Patriots' Recreation

Friday night, August 26

In the corner of the blue carpeted, concrete-walled room, a giant flooring fan whines, pushing round sweat-odored air. The locker room stinks, however no less than it is air-conditioned. Kind of. It's higher than being outdoors within the late-day, late-August New Orleans sun. So, the Patriots of John Curtis Christian College, greater than 100 of them, hand around in this dank room with missing ceiling tiles and funky smells. It barely contains all of them.

The ground is littered with damaged shoulder pads, socks, spools of athletic tape, Adidas sneakers, and the bright pink or blue rubber Croc moccasins the players wear in the showers. A quote hand-painted on a scrap of plywood that's duct-taped to the wall reads, Winners Think about Profitable, Losers Think about Getting By.

They're buying and selling gossip, razzing one another about girls, or arguing about what to anticipate from tonight's opponent, all fired up for a new season and the beginning of a new faculty 12 months on Monday. A multiracial, multicultural gumbo of kids from everywhere in the metropolis and the suburbs, they're sons of the rich and the simply scraping by, they're scrawny ninth-grade third stringers and outsized, muscle-bound beginning seniors, and so they're all united in determination to convey the mighty John Curtis Patriots to yet another state championship this year. A few boys sit alone on stools, headphones blocking out the roar. Others are curled up in a nook making an attempt to nap, whereas a number of enact pregame rituals, getting their heads able to play.

Offensive guard Andrew Nierman, a bruising six-foot-one, 300-pounder, ties the footwear of his good buddy, 325-pound defensive tackle Jonathan "Tank" English. Tank earned his nickname in fourth grade, when he and Andrew dressed as army guys for Halloween. A snarky janitor informed Jonathan, nearing 2 hundred kilos even then, that he looked like an army tank. In grammar school, he developed a nasty behavior of by no means tying his laces tight enough, so Andrew at all times tightens them for him before video games.

Tank and Andrew are both the formidable, decided sons of hard-working single moms. Tank's father died of a coronary heart attack two years ago, after a decade of battling heart illness, hypertension, and kidney problems. He was solely forty-9. Tank and his mother, Althea, who runs a day-care heart, live in mostly African-American section of Kenner, a suburb just west of River Ridge, and Tank has attended Curtis since the third grade. Andrew, who has contended with growing up biracial in a nonetheless strongly segregated New Orleans, commutes from thirty miles away, where he and his mother live alone. He has no relationship with this father, who left years in the past.

Andrew and Tank, each juniors, anchor the Patriots' front line -- Andrew on offense, Tank on defense. They're each savvy, bodily players who run sooner than 300-pounders should, and the coaches are relying on each of them to play leadership roles this year. Off the sphere, their demeanor is extra preacher -- Tank -- and teacher -- Andrew -- than bone-breaking tacklers. Tank is a warm, completely satisfied-go-lucky man-boy with a deep chortle and a melodious voice as easy and candy as jelly. He leads his teammates in prayer earlier than video games and is a great motivator on the field. Andrew is thoughtful, studious, and critical, with darkish, intense eyes; a beefy bookworm in shoulder pads. He is one of many smartest kids within the school and desires of attending a high educational college, perhaps even Harvard.