseball team has teased us a bit over the years, but the rest of our coverage is localized. We have great moments, but usually our last interview of a season is one of a loss.
So sometimes the side stories become the championships. Kevin Wellman on Monday night was a champion. And I told him as much.
For a coach to take 20 minutes one-on-one with a student athlete - and for that athlete to stand there and make a defense of his position and then have a respectful exchange with the coach was something to take in.
This athlete didn’t want to talk and tried to walk away, but Kevin asked him to stop. At that point, I knew I was going to be waiting for a bit. We’re not going to use anything said here because it clearly wasn’t meant for public consumption, but the actions of a coach and an athlete in a time when we see less-than-exemplary behavior, should be discussed.
This was a coach who put a heavy loss aside. A loss that may have hurt their chance for a conference title wasn’t in his mind. It was this student-athlete and issue that had surfaced that was important enough for a coach to stop, put the next game taking place on the field at the time, out of his head, and spend time with a student.
In the real world, our students have such a minimal chance of making a living playing a game. We’re lucky if some of the ridiculous costs of education gets paid. So what happens is coaches teach a sport, but here in Fort Madison, we see regularly how they teach something else. How to be a person. How to deal with adversity, and how to deal with not always winning.
Twenty minutes I leaned against a light pole. I wasn’t going anywhere because, if Kevin Wellman wants to take an hour coaching outside of the game, that deserves some patience from the rest of us.
I don’t know if that athlete was comforted or calmed and I’m not sure it matters, although I hope he was.
I know coaches who would have let that kid walk off angry and dealt with it later because other commitments were at hand – a jayvee game, other athletes needing a moment, or even a reporter hanging around waiting for a comment.
What has to be said is that we have some of the best coaches in the state. I told Kevin what I witnessed that night by him was very impressive. He was humble, as anyone who knows Kevin would expect. But champions are right in front of us and on this one Sunday morning, we’re giving that the headline, and that really is Beside the Point.
Charles Vandenberg is editor and co-owner of Pen City Current and can be reached at Charles.V@PenCityCurrent.com.