Everything was going pretty good last Friday.
For once, there was only one home game to cover that night. For once, the sun was starting to show again. And for once, Point photographer Chris Clark was actually in Sussex County, instead of Costa Rica, or Chile, or god knows where, doing god knows what, and on time for something without an excuse like “well, dude, I thought you said it started at 6:30,” or “I thought you said the game was at Tech,” even though I’ve told him to download the IR sports Team App like 50 times.
But with everything seeming to work out, I should have known that Murphy and that law of his wouldn’t lay low much longer and, sure enough, they didn’t.
As soon as I got to the sidelines for the first-ever varsity girls’ lacrosse game at Indian River, I got the news that Kealey Allison — a team co-captain/major advocate in getting the sport to the school/great replacement hotdog salesman when a certain Coastal Point sports reporter used to take Boogie board breaks back in the days of the state-line Weiner Wagon — had gone down with a knee injury just two days before and would likely be out for the season.
And even though her dad, Jamie, has his suspicions that she’s probably just faking it to get out of Coach Ayers’ unrelenting running routines at practice, and even though the Indians still made school history with a 13-8 win over Delaware Military Academy, I got to wondering what other teams ol’ Murph had both literally and figuratively injured over the years (I was gonna do another one of those list things that I always do).
But then it dawned on me, that this was the exact plot of Disney’s “The Mighty Ducks” (aside from like, 50 or so major differences).
It is possible that I’ve referenced “The Mighty Ducks,” or some variation of “The Mighty Ducks” (“D2: The Mighty Ducks,” “D3: The Mighty Ducks,” etc.), more times than I’ve told Chris Clark to download the Team App for Indian River sports so he’s not late for games.
There is, however, a good reason for it.
Ignoring the questionable logic of putting Emilio Estevez (“The Breakfast Club,” “D2: The Mighty Ducks”)— a self-proclaimed alcoholic fresh off a DUI arrest — in charge as a role model for a group of underprivileged youths (apparently it was either jail or 500 hours of community service…the ’90s were a different time, I guess… “free love” etc., etc.), you can learn a lot of lessons from that movie.
The main lesson being that when you get injured, you better not try and hide it. The Ducks’ star center, Adam Banks, learned that the hard way in “D2,” when he snapped his wrist and tried to keep it from Coach Bombay (Estevez) so he could play in the big game against Iceland.
It took Estevez awhile to figure it all out, probably because he was hung up on dodging ZUIs (Zambonis Under the Influence), but eventually ol’ Gordo caught on and benched Banks after some, most-likely Jager-fueled, life lesson.
It all worked out in the end, however, just like it has in every Disney movie ever made, aside from “Old Yeller,” as the Ducks skated off into the sunset while that “We Are the Champions” song played and we were left wondering how come it seems the old German guy that always sharpens the skates and gives the inspirational/half-in-German speech at the end is played by a different actor every time.
While the Indians won’t have any Hollywood grandeur on their side, they also won’t have any heavy German accents or Charlie Sheen’s brother holding them back this season as they look to overcome a tough ruling of Murphy’s Law.
And while Allison probably won’t be back on the field for the big game against Iceland, you can bet she will be for the sequel, when the Indians take the field with a year of varsity experience under their belts in 2017.