It was Banquet Night for Faith Christian.
Maroon table cloths covered round tables in the school cafeteria. There was gold trimming and hand-drawn poster boards celebrating the Boys Soccer Sectional Championship that the Eagles had won just a month prior. Underneath the monthly lunch menu, a collection of year-end awards decorated a rectangle card table at the front of the room.
It read: MOST IMPROVED PLAYER: COLE UNGARO.
Cole had begged his Mom, Tammy, for the family to make the 122-mile drive from Lafayette, Indiana to Chicago, Illinois to see his favorite player, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and the LA Galaxy in person. It would mean an early wake-up call and a two-hour drive through snowy conditions to get there in time for the afternoon kickoff. Tamara knocked on his door Saturday morning, thinking she’d need to rouse him out of bed, like most Saturday morning 17-year-olds. Instead, he was dressed and ready to go.
At the start of the season, Cole told the team they were going to go undefeated. After three years as a back-up forward, he’d made the decision to switch to goalkeeper. He could see the game and help organize the backline. With seven games to go and tournament play to follow, Cole broke his foot. He refused to have it X-rayed, as he didn’t want a doctor to rule him out for his final games as a senior. Each game he’d remove his protective boot and place his broken foot into soccer cleats. A broken bone wasn’t going to stop him from playing.
The conditions at Toyota Park were less than ideal. It was freezing. The coldest game on record didn’t stop Cole from watching every minute of the 90. Cole, in a fit of elation, jumped out of his seat when Ibrahimovic headed home the game’s lone goal on a floated cross from Ashley Cole. The hulking Swede outstretched his arms in celebration and drifted across the touchline, his eyes brimming with bravado and accomplishment. On the drive home, Cole was convinced that Zlatan made eye contact with him following the goal. His hero had recognized him. A mutual admiration between two men who love the game.
Cole had to change quickly. The year-end banquet started in an hour and he’d just finished refereeing a youth game. He tossed off his stripes and put on khakis and a button-up shirt. A slight breeze drifted across the Indiana plains as he drove towards school to celebrate a 13-2-4 season and a sectional championship. Cole smiled at the thought of an award with his name on it. He played, coached, officiated, watched. Soccer was his identity.
Driving west through suburban Lafayette there was a bite to the air. Somewhere along the East 100 North, Cole, smiling at what could have been, lost control of his car and collided with a tree. A broken body, deflated soccer balls and his eternal optimism were all pronounced dead at the scene. The flashing lights of Saturday night made shadowy figures of those who found the 17-year old ‘keeper who played through broken bones to chase the game he loved with abandon. Of the wreckage, even the remains were soccer salient.
It read: ZLATAN.
In large capital letters, an icon of sport rendered two dimensional in the strangest of places, under INDIANA and printed on colored reflective and adhesive sheeting.
On Wednesday, the Ungaro family, minus their soccer-loving son, Cole, loaded in their car and drove three hours and 35 minutes to watch the LA Galaxy take on the Columbus Crew. The sun was shining. It was a day Cole would have been proud of.
Following the game, Zlatan met with the family and signed Cole’s license plate and posed for photos with the mourning family.
Nearly everyone who was there could swear that this time it was Cole who was making eye contact with them from afar.
Smiling.
