Sidelines
BEFORE games, we went to the cemetery. The coach comes back
at Aloha StadiumThe bus would pull up, and we slowly filed out, stepping off one by one. We were there, heads bowed, silently, solemnly, whispering as we taped jerseys tighter, hushed as we tied up sleeves, adjusted thigh pads, stashed a piece of ti leaf in our belts. We went, and then we were gone, back on the road, lost in our thoughts on our way to the stadium, on the way to a collision in the night.
We on the Lahainaluna football team went because our coach took us, to pay our respects to Coach Neizman. Coach Neizman was gone now. And Coach Neizman had been his best friend.
Lanny Tihada told us a lot about his best friend that season. How he had been a great coach, a great friend, a great man. The kind we should all grow up to be. He told us how his friend had chased Mrs. Neizman, who was hopelessly out of his league, but Coach Neizman had chased and chased and chased again, until she finally relented and let him catch her. Never give up, our coach told us. Coach Neizman hadn't, and it was the best thing he had ever done.
There were long, soul-stirring talks at the end of practice, endless dedications, constant reminders, soaring and swirling emotions. His friend was gone, and this hurt our coach. And so it hurt us, too. When our tough coach talked about his best friend the stories took him away, he was warm, almost glowing. But when the tale was over you could feel the ache in his heart.
The kids were around. They were always around, more so, it seemed, after Coach Neizman's passing. They had to be. They were young, Coach Tihada was Uncle, and the Lahainaluna football team was family. And family sticks together in times like these. Family holds its own close.
Coach seemed to bring them in even closer, dropping his tough guy image to envelop them in his arms, sweeping them into the fold with his battered shoulders. He wanted them with the team, with him. They were his family. They were our family.
They were at the edge of the field, and there was giggling in the dorms late into the night in Summer Camp.
They were always there.
"Yeah, I remember," Ikaika Neizman said last night, sweating and battered and at the wrong end of a playoff loss.
Ikaika Neizman plays for the Lunas now. He's a senior now. He runs and tackles and kicks extra points, and he made things happen last night against Kahuku. And you can see his father in him.
"Very much," my coach said, smiling after the game like he never used to smile after a loss. He's there now, too. Still there. He never left.
He's watched his best friend's kids grow up, an assistant coach on the team that is still his family.
Last night Ikaika stretched, reached and plucked a long pass out of the sky, sprinting until his lungs burned, 70 yards in all, a beautiful play, and for a stolen moment Lahainaluna had Cinderella dreams.
That was Coach Neizman's boy. Our boy. It was almost too much for the heart to take.
Kalani Simpson's column runs Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays.
He can be reached at ksimpson@starbulletin.com