Walking the Walk

You hear the sounds, see the images, and, if the occasion warrants, feel the emotion, for better or worse, as if the event had actually occurred earlier that day.

 

Flash back, if you will, to one such moment in the annals of Collegiate athletics, the final sequence of the 2002 VISAA field hockey tournament championship game between the Cougars and St. Stephen’s-St. Agnes contested with unrelenting spirit and zeal on the playing fields of The Steward School.

 

Only seconds remained in regulation, and the squads were locked in a scoreless tie when the Saints made one final, frenetic charge to the Collegiate goal.

 

The roar from the passionate throngs cheering both sides was deafening, and just as the final horn was sounding, a SSSA player delivered a shot into the cage that eluded the Collegiate goalie.

 

The sound of the final horn was barely discernible because of the din. Many in attendance never heard it above the roar.

The official closest to the goal with responsibility for the call signaled “no goal.” Her view was that the ball had not crossed the end line when the clock ticked to zero. The other referee overruled her.

 

“The question was, did the ball go in before or after the buzzer?” said Karen Doxey, who headed the Collegiate field hockey program for 35 years until her retirement following the 2021 season. “Our goalkeeper was out a little bit. The shot went past her. I heard the buzzer. Then it went in the cage.”

 

As the Saints’ fans rejoiced, the Cougar partisans expressed shock and disbelief. Amidst the tumult, Doxey, ever composed, approached the officials.

 “Are you sure the ball went over the line before the horn went off?” she asked.

 

Their answer? “Well, it was past the goal keeper.”

 

Then they added, “We’ve got to call it a goal.”

 

Doxey returned to her team and conveyed the news.

 

“This is how it is,” she recalls saying. “The officials’ word is final. I know there’s some question. They have to go with their best judgment.”

 

To say her girls were disappointed and incredulous is an understatement. They were on top of their game, after all. They had gone undefeated (9-0) in the League of Independent Schools. They had won the league tournament. They were the defending state champ and had an 18-1 record before that afternoon.   

 

“I remember a girl saying, ‘But this was our game. We earned this,’” Dox recalled. “I said something like, ‘You have to earn it that day. Things don’t always go our way.’”

 

The experience hurt badly. How could it not? You control what you can control, however. You don’t whine. You don’t complain. You pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and move on the best you can.

 

“I didn’t even want to go back and look at the tape of the game,” Doxey said. “It was a couple of years, and I couldn’t tell. The filming back then was hazy, and the ball is three inches wide.”

 

While the memory might have faded just a bit, the message surely hasn’t. The true test of character, you see, is not the event. It’s how you handle the event. Talking the talk means nothing unless you also walk the walk.

 

“Karen is one of the most competitive people I’ve ever known, but I’ve never seen her desire to win trump sportsmanship and fair play,” said Hugh Harrison, whose daughters Courtney Harrison Bradenham ‘02 and Sarah Harrison Strasser ’05 played hockey for the Cougars. “Her players embrace and reflect her values. When looking at games from the perspective of a parent and supporter of Collegiate School, I can never remember a single Ooh-I-wish-I-hadn’t-seen-that action or reaction by Karen or any of her players.”

 

In the aftermath of that championship game, Dox certainly fielded plenty of questions.

 

“Karen never once blamed the loss on the ref’s call and invariably responded in her typical Karen way, ‘Well, one call didn’t lose the game’ or ‘We had our chances,’” Harrison added. “In true Karen form, she turned it into a valuable lesson on sportsmanship for her players and their parents.”

 

Ginnie Friddell Kurtz ’04 was a starting left forward and a second team All-Metro selection that year. She remembers the moment well.

 

“We were devastated,” she said. “I remember the players questioning the refs and wanting to protest the call. That was not what Coach Doxey and M.H. (Bartzen, her longtime assistant) were modeling. That really disappointing moment stung so much. They let us feel it, but they never made it about the refs. They always prioritized sportsmanship. That means that you have to deal with tough losses. That’s part of playing the game.”

   ~Weldon Bradshaw