The Brag Thread

A little note on my kid. He's had a run of bad luck recently. Was dropped from his United team when they moved up to silver because of ADHD issues. I put him on a much weaker team so that he could work through those issues but the team struggled to assemble and then to thrive at first. He got a small concussion at camp over the summer and was out for several weeks. In one tournament, a defender fell over his leg and he was on crutches for a week after. And for the tournament on labor day he got sick with a cold but played anyway, feeling lousy for his first game.

18 shots on target. Let in only 3...2 there was nothing he can really do about. Team also came together and lost out on first place by one goal. He also really came together, so I was very happy for him.
 
18 shots on target. Let in only 3...2 there was nothing he can really do about. Team also came together and lost out on first place by one goal. He also really came together, so I was very happy for him.
Great job. A lot easier to improve and gain experience when you face that many shots, on target on not.

New brag for my kid. As a freshman she made the varsity team in basketball at her High School. :D
 
A little note on my kid. He's had a run of bad luck recently. Was dropped from his United team when they moved up to silver because of ADHD issues. I put him on a much weaker team so that he could work through those issues but the team struggled to assemble and then to thrive at first. He got a small concussion at camp over the summer and was out for several weeks. In one tournament, a defender fell over his leg and he was on crutches for a week after. And for the tournament on labor day he got sick with a cold but played anyway, feeling lousy for his first game.

18 shots on target. Let in only 3...2 there was nothing he can really do about. Team also came together and lost out on first place by one goal. He also really came together, so I was very happy for him.

Oh man, that does sound like he's going through a rough patch, but a great way to start the climb to out of the rough patch!! That's great for your son! Congratulations on what sounds like an exciting game and a little stressful on your GK, but what better way to improve as a GK then when you're facing so many shots!

Hoping that your son and his team continue to come together and develop and get stronger as a team! Also hope he feels better it stinks when the kids play when they don't feel well...
 
I have an awesome brag!!!

My son, 2003 keeper, was hit in the groin last fall with an extremely hard kick in practice. He was rushed to the ER for emergency surgery, where tests eventually revealed he had stage 3 testicular cancer. After 7 months of chemotherapy, 5 surgeries and a ton of fight, he was pronounced in remission! He trained and trained to get his body back at full strength, physically and mentally. And now he is the starting keeper on his ECNL team! He is my warrior and Im so proud of him every day!!!
 
I have an awesome brag!!!

My son, 2003 keeper, was hit in the groin last fall with an extremely hard kick in practice. He was rushed to the ER for emergency surgery, where tests eventually revealed he had stage 3 testicular cancer. After 7 months of chemotherapy, 5 surgeries and a ton of fight, he was pronounced in remission! He trained and trained to get his body back at full strength, physically and mentally. And now he is the starting keeper on his ECNL team! He is my warrior and Im so proud of him every day!!!

I can’t even express to you how emotional this made me feel! By far one of the best brags I’ve ever heard! Please keep us posted on his progress and good luck to him!!!!
 
I have an awesome brag!!!

My son, 2003 keeper, was hit in the groin last fall with an extremely hard kick in practice. He was rushed to the ER for emergency surgery, where tests eventually revealed he had stage 3 testicular cancer. After 7 months of chemotherapy, 5 surgeries and a ton of fight, he was pronounced in remission! He trained and trained to get his body back at full strength, physically and mentally. And now he is the starting keeper on his ECNL team! He is my warrior and Im so proud of him every day!!!

Never thought I'd call a guy who gets smacked in the nuts lucky but wow, that's some luck right there (and after the luck of finding it your son is a total beast to battle and defeat cancer!!). Thx for sharing this story.
 
I have an awesome brag!!!

My son, 2003 keeper, was hit in the groin last fall with an extremely hard kick in practice. He was rushed to the ER for emergency surgery, where tests eventually revealed he had stage 3 testicular cancer. After 7 months of chemotherapy, 5 surgeries and a ton of fight, he was pronounced in remission! He trained and trained to get his body back at full strength, physically and mentally. And now he is the starting keeper on his ECNL team! He is my warrior and Im so proud of him every day!!!
I think this may be the ultimate brag!! I can't imagine what it must have been like as a parent to go through that then alone your son, so a million times over I say He is the ultimate warrior!!!! Continued strength, success and blessings to him and your family always!!! what a great post!
 
I think this may be the ultimate brag!! I can't imagine what it must have been like as a parent to go through that then alone your son, so a million times over I say He is the ultimate warrior!!!! Continued strength, success and blessings to him and your family always!!! what a great post!

Just gotta say - everything happens for a reason. From a perspective of faith, nothing happens as a coincidence. God used a creative way to reveal an issue that could have gone unnoticed. May God continue to enrich and bless your son, give him strength, and 'keeper' him healthy :) Jeremiah 29:11!
 
I have an awesome brag!!!

My son, 2003 keeper, was hit in the groin last fall with an extremely hard kick in practice. He was rushed to the ER for emergency surgery, where tests eventually revealed he had stage 3 testicular cancer. After 7 months of chemotherapy, 5 surgeries and a ton of fight, he was pronounced in remission! He trained and trained to get his body back at full strength, physically and mentally. And now he is the starting keeper on his ECNL team! He is my warrior and Im so proud of him every day!!!

Wow! Stage 3?! Who knew that a hit in the groin could be considered a blessing! Keepers are gritty, and your son is obviously a natural Keeper! Great brag! Wishing him continued health and strength!
 
It has been a long time coming that I could finally get a video of my G2006 daughter without the camera only capturing the grass. This video also depicts how psycho I am because you can hear my erratic breathing.
This is playoff PK's. My daughter has been playing on 2 Mexican League boys teams in addition to her club team. To say my weekends are all about soccer is an understatement. She loves it and I love watching her!
 
At its best, youth soccer is a place where young boys and girls learn some of the mental toughness, work ethic, and positive mentality necessary to lead successful, fulfilling lives as adults. If your child is able to capitalize on that experience, make life-long friends, inspire and help others, and use their athletic talents to help get a college education, it's all gravy. Anyone who's read my posts on this forum knows I have plenty of criticisms of youth club soccer, but this post is all about the gratitude for what it has given my daughter, and by extension, given us as parents.

Today we're loading up the car and driving my GK to drop her off at college for her freshman year. Under normal circumstances, she would have been on campus already, practicing with the team and eyeing her chance at seeing the field in her first college games. Under normal circumstances, I'd have already posted brags here about how her team finished their final season of club soccer and how awesome her coach and teammates and team parents had been, and how everyone needs to enjoy this time while they can because it's over before you know it. But these aren't normal circumstances. It's been a tough year for everyone. 2020 is not for the faint of heart nor for the rigid of mind. But I would wager that as far as youth soccer goes, the class of '20 has had it worst of all. This is the class that got caught in no-man's land with NCAA recruiting changes. This is the class that endured the birth-year change at the most critical point between youngers and olders, seeing long-standing teams broken up and coaching changes beyond even the normal carousel of club soccer. This is the class that got the brunt of every major league change and destabilizing club moves since the SCDSL broke up the CSL monopoly; ending with the girls DA fiasco. It's been brutal. Losing their graduation, losing prom, losing their goodbyes to their teams and coaches, losing their freshman year experience, losing their freshman soccer seasons for those who went on to potentially play at the next level.

But she's a goalkeeper. This is what she's trained to do. You see the play shifting in front of you; the counter attack is sudden. The shot comes from an unexpected angle; the ball takes a deflection. The ref calls "hand ball" in the box on your defender when the ball clearly hit her upper arm, close to her body. The PK taker feints, comes to a near stop to pull you off the line and goes the other way. You react and make the save, but the ref blows the whistle and gives them a re-take because someone ran into the box too early. The ball goes in the net. It's not fair. But you can't dwell on that. You have to erase it. Make the next play. See the next shot. Make the next save.

She's a goalkeeper. She knows what losing feels like. She knows getting beat. She knows what it's like to put in 2x the practice time because you're expected to make every team practice and every club GK workout AND do private training on your own. She knows what it's like to get yanked in the middle of a game for a bad play; to get cut from the team. Been there done that. Knocked to the ground. Trampled. Kicked in the head. And always getting back up.

She's a goalkeeper. Goalkeepers don't get the glory... not often, anyway. But that's okay. She doesn't do it for the glory. She does it because everyone depends on her to do her job, and do it well at all times, to never let up, and she likes it that way.

She's a goalkeeper. Goalkeepers react to things that are outside of their control, and do everything in their power to get it back under their control. Goalkeepers have to be the most resilient, most mentally tough players on the field. And never has there been a time in our lives that required more resilience, more mental toughness.

I'm bragging today on my kid today, not because she's a stud athlete who got recruited to play college soccer, or got a scholarship, or because she was an ODP selection, or because she played in a national elite league, or won National Cup or Surf Cup, or worked as an intern using soccer as an outreach to underprivileged girls in another country in her off seasons, or raised $2000 in donations to provide equipment for those girls, or because she played on the "A" team, or won a PK shoot-out. I'm bragging on her because she lost her first 10 club soccer games by an average score of 11-1, got cut, got demoted to the "B" team, got pulled in a big game for letting in howlers, got trampled, kicked in the head, lost numerous PK shootouts, lost tournaments, lost playoff games, was overlooked by college coaches for months while her teammates committed to school after school, and then lost her entire final season, her prom, and her graduation to COVID19, and and still accomplished all of that above. She is a bright, shining hope for the future, and it simultaneously breaks my heart to lose her irrepressible presence in our house, and fills it with joy to see her step between the goal posts on the field of life. And even if she never sets foot on a soccer field again, I'll be forever grateful for everything that the game, her teammates, and especially her coaches have given her to help prepare her for this crazy, unpredictable, sometimes ugly, and sometimes beautiful, life.

Thanks to everyone on this forum (except one or two who will go unnamed ;) ) for all your encouragement and knowledge and guidance. I'll do my best to pay it forward to the newbies.

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Maybe it's not a "brag" per se, but after almost a year and a half of not being able to really play the sport she loves, my DD's college finally got the ok for full practices. They had already canceled all of their scheduled spring games & local scrimmages, so I use the word "play" loosely, but the fact that this week she finally got to get in the pipes on a full sized field with 11 v 11 action was enough for this dad. Even if it was just playing against her own teammates, was a truly cathartic moment for her. After a semester and a half of miserable, depressed, angst-ridden phone calls home, Covid scares and mental health issues related to losing her senior HS year and college Freshman season, and then the past month of anxiety leading up to her return from such a horrible lay-off, my keeper called the other day with pure joy in her voice after her first 2 hour full practice, exhausted but finally back in her element. From the first warm up to the last scrimmage, diving all over the place, getting dirty, getting cleated, yelling to her defenders, making great plays that had her teammates hollering, letting in a soft one that should have been stopped and yelling at herself... every single bit of it was overlaid with just pure, unmitigated euphoria. I cannot wait till the Fall when I can finally watch her play a real game in person.
 
Maybe it's not a "brag" per se, but after almost a year and a half of not being able to really play the sport she loves, my DD's college finally got the ok for full practices. They had already canceled all of their scheduled spring games & local scrimmages, so I use the word "play" loosely, but the fact that this week she finally got to get in the pipes on a full sized field with 11 v 11 action was enough for this dad. Even if it was just playing against her own teammates, was a truly cathartic moment for her. After a semester and a half of miserable, depressed, angst-ridden phone calls home, Covid scares and mental health issues related to losing her senior HS year and college Freshman season, and then the past month of anxiety leading up to her return from such a horrible lay-off, my keeper called the other day with pure joy in her voice after her first 2 hour full practice, exhausted but finally back in her element. From the first warm up to the last scrimmage, diving all over the place, getting dirty, getting cleated, yelling to her defenders, making great plays that had her teammates hollering, letting in a soft one that should have been stopped and yelling at herself... every single bit of it was overlaid with just pure, unmitigated euphoria. I cannot wait till the Fall when I can finally watch her play a real game in person.
Will she be granted an extra year of eligibility?
 
My daughter tore her ACL, LCL, Meniscus and had fractures of her tibia and femur. It was a long recovery and she is back stronger than she was before. Covid allowed her to have some extra months to train. She wrote the below post a few month's ago and we are so proud of her.


One year ago today I had reconstructive surgery on my knee. I always heard stories of soccer players tearing their ACL. I prayed and prayed that day would never come for me. On August 17, 2019 during my club scrimmage, I ended up tearing my ACL, LCL and meniscus and fractures. Soccer, is much more than a sport to me! Hearing the doctor tell me that I wouldn’t be able to play the game that I love, and have loved the past 12 years of my life, broke my heart! Having a major injury, as an athlete, is something that you don’t understand the effects until it happens to you. I felt so alone no matter how many times someone told me it was all going to be okay. Going from practicing 4 times a week and games every weekend with club, to training on my own and learning how to walk and run again, was a big change. No matter what, I knew that I wanted to get back to soccer and I was going to do whatever it took. It has definitely not been an easy recovery!
Finally, thanks to the countless hours of physical therapy, biomechanical training, lots of Advil and MOST IMPORTANTLY my family, coaches and friends! I am a couple weeks away from being able to be released for contact. Thirteen months and I will be back on the soccer field at 100%! If I could go back and change anything, I wouldn’t! The scar on my left knee is much more than just a scar. It reminds me everyday that hard work and dedication pay off and it shows how far I have come. I am so proud of myself for not giving up when times were rough and continuing to believe that everything happens for a reason.
I can't wait to play soccer again!
#JUST A MINOR SETBACK FOR A MAJOR COMEBACK!
 
My daughter tore her ACL, LCL, Meniscus and had fractures of her tibia and femur. It was a long recovery and she is back stronger than she was before. Covid allowed her to have some extra months to train. She wrote the below post a few month's ago and we are so proud of her.


One year ago today I had reconstructive surgery on my knee. I always heard stories of soccer players tearing their ACL. I prayed and prayed that day would never come for me. On August 17, 2019 during my club scrimmage, I ended up tearing my ACL, LCL and meniscus and fractures. Soccer, is much more than a sport to me! Hearing the doctor tell me that I wouldn’t be able to play the game that I love, and have loved the past 12 years of my life, broke my heart! Having a major injury, as an athlete, is something that you don’t understand the effects until it happens to you. I felt so alone no matter how many times someone told me it was all going to be okay. Going from practicing 4 times a week and games every weekend with club, to training on my own and learning how to walk and run again, was a big change. No matter what, I knew that I wanted to get back to soccer and I was going to do whatever it took. It has definitely not been an easy recovery!
Finally, thanks to the countless hours of physical therapy, biomechanical training, lots of Advil and MOST IMPORTANTLY my family, coaches and friends! I am a couple weeks away from being able to be released for contact. Thirteen months and I will be back on the soccer field at 100%! If I could go back and change anything, I wouldn’t! The scar on my left knee is much more than just a scar. It reminds me everyday that hard work and dedication pay off and it shows how far I have come. I am so proud of myself for not giving up when times were rough and continuing to believe that everything happens for a reason.
I can't wait to play soccer again!
#JUST A MINOR SETBACK FOR A MAJOR COMEBACK!

Good for her! My daughter has just been through a similar journey (very similar time frame) and is back on the field and has earned conference defensive honors twice. Best of luck to your DD...I know how tough mentally and physically it is to come back from such a catastrophic knee injury!
 
Good for her! My daughter has just been through a similar journey (very similar time frame) and is back on the field and has earned conference defensive honors twice. Best of luck to your DD...I know how tough mentally and physically it is to come back from such a catastrophic knee injury!
Congratulations to your daughter. Such an accomplishment after an injury like that.
 
Will she be granted an extra year of eligibility?
Yes, she will. Interestingly, though, most of the seniors on her team have decided to graduate and move on rather than return for one more season. I think when you get to that point in your schooling, you're so eager to get started with "real" life, you don't want to delay it, even for one more season of soccer. It will be interesting to see if she and the other younger players follow suit when they get to that point.
 
Yes, she will. Interestingly, though, most of the seniors on her team have decided to graduate and move on rather than return for one more season. I think when you get to that point in your schooling, you're so eager to get started with "real" life, you don't want to delay it, even for one more season of soccer. It will be interesting to see if she and the other younger players follow suit when they get to that point.
If anyone planning to continue with masters, that's 1 year of playing - I would take that.
 
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