How sweet of the Lord that though Ian graduated Friday night, the memories were not over yet! Saturday night we played Madison at 7:00 at DHS JC Sawyer Stadium to determine whether or not we would proceed to State. The last time Madison lost in their regular season, it was to “some team in West Tennessee”: Dyersburg Trojans. 2-1. March 24. Madison won 3rd place at State last year and had nine of their starters return this year.
But for the Dyersburg Trojans, this has been the most unlikely of soccer seasons with the most unlikely of soccer teams, and I’m reminded of how the Lord loves to take the small things and use them to display His glory. The beauty of strength in weakness. It is as beautiful and poetic as Sam being the hero in The Lord of the Rings or David vs. Goliath. God is the Best Storyteller, and the best stories are the true ones.
For us personally, I think of Ian Bumpas, who has loved soccer since he was three and began playing at the Y, and he was so fast and so good that people would ask us if we worked with him at home. Hahaha! One friend recalled on Facebook this past weekend that she remembered little Ian as fast as lightning, while the other kids were picking clovers in the grass.
Ian’s other starting senior is Andrew Collier. Ian and Andrew became friends when Ian knew he was not going to kick for DHS anymore. Ian had been through kicking camp, so he recruited Andrew to kick and began getting together with him and teaching him everything he’d learned. Such a sweet friendship between these two guys developed, and Andrew has been an AMAZING kicker for DHS. I don’t remember all the awards and titles, but I’ll just say, he turned out to be one of the finest high school kickers in the state.
At the beginning of the season, Andrew and Ian were our only starting seniors, so of course, our expectations were not very high for this team. And Ian hadn’t played in three years. We didn’t know what to expect.
But another senior earned a starting position: Malik Johnson, who had never played soccer before this year a day in his life. A football player who’ll be headed to play college football in the fall just decided to come out and give soccer a try. But he is so physical. And we have literally watched him develop foot skills and passing skills on the field before our eyes!
And I think of junior Yohannes Mesfin, whose parents Hirchie and Sara Schaffner, literally found him in a garbage dump in Ethiopia when they were on a mission trip to Ethiopia. They went back for him the summer before Ian’s sophomore year and adopted him. He didn’t speak a word of English, but he knew how to play soccer.
Then there’s Bryce Gilmore, a junior. The season had already started when we learned about this young man who had just moved to Lake County from Memphis, who’d grown up playing club soccer as keeper. Coach Greg said he was the most respectful, well-mannered young man. His family had disintegrated and he’d moved to Lake County to live with an older cousin and her husband, but Lake Co doesn’t have soccer. Thankfully, their new principal, Mrs. Decker, had just left DHS and has a strong relationship with our folks, and our boards were able to work it out legally for Bryce to play for us. Since we already had a keeper with sophomore Elliott Walden, Bryce began playing defense, and as a former keeper, he totally understands how to defend the goal to support the keeper.
The rest of our usual starters are sophomores and freshman!! And YET, there we were on Saturday night, undefeated in the district for the first time since 2009. #1 in the District and Regional champions. The first time that’s ever happened in the same year. And we competed Saturday night to see if we would go to proceed to the State competition.
And I think of our amazing coaching staff. Coach Greg Stapleton who VOLUNTEERS as coach!!! Works for BASF, presumably so he can coach soccer!! Hahaha! Then “Nuts” Bradley Greer, who also volunteers as coach, who played for the Trojans, and I think graduated in 2006, right in the middle of the season suffered a heart attack. But he was back with our guys the first chance he got. And Musa Manneh, who played professional soccer for Gambia and teaches math at DHS. He has quite the story himself. And then this year track coach Stephen Thomas who also teaches at DHS began volunteering his time as a soccer coach and had our guys warming up before the official practice could begin by running two miles a day. Each day he would pair the fastest runners with those who were not as fast, and every day the guys were paired with someone different, fostering opportunities for the guys to get to know each other which I’m convinced led to stronger relationships and ultimately greater teamwork. God has brought together a group of men who have had such a beautiful influence on our young men, who have imparted so much more than just soccer to them.
It has been so beautiful to see the transformation of this team in really playing together as a TEAM!!!! No hot shots or big egos or ball hogs! These guys have truly played together in a way I have never witnessed before.
Ian asked me some time around the middle of the season if I thought there might be any way his uncle, my brother who fixed his knee, might could ever see him play soccer. I told him I knew he’d love to, but I didn’t think it was likely since he lives in Chattanooga and is so busy with surgery, plus he’s on staff with sports teams and teaches orthopedic residents. But I asked Jad, and he said, well, maybe if they make it to State…Since it’s only about a two hour drive…
But, ever since then, I’d been praying that we’d make it to State. It was a stretch, but with God, I knew all things were possible.
Oh, the prayers I prayed!!!
And I know I was not alone.
Did other teams and their parents pray too?
Certainly.
Was it God’s will for us to go to State?
Before Saturday night, I didn’t know.
But I am SO SO SO thankful that my mom and my sister got to see Ian play Thursday night. And to hear Elizabeth Bumpas sing the national anthem. And not just any game either. The most exciting game EVER.
They got to see Ian’s bullet kick when he scored the first goal early in the game.
They got to feel the tension throughout the rest of the game after Lexington scored and we sat tied 1-1 until we went into OT.
They got to feel the agony of what looked like defeat after Lexington scored in the second OT half and we had less than two minutes left and they were ahead 2-1.
They got to feel the HOPE and EXCITEMENT and JOY when sophomore Coleman Self scored with less than two minutes left, tying it up 2-2.
And then the PKs…
For Ian, who is known for his boot or kick, and sophomore Aaron Stapleton, Coach Greg’s son, who began playing with varsity when he was in middle school, to both miss the goal on their attempts while Lexington made their first three, bringing the game to what we thought was a sure loss at that moment with the score at 5-2. Oh the agony as our hearts melted within us!!
But then Bryce Gilmore scored, moving us forward with 5-3.
And then Elliott Walden blocked Lexington’s next kick, holding them at 5!
And then Yohannes Mesfin scored, inching us forward to 5-4.
And then their keeper, Captain America, who is being heavily recruited by colleges, MISSED the GOAL. HOW in the WORLD DID THAT HAPPEN? No explanation. Divine intervention?
It is a great mystery how God sovereignly controls all things, and yet at the same time man freely moves about. And God uses it all ultimately for our good and for His glory.
And then Andrew Collier scored, tying us at 5-5!
And then Lexington missed again thanks to Elliott Walden!!!!!
Could it be?
Was this really happening?????
YES!!!!
Coleman Self, whose goal at the end of the second OT half kept us in the game, SCORED, and DYERSBURG WON REGIONALS!!!!
Through middle school at CCA, he looked forward to the day that he’d be able to play at DHS. Those dreams were shattered in August of his freshman year during football practice when he tore his ACL after having been talked into kicking for the football team, and again his sophomore year after having kicked all season of football, kicking into the end zone almost every time, when they made it to the playoffs and he tore it again at the beginning of the second half.
His surgeon, my brother, told him he should never play again as a third tear would require two surgeries–the first a bone graft and then six months later the surgery actually connecting the ligament to the bone, and that he’d be looking at quality of life issues for the rest of his life.
Ian so loved soccer, he remained a manager for the Trojans throughout high school, and I don’t think he missed a practice or a game. After we lost to Lexington last year, knocking us out of moving forward to Regionals, Ian begged us to let him make his own decision about playing. He said he understood the risks, but it was his life. We talked to my brother and agreed. And prayed for the Lord’s protection.
What a glorious story the Lord had written already.
I wrote then that if it ended there it would be beautiful, that I was praising Him and will praise Him still.
But my prayer was that we would win and that Ian would get to have his dream come true of my brother getting to see him play soccer.
Ian has told me several times that his favorite passage is Isaiah 40:28-31, which I thought was cool because I’d memorized it back when I was in college. I’ve thought about those words lately though from his perspective, and they’ve taken on a whole new meaning.
“Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary and to those who lack might, He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired and vigorous young men stumble and fall, yet those who wait upon the Lord will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not become tired. They will walk and not become weary.”
After I posted this story on Facebook, many people felt that it was almost destined that we win—that this was so much like a story that we were destined to have that kind of a happy ending. And don’t we all long for happy endings?
Every Trojan on the field and in the stands wanted to see us go to State.
Evidently God wanted something more for us. Something more for our young men.
It began to hit me Sunday morning when I heard someone ask the question in a completely unrelated subject: “How do we grow the most? Through wins or losses?” He went on to say that God is interested in a lot more than our happiness—He’s interested in our growth. And He wants our relationship with Him to be real and intimate.
Ian told me that he told Coach Stephen and Andrew that he thought one of the reasons he missed the first PK in the Regional game is because God wanted to humble him. Wow. How many 17 year-olds have that much insight or get the opportunities to gain insight like that? As with his other loss and grief, God used that experience to draw him deeper to Himself.
This journey with all its life lessons and friendships have shown me that there’s so much more to soccer and sports than soccer and sports.
And so the season ends with glory. No, not with us traveling to State, but with the glory of a team that learned to work together and to support one another and trust each other. And to see the beauty of the little team that could.
And I’m so thankful that Ian got to play Trojan soccer.