Saturday, December 15, 2007
Rare stumble by Nyarko ends rare run by the Hokies
Aaron McFarling
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CARY, N.C. -- Five times out of 100. That's the guess of Virginia Tech soccer coach Oliver Weiss, anyway, and that may be on the high side.
Five times out of 100. When the ball flips past the goaltender, and superstar striker Patrick Nyarko is chasing it, and there is nothing there but a spinning ball and a wide open net, only five times out of 100 will Nyarko stumble as he did in the first half Friday night. Only five times out of 100 will he have to collect himself and regain his balance, allowing two defenders to sprint into position in front of the net. Only five times out of 100 will he look up and see those two defenders, then decide to pass instead of shoot.
Maybe it's fitting. The percentages have been against this Tech soccer team all season, and it never seemed to matter. The Hokies kept winning, kept advancing, kept rolling all the way into the final four despite it all.
But Friday night, on a play where the percentages could not have been more in their favor, the game turned against them.
Five times out of 100 -- and this was one of the five.
Nyarko did recover from the stumble, and his pass to teammate Robert Edmans was true. But Edmans' left-footed shot was not. It sailed high over the crossbar, ending the first -- and ultimately best -- scoring chance the Hokies would get against Wake Forest. The Demon Deacons scored twice in the second half, won 2-0, and that was that.
End of wonderful run.
"Initially I had no chance of getting to the ball," said Nyarko, painfully recalling the long pass from midfield that skipped past a Wake defender and goaltender Brian Edwards. "I had to put in so much effort getting to the ball, and when I did, I tripped up a little bit and couldn't get my footing. Finally, when I got my footing I raised up my head and there were two defenders in the goal.
"There was no way I could have shot and made it."
But there's more to it than that. The reason Weiss put the estimation at five times out 100 and not even lower than that is because of the way Nyarko runs.
It's a shifty motion that fights against the laws of anatomy, a strange way of picking them up and putting them down that confuses defenders on where he's heading.
"That's why he's so unpredictable," Weiss said.
And if it causes a stumble five times out of 100, then that's a trade Tech will gladly make. The Hokies have never had a player like Nyarko before, and they may never again. He is that special. He is the reason the team made it this far, because even when he wasn't scoring this season, he was drawing defenses and setting up teammates.
And every training session, Nyarko raised the standard for players such as Ben Nason and James Shupp and Marcus Reed -- fine athletes in their own right who improved by simply trying to keep up.
"He's been the best player I've ever coached," Weiss said, "The best that's been in our program for sure."
Nyarko led the ACC in goals last season, and this season he was even better. Before the game Friday, the 6-foot, 165-pound junior from Ghana was named one of three finalists for the Hermann Trophy, the highest individual honor in college soccer. He says he plans to come back for his senior year, and if he does, the Hokies can be a national player again next season despite a slew of other losses.
But after that first-half stumble, he could get nothing going against Wake. Credit for that must go to the Deacons.
Twice Nyarko went one-on-one in the open field against Wake's Ike Opara, and twice he had the ball stolen. This is unheard of for Nyarko, who is so spectacular dribbling the ball that Tech teammates have admitted to becoming fans and simply watching him at times during the regular season.
"If he's not the best player out there, he's up there," Opara said. "Tonight was about moving the feet. I made that a focus, because he's deceptively fast, he's quick, he's strong and he's very talented. You have to take that into account when you're defending a great player. I was just trying to force him inside."
Opara was also one of the two defenders standing in front of the net on that first Tech scoring opportunity. As he sprinted toward the goal, he turned his head just as Nyarko stumbled.
"I saw that," Opara said with a grin.
How often does that happen to a player like Nyarko?
"Not often," Opara said, shaking his head.
Maybe five times out of 100.
And on Friday, one time too many for Tech.
