The Underdogs

by Mike Lupica

  No gain.

  The quarterback did try to throw on third-and-long, rolling to his right, but Jeremiah Keating read the play perfectly, dropped back on the tight end, knocked the ball down.

  Three and out. The Panthers brought in their punter. Will and Tim dropped back, Tim just there to block. Will looked over at their sideline. Dick Keenan still had his arms crossed in front of him. But something about his face had changed now. He didn’t look happy. Will wondered if anything made this guy happy. But there was definitely something different.

  Will thought: He’s like my dad.

  He’s back on the field finally and he likes it.

  Will got off a good return, taking the ball back to midfield. Chris faked it to Will on first down, straightened up, hit Toby for six yards. But then Will got caught in the backfield for a five-yard loss, only got eight on third down.

  They had to punt now, Will worrying as they did that they might have handed momentum right back to the Panthers. Only they hadn’t. Because they weren’t beating the Bulldogs with the option anymore, couldn’t solve the new defensive formation, mostly couldn’t get through or around Toby Keenan, who played like he was on some kind of mission now. He made all three tackles on the Panthers’ next series, forced them to punt again.

  Still 19–14. Four minutes left now. Bulldogs’ ball on their forty.

  Right before Chris called the first-down play in the huddle, a 38 Toss to Will, Tim put his hands on Will’s shoulders and said, “Thrill? You think you could win this sucker for me?”

  “We all can,” Will said.

  And then gained twenty yards on 38 Toss. From their forty to the Becker Falls forty, just like that. Chris handed it to Will now on a counter-play. He gained eight more yards. Then four more on a direct-snap Wildcat play his dad had installed for today’s game. Another first down. Ball moving, chains moving. The Panthers had called two of their time-outs already. They had one left.

  Tim pointed that out in the huddle.

  “They can stop the clock one more time,” Will said. “Just not us.”

  They ran 38 Toss again, and it was as if the Panthers hadn’t seen it all day. This time Will took it all the way to their fourteen.

  Minute and a half left.

  Now the Panthers called their last time-out.

  It was all Will Tyler now. He knew it; the Panthers knew it. He carried up the middle for six yards, then ran off-tackle for four more. First-and-goal. He could have gotten a yard or two more but had no chance to get into the end zone. Decided to stay inbounds. Let the clock run.

  Will tried to run left on first down but slipped as he made his cut, went down for a two-yard loss. Got back to the four on second, before getting stuffed by their nose tackle.

  Third down from the four. Fifteen seconds now. Will’s dad had two time-outs left, called one of them now. Signaled for the play he wanted.

  35 Dive, to Will.

  In the huddle Will said to Chris, “I’ll line up at fullback. Give the ball to Tim.”

  There was a long pause and Chris said, “You sure?”

  Will said, “I’m so sure you wouldn’t believe it.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” Tim said.

  “Yeah,” Will said. “I sort of do.”

  Chris went on a short count, taking the snap from Wes as Ernie Accorsi tried to push the Panthers’ nose tackle all the way out of the back of the end zone. When the middle linebacker tried to step up and fill the hole, Will took him down with the hardest block he’d ever thrown in his life, sealing the hole for the friend who had sealed so many for him.

  Tim LeBlanc scored standing up. His final touchdown as a Bulldog.

  Bulldogs 20, Panthers 19. The refs didn’t even bother having Hannah come out to kick the point. Game over.

  When Tim broke free, Will handed him the ball.

  “This belongs to you,” he said.

  Tim said, “I didn’t know we could keep game balls.”

  Joe Tyler was there now. “You can carry that baby all the way to Arizona.”

  Then the Bulldogs were swarming Tim again. When they finally settled down, on their way to get the snacks Ernie’s mom had brought today, Will watched Toby break off on his own and start walking toward his dad.

  Dick Keenan watched him come, no smile on him, no change of expression. When Toby got close enough, all his dad did was nod slightly, then point at his son.

  A start, Will thought.

  This time Toby didn’t have to walk to the parking lot alone.

  CHAPTER 28

  Will and Tim decided to say their good-byes in front of Vicolo’s when Tim’s party was over.

  Will’s dad and Tim’s parents were the last ones left inside, finishing their coffee. Now it was just Will and Tim on Main Street, neither one of them wanting to act as if they were actually saying good-bye to each other.

  Tim kept saying he’d call Will tomorrow as soon as he got to Scottsdale.

  “I keep thinking that because of the time change, you’ll get scores before I will,” Tim said.

  Will said, “You would think that.”

  “The only thing I really know about the Arizona Cardinals,” Tim said, “is that we beat them that time in the Super Bowl.”

  We. The Steelers.

  “That’s the way we’re probably gonna beat Castle Rock,” Tim said. “Some last-second hero play.”

  We. The Bulldogs.

  “That,” Will said, “would be sweet.”

  “Don’t you screw it up for me,” Tim said. “You know how the story is supposed to end.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  All their lives they’d been able to read each other’s minds, know what the other one was going to say before he said it. And now it was as if they were just trying to find things to talk about.

  “You’re sure New Balance won’t care that I’m keeping all my equipment?”

  “My dad talked to them,” Will said. “Mr. DeMartini said that everybody gets to keep their stuff when the season’s over. Especially one of the original eleven.”

  “Back down to eleven.”

  “Nah, we’re still twelve,” Will said. “We’ve just got one of our best subs in Arizona now.”

  “Dude,” Tim said, “you gotta go all the way.”

  Just like that, it was you. Maybe it was as good a way for Tim to say good-bye as any.

  They bumped fists, then shoulders with a quick lean-in. No hug.

  “Have a good trip,” Will said.

  “Probably sleep all the way,” Tim said.

  “With that game ball on the seat next to you.”

  “You know it.”

  Tim’s parents came outside. Will shook hands with Mr. LeBlanc. Mrs. LeBlanc was a hugger, holding on to Will longer than he would have hoped before she finally pulled back. Nothing more to do or say. Will stood there watching them walk to the corner of Elm, where they’d parked their car.

  Before Tim got in, he turned and shouted down the block to Will.

  “Promise me you’re gonna beat those guys.”

  “Promise,” Will said. “And you know how I am with promises.”

  Then Tim got into the car and it made the turn on Elm and was gone.

  One of the original eleven in that car.

  One Will missed already.

  Three games left in the regular season: Camden, LaGrange, Morganville.

  No margin for error, in any way. The Bulldogs still had to win out to lock down their spot in the championship game. And they had to stay healthy. They had no chance to write the ending they all wanted with ten players. Simple as that, and not just simple math.

  Three games left, two at home, the last two. Win them all and they were playing Castle Rock at Shea the week after the Morganville game.

  But now it was the Friday before they were going on the road to play in Camden, and Will and Hannah were having lunch in the cafeteria, the usual Friday mac-and-cheese, Hannah having already scarfed hers and finished half of W
ill’s. It was nothing either one of them had talked about, but they’d been having lunch together every day at school since Tim had left.

  “You know, I wasn’t going to mention this,” she said, “but I think I might have broken my index finger when I made that tackle at the end of practice last night.”

  “What?”

  He turned and saw the smile and knew right away that he’d been punked.

  “Not funny,” he said.

  “Kind of funny.”

  “Then how come I’m not laughing?”

  “Oh, come on, I was just joking. If Tim had said something like that, you would’ve thought it was funny, admit it.”

  “Listen,” Will said. “I’ve tried to explain this to you before. I get that you’re funny. I just don’t always think you’re funny.”

  “You gotta chill, Thrill. Nobody’s gotten hurt so far. Why do you keep thinking something bad is gonna happen every time the ball is snapped?”

  She asked if he wanted his brownie and he told her to have at it, he wasn’t that hungry.

  Will said, “It’s just because we’re so close.”

  “So stop worrying!” she said. “You’re not even good at being a worrier, so don’t even try, you idiot. You always believe things are gonna work out great. Maybe that’s why for you they usually do.”

  “Not always.”

  “Most ways.”

  “Tim left.”

  “Yeah,” she said, “he did. So things don’t always go perfectly for you. But they’re not so terrible, either. Now we’ve even got the meanest guy in town not only acting like a good guy, but a good coach.”

  Dick Keenan hadn’t dialed himself down completely. But at least now he was barking out instructions at practice, teaching them new formations on the fly, even having Toby call out defensive signals now the way Dick Keenan had done when he was the middle linebacker at Forbes High.

  So practices had gotten much louder, no doubt. Toby’s dad was tougher on them than Will’s dad was. Much. And occasionally, right in front of the players, Joe Tyler would find a way to tell Mr. Keenan to lower his voice, joking that there were laws in Forbes about making too much noise in public places.

  Even Toby wasn’t afraid now to tell his dad to cool it once in a while. He’d done that the night before, after his dad had gotten all over Johnny Callahan for missing a tackle.

  Dick Keenan, red-faced, had said, “I just want you guys to get it.”

  “We get that, Dad,” Toby said in a quiet voice. “Trust me. We all get that.”

  Will had watched the two of them, holding his breath. But one more time Toby’s dad surprised him and let it go.

  For all three practices this week, including one he’d run himself because one of Joe Tyler’s classes got moved up a night, he’d brought one new defense with him, walking them through it, running from one spot to another, telling them what they were supposed to do if an offensive guy blocked down this way, or the quarterback rolled out that way, or the receivers crossed and tried to pick off defenders.

  When practice was over that night, he’d said, “Playing defense the way you were before, I swear, I don’t know how you beat anybody.”

  When he was out of earshot, Will turned to Chris Aiello and said, “My dad says Mr. Keenan is still kind of a work in progress.”

  After school on Friday, Will walked home alone. He was getting used to it already, not having Tim at his side, not having Tim talk and talk all the way to his house, or Will’s, acting as if every single thing that had happened to him at school was totally fascinating to Will. Hannah couldn’t pick up the slack here, the way she did at lunch, because she was staying after school most days now to work on the school paper she and a couple of other kids were trying to start up.

  “Hey,” she’d said, “it’s the family business.”

  So Will was alone on the walk home the way he was alone in the house until his dad showed up from work.

  Today he decided to take a slight detour, to one of his favorite spots along the river, finding his favorite rock, throwing down his backpack, pulling out a bottle of Castle Rock water, staring across at what he’d spent most of his life thinking was a better place to live.

  Only he didn’t feel that way anymore.

  He was happy now on this side of the river. He would have been a lot happier if his best friend hadn’t left here. But he didn’t want to be there anymore. He wanted to be here. With the Bull-dogs. Even with Hannah Grayson. He wanted to be on the team that beat Ben Clark’s team, and Kendrick’s, the team that didn’t have to worry about their cool uniforms or their cool turf field.

  He wanted to do it on this side of the river.

  Hannah talked about how he believed that things were always going to work out great. But in his heart, he wasn’t so sure at the start of the season, wasn’t sure their eleven—the only eleven they had—could beat Castle Rock’s.

  But now, even back to eleven, Will believed they could.

  He kept trying not to get ahead of himself, not with three games left, even if only one of the teams—Morganville—had a winning record. But sometimes he couldn’t help it.

  Today he told himself to chill, the way Hannah had told him to, enjoy a view from this spot that looked a whole lot different to him than it had six weeks ago.

  He heard the brief blast of a car horn then, turned around, saw that it was his dad’s white-and-blue USPS truck. Saw his dad waving to him through the open window. Saw him park at the top of the hill, get out and bend his knee a couple of times. One thing hadn’t changed with Joe Tyler, even with things going good with their team:

  He still had a real bad knee.

  He kept telling Will that he felt no pain these days. But his son knew better.

  “When you weren’t at home, I thought I might find you here,” his dad said, making his way carefully down the bank. “Want some company?”

  “Always.”

  There was enough room for both of them on the flat, smooth rock. His dad sat down, stretching the bad leg in front of him, kneading it with his big right hand. Will offered him some water and he drank some. Then they just sat there in silence for a few minutes, watching the water move past them, on its way to meeting up downriver with the Ohio. Joe Tyler, Will knew from experience, wasn’t his buddy Tim. He never talked just to talk.

  After a while he said, “I just wanted to thank you, pal.”

  Will turned, saw his dad was still staring out at the water. “Thank me for what?”

  His dad said, “For getting me to coach.”

  “You’re thanking me? Dad, we would’ve had no chance without you. Are you insane? You’re the best coach I’ve ever played for. That any of us have ever played for.”

  “Doesn’t happen without you,” Joe Tyler said.

  Maybe it was just the day for it, Will getting credit for stuff he didn’t think he had anything to do with.

  “You sound like Hannah.”

  “I’m just gonna hope that’s a good thing.”

  “Don’t tell her. But it is.”

  Joe Tyler said, “There’s a line my old high school coach used to use on us all the time. He said great coaches are the ones who take their belief in their players and get the players to believe in themselves.”

  “That’s what you’ve done with us.”

  “No, see, that’s the thing,” his dad said. “It’s different with us. It took you believing in me to get me believing in all of you.”

  “I just asked you to do something I wanted you to do, and I thought you wanted to do,” Will said. “And something we could do together.”

  “Doing this together, like this, it’s made me love football again,” Joe Tyler said.

  “I can see that, Dad. I think everybody on the team can.”

  “But here’s the thing, pal: I never thought it could happen. I didn’t just stop loving football; I blamed it for just about every bad thing that ever happened to me, with the exception of your mom passing. I blamed it for a
lot of pain, pal, and not just in my knee.” He nodded. “So thanks for a lot of stuff.”

  “You’re welcome,” Will said.

  They sat there for what felt like a long time after that, just the two of them, watching as a sleek-looking motorboat roared past them. Then they were talking about the first ten plays Joe Tyler wanted to run against Camden tomorrow on the road, both of them getting excited.

  Yeah, Will thought.

  Yeah, man.

  This side of the river was exactly where he belonged at that moment, exactly where he wanted to be.

  CHAPTER 29

  They beat Camden, 20–0, Hannah scoring her second touchdown of the season on a play Joe Tyler had drawn up on the sideline before they ran it, Will looking as if he were running 38 Toss to the right, then pulling up and throwing a pass to where Hannah was standing wide open between the goalposts.

  “Finally,” she said before she kicked the point. “You identify the best receiver on the team.”

  “It would have been, like, criminal not to,” Will said.

  “Tell me about it.”

  A good day all around, starting with the fact that they made it through another week without anybody getting hurt. And the gadget play to start the game, the flea flicker to Toby, went for sixty yards and a touchdown, the Bulldogs never looking back from there.

  So their record was 4–2. Two wins away from the rematch with the Castle Rock Bears, who just kept winning themselves, still undefeated, the only close call they’d had all season coming against the Bulldogs.

  It was the game Will thought about all the time, not just because he’d come up a yard short, but because they’d come that close without Toby.

  Without a difference maker like Toby.

  And Will had to admit that they’d come as close as they had to upsetting the Bears without Mr. Keenan being in charge of the defense.

  “He’s like our Dick LeBeau,” Jeremiah said at practice one night. “Just much louder and much meaner.”

  Talking about the Steelers’ Hall of Fame defensive coordinator.

  And Will had said, “Mr. Keenan probably thinks Dick LeBeau doesn’t know anything about defense, either.”