by Amy Bass
The governor, of course, had no such power, as immigration questions are decided at the federal level. President Obama affirmed that the United States would forge ahead with its plan to accept some ten thousand Syrians in the coming year. They were the victims of terrorism, said Obama, not perpetrators.
But LePage, who had a history of unsavory—racist, even—remarks, found momentum in the presidential campaign of Trump, telling a radio show host that he was “Donald Trump before Donald Trump was Donald Trump.” In the wake of Paris, Trump followed his promise to build a wall between Mexico and the United States with a call for a “total and complete” ban on Muslim immigration. He even went so far as to have Rosa Hamid, who was dressed in hijab and a shirt saying “Salam, I come in peace,” thrown out of a campaign rally in South Carolina. These moments continued to embolden Islamophobic sentiment, evidenced when CBS’s Evening News visited Lewiston for a segment that included the soccer team. “These filth have no place in the West and should be expelled by any means necessary,” wrote one viewer in the comments section of the CBS website about Lewiston’s Somalis.
The media hype surrounding the team eventually settled down. Most days, the champions went through the rituals of high school life like everyone else. Some, like Ben and Joe, hit the track for the indoor season, while others, like Alex, won another state championship—against Scarborough, no less—in hockey. Over February break, Zak and Karim traveled to try out for FC Miami City, a Premiere Development League team.
The first day back from break loomed cold but sunny, hinting of spring. Students filed across the frozen grass, avoiding small piles of snow that remained from the relatively light—by Maine’s standards—winter. Tunics and colorful dresses peeked below the hems of puffy parkas.
Inside, McGraw stands in his usual spot outside his classroom, his gravelly voice calling out to students as they pass by. He is in his element, catching up with students, asking what they did over break. Yusuf stops by with news: Nuri is moving to Minnesota. He has family there, and his mother wants to join them.
“I won’t sleep tonight,” McGraw mutters, his eyes losing their twinkle as he sinks deep into thought, already reconfiguring next fall’s offense in his head.
McGraw is sad about losing Nuri. He knows there’s nothing he can do—family comes first—but he’s going to miss the kid, not just the player. Nuri worked so hard, rose to the top. But Muktar’s little brother Warsame is coming up, McGraw remembers. Coach Abdi told McGraw the kid is really good, smart, and definitely ready for a four-year varsity run. And Shaleh, quiet, studious, and strong, shows great leadership potential. Captain potential, perhaps.
McGraw heads into his classroom, perked up by the thought of Warsame and Shaleh. The walls are filled with the usual student project posters screaming in neon pink and green about “DEOXYRIBONUCLEIC ACID,” words like “replication” and “translation” explaining the intricate patterns of colorful squares and circles. There’s a new poster added to the mix, a photograph of the team with CLASS A STATE CHAMPIONS scrawled across the bottom. On another shelf sits a framed photo of McGraw facing the crowd, hands in the hair, at Fitzpatrick Stadium. Chabot called the Sun Journal the day after the photo ran and asked for a copy, framing it to present to McGraw at a faculty meeting. As always, McGraw was humble, giving credit to the kids and his assistants, wanting to share any spotlight shed upon him. It isn’t an act, Chabot thought, watching him. There just weren’t a lot of Mike McGraws in the world.
McGraw’s classroom closet is now filled with the team’s backpacks, the fierce devil mascot embroidered at the center. Even though it’s February, McGraw is still collecting kits; something akin, he says, to pulling teeth.
“If they don’t turn the stuff in,” he grumbles, taking a mental count of the bags before him, “they don’t get their championship jacket.”
The jackets were a gift from Lee Auto Malls, a venerable local family business. On a chilly day in January, the team met with Adam Lee, who presented a $4,000 check to thank them for becoming such an important part of the city’s history, “a dramatic example of what we can all accomplish together.”
McGraw preps for his first class, which will include a lab about diffusion through a membrane. He writes definitions of hypotonic, isotonic, and hypertonic on the blackboard, his left hand working in an efficient, neat, script, when Maslah saunters in. Throughout the winter, McGraw has been his anchor, going with him to talk to teachers, helping him keep up with his work.
“Did you see Coach Fuller?” McGraw asks. “Did you talk to him last week about prep school?”
“I was supposed to,” Maslah says, looking down, “but I didn’t come in.”
“Go see him when you’re on one of those,” McGraw commands, pointing to the hall pass in Maslah’s hand, his coach voice creeping in. “Go see him.”
McGraw shifts gears and asks Maslah about his team jersey, which he hasn’t returned.
“I need number nine,” McGraw says.
“I’ll pay for it,” Maslah counters, shaking his head.
“You can’t,” declares McGraw. “It’s irreplaceable. If you don’t give it back, some kid next year isn’t going to have a jersey.”
He pauses, letting it sink in.
“It’s a famous number, you know,” McGraw says.
“Yeah,” answers Maslah, smiling as he thinks about the twenty-six goals he scored in that shirt. “Well, it is now.”
Undeterred, McGraw weaves one of his stories, his expression serious, his gruff voice gentle. He tells Maslah that the number has a history—a “famous” history. He cites past players who wore it. McGraw enjoys his raconteur moments, but also just wants the jersey back. He knows Maslah is having a hard time letting go of more than a shirt. As the dance continues, Maslah’s demeanor changes from wayward student flaunting a hall pass to player listening to coach. He agrees to find the shirt and bring it to McGraw.
McGraw never got the jersey back.
In June, Lewiston High School graduated fourteen members of the championship soccer team. These days, immigrant students graduate at a higher rate than native-born Mainers, 78.3 percent to 73.3 percent. In the fall, Maulid would be the only returning varsity starter, flanked by others who logged minutes on the championship team, like Muktar and Joe, Shaleh and Ben, Yusuf and Alex. Maulid was excited to be a captain, but there was a lot to do before the start of the season. Summer games. Ramadan. A trip to Gillette Stadium to be honored by the New England Revolution.
Denis Wing arranged a coach bus to take the team to Gillette, figuring they’d earned padded seats and a little air conditioning. The Revs wanted to honor the Blue Devils as “Heroes of the Match” on the infield before the start of the game. Wing told the players to meet at the high school at 12:30, plenty of time for them to be late. Ben strolled in wearing a turquoise button-down shirt and a black bow tie, ready for the occasion. McGraw arrived dressed in khaki shorts, his blue coach shirt, and a blue baseball hat, already texting those he hadn’t heard back from. Zak and Karim were in Minnesota visiting family. Nuri had already moved.
“Where’s Yusuf?” McGraw barked. “Where’s Khalid?”
A few Booster parents arrived with a giant cooler loaded with water, and dispersed Costco-sized boxes of snacks to the back of the bus. As the players boarded, they were grateful for the blast of cold air that greeted them. The July day loomed hot and humid, and most had been up much of the night before. It was Eid, the end of Ramadan, a day filled with celebration and family, starting with morning prayers at nine at the Lewiston Armory, used on occasions when the city’s mosques are not big enough. “Eid Mubarak!” players greeted one another.
“There’s H!” someone cried, spying Abdi H. walking across the parking lot with a platter of Subway sandwiches provided by Kim Wettlaufer. The sandwiches were gone in minutes.
About halfway into the trip, McGraw strolled back to give them one last speech. The players, many of whom were sleeping, shook themselves to attentio
n. Most of them had graduated. But he was still their coach.
“This is a big deal,” McGraw announced. “These people have invited us, and it’s a big deal. I don’t know what they have in store for you down there, but you are representing a lot while you’re there. Your team. Your school. Your families. Our community. I expect you to remember that. This might be it. This might be the last time. So this is a big deal.”
The parking lot at Gillette was a sauna, heat radiating from the black pavement. After their initial awe at the stadium, the team was dismayed at the high prices of the restaurants, only a handful having enough money to make any purchases. Before going onto the infield, Revs striker Kei Kamara, who hails from Sierra Leone and came to the United States through a refugee resettlement program, greeted them, taking selfies with each player.
After the game, there were fireworks. The team was tired, but they were used to staying up late from Ramadan, eating far into the night. Joe sat next to McGraw, transfixed, while Maulid never flinched as the colors burst in the sky. He now knew that the loud bangs and booms his parents once ran from, the terrorizing and paralyzing sounds of war, were how some Americans celebrated.
That fall, the Blue Devils would fail to repeat their championship season, going out in the quarterfinals to Camden Hills. After spending the summer teaching soccer in South Africa, Abdi H. headed to the Kent School in Connecticut with Moe for a postgraduate year, while others enrolled in classes at the local community college or at the University of Southern Maine.
Before the season started, a late-summer visit to Maine from then–presidential candidate Donald Trump resurrected some of the myths and stereotypes of Lewiston’s past. Trump warned Maine of the criminal and terrorist element housed in its Somali community. He was, of course, wrong. Crime wasn’t up in Lewiston since the Somalis came, Lewiston Police Chief Brian O’Malley assured residents. It was down. Way down.
“He’s crazy, right?” Maulid asked of Trump. “He doesn’t want any of us here.”
Maulid’s mother woke him early on November 8, 2016, urging him to vote before school, fearful about what a Trump presidency might mean for her family. She knows that as a U.S. citizen she is safe, but still, she worries. Within a few months of Trump’s improbable election, thousands would descend on America’s airports, including Bangor and Portland, to protest his executive order banning citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, including Somalia. Yet again, Lewiston’s refugee community found itself on high alert, worried that the city’s racial divide could crack open. A student wearing a Trump shirt told Maulid that his time in the city was coming to an end, while a driver threatened a Somali woman who was crossing the street, yelling at her to take off her hijab as he sped by.
“You guys are okay,” a classmate told one soccer player, reigniting a familiar refrain. “Just no more immigrants.”
McGraw knows that Androscoggin County voted for Trump. It was the first time in thirty years the region went Republican. Just because a community came together doesn’t mean it stays together. But McGraw hopes that if he keeps the team focused on winning, there won’t be much space for what he calls “the other stuff.” Soccer, he trusts, can continue to lead the way, giving the city something tangible to hang onto as it espouses the benefits of a global community, and does the hard work of keeping its arms open.
Maulid agrees. Gazing at his bedroom wall, clippings and photos from the championship season hanging in a bright mosaic, he dreams of playing soccer professionally. Then he wants to return to Lewiston and build more soccer fields, teaching kids how to play. He loves having little kids walk up to him on the street, asking about the flip throw, and taking selfies with him. Soccer is the beginning, the end, and the middle.
“We brought the community together,” he says. “They believed in it, and they believed in us.”
Lewiston High School Blue Devils Soccer
State Champions 2015
No.
Name
Position
Gr.
1 Abdirizak Ali Midfield 12
2 Abdiaziz Shaleh Midfield 11
3 Dek Hassan Defender 12
4 Hassan Qeyle Midfield 12
5 Zakariya Abdulle Defender 12
6 Noralddin Othman Midfield 10
7 Muktar Ali Striker 10
8 Mohamed Khalid Defender 12
9 Maslah Hassan Striker 12
10 Abdi Shariff-Hassan Striker 12
11 Maulid Abdow Midfield 11
12 Mohamed Abdisalan Midfield 12
13 Yusuf Mohamed Forward 10
14 Joséph Kalilwa Midfield 11
15 Hassan Hassan Midfield 11
16 Mwesa Mulonda Midfield 11
17 Ben Doyle Defender 12
18 Abdulkarim Abdulle Striker 12
19 Ian Hussey Defender 11
20 Benjamin Musese Defender 11
21 Timo Teckenberg Midfield 10
22 Ryan Bossie Defender 10
23 Evan Cox Defender 10
32 Austin Wing Goalkeeper 12
GK Alex Rivet Goalkeeper 10
Coaches: Mike McGraw, Dan Gish, Abdijabar
Hersi, Per Henrikson
Athletic Director: Jason Fuller
Principal: Shawn Chabot
Scorer: Doe Mahamud
Mascot: Blue Devil
Postscript
Soccer is Life
It was August 2017, and Nuri was back in town. The defensive midfielder missed his friends and former teammates. He’d played soccer his junior year in Minnesota, but the season had ended with a torn ACL and meniscus. Despite the tough road back from surgery, he was determined to play the game again. And he wanted to do it in Lewiston.
Muktar was the only other remaining member of the 2015 championship squad. Young and inexperienced, the Blue Devils needed leaders. A few weeks into the season, they decided Nuri should have a captain’s band on his arm. Just as he had once looked up to Karim and Abdi H., these younger players now looked up to him.
Unlike 2015, this season, which saw most of Lewiston’s home games played at Bates College while the high school’s playing fields were renovated, was not perfect. But McGraw thought something felt very right. It wasn’t just the return of Nuri. The next generation was rising.
Muktar’s younger brother, Warsame, was coming into his own. Bilal Hersi—one of Coach Abdi’s younger sons—looked to be a top scorer. Benji Saban wanted to follow in Shobow’s footsteps. Bakar Shariff-Hassan knew how big Abdi H.’s shoes were and wondered if he could ever fill them.
Playing in freezing rain on Bates’s Garcelon Field in the regional final against heavily favored Bangor, these players came of age. In a tight game from the start, Lewiston hit halftime in a 1–0 deficit. About five minutes into the second half, Bilal put Lewiston on the board. Then, with twenty minutes to go, he kicked the ball in front of Bakar, who put it into the net. Goalie Dido Lumu, who had stepped up when Alex Rivet left Lewiston for prep school, made two monster saves in the final minutes to keep the Blue Devils on top.
The upset sent them to the state championship game for the third time in four years.
November 4, 2017, broke chilly but clear as Lewiston prepared to play Portland High School. Eric Wagner made the drive from Swarthmore, determined not to miss this one. On the way, Wagner picked up Abdi H. at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, where he now played Division 1 soccer.
The tense, defensive game was a stalemate. “Overtime,” Wagner texted former teammates who couldn’t be there. “Fifteen minutes of golden goal.”
“You’ve got this, you’ve got this,” McGraw told the team before sending them back out. “Get the ball into a dangerous place, and we’ll see what we see.”
With just over five minutes left on the overtime clock, Nuri lined up for an indirect kick about forty-two yards out. He looked at his teammates on the field. No Karim. No Maslah. No Maulid. No Abdi H. No Q. But here he was, doing what he did best, trying to place the ball in front of someone. He ca
lled Warsame’s name. He knew the sophomore jumped higher than anyone else and would have an advantage for a clean header.
As the ball soared over traffic, Warsame gritted his teeth. He wanted this so badly. A golden goal for a golden trophy that would match his bleached hair and his shiny metallic cleats. He was hungry for his own title, to be sure, but even more, he wanted Muktar to have another one. He knew Portland’s goalie was going to come out as soon as Nuri launched the ball—it had been his pattern throughout the game. Warsame leaped and barely flicked the ball toward the corner. It bounced and rolled slowly toward the net. Warsame froze, waiting, hoping.
Goal: 1–0 Lewiston. They were champions again.
The team lifted Warsame toward the sky as fans—including Abdi H. and Moe, who ran out onto the field to tackle McGraw—celebrated. Warsame was overcome. Teachers regularly told him he could be a leader one day. Feeling his teammates hold him up made him think that day had arrived. This wasn’t about his one goal, he realized. It was about all of them: the coaches, the players, the fans, and, above all, Muktar.
The 2015 team was, from every angle, every statistic, in every way, a dream team. But now, Warsame knew, they had taken their turn. And there were many more behind them, ready to play this game, for this school, in this city.
“We bleed blue and always will,” Warsame says of the moment. “Soccer is life.”
Acknowledgments
As an undergraduate history major at Bates College, I lived in Lewiston for four years. But I never really knew Lewiston. I am grateful I’ve had this chance to go back, and glad the city obliged my return. So many there helped make this book a reality, starting with Coach Mike McGraw. He thought a bit (as he should have) before saying yes to me, but then I never again had to ask if I could tag along. From postgame chats at the Goose to a very special afternoon visiting with his mother, Florence, our unfolding relationship was constantly reassuring that I might be up to the task of telling this story.
