In a league of their own

Let's face it, no one likes to lose.

Anyone who has ever participated in any type of competition would certainly choose being on the winning side rather than on the losing end.

I was one of those kids who had some natural athletic ability and was fortunate enough to always have been on a team that won more often than not.

Winning is easy. When the game is over, you smile and shake the hands of your opponents and let them know that it was a good game.

For the losing team, however, it can often be much more difficult to maintain the pleasantries and a positive outlook.

No doubt you feel pretty bad, possibly at yourself for not performing as you would have liked. You may even start to play the blame game; pointing out the mistakes of others on your team and perhaps even feel some hostility toward another team member.

Then of course, you have to deal with the disappointment, criticism or possibly even ridicule of your coach, spectators and/or parents.

No, losing, and losing often, rarely begets anything positive; or does it?

Today I want to tell you a little bit about the Panther Valley Lady Panthers softball team, a young and fairly inexperienced team that had only four seniors this year; one who made her rookie debut.

There were also other girls on the varsity team who never played before and some only ever playing the sport for the second time in their lives.

With a 1 and 19 record, one might think that these girls are one bunch of unhappy campers with a huge chip on their shoulders and a defeatist attitude.

But with these girls, nothing can be further from the truth.

It was pretty easy to determine early on that the Lady Panthers would once again have a losing season.

Knowing this might have been a good enough reason for the girls to start dropping off the team. After all, why stick around if you know you aren't going to win and may end up resembling the Bad News Bears from time to time?

Why?

Because these girls are special.

Right from the beginning of the season, the girls formed an incredible bond that would not, under any circumstances, be broken.

Girls of different grades, skill levels and pecking orders of the school social hierarchy were now equal, if not one.

Even when one girl (who happened to be the new girl) was suspended from the team for a non-softball related issue (and after having had an exchange of words with a couple of teammates before the season), the entire team rallied together and approached the principal to have her reinstated to the team.

I found this to be highly admirable and highly uncharacteristic of teenage girls these days, who are usually rather fiercely competitive with other teenage girls over just about everything.

One less girl on the team could very well mean more playing time for someone else.

Additionally, where most teenage girls would be quick to point out and become angry with the mistakes of another teammate, these girls always chose to encourage one another and to celebrate the tiniest moments of progress.

After every game, the team and the coaches would gather in the center of the field to listen to the disappointed remarks from the coach and to review the mistakes they all made. The coaches would then leave the girls on the field to discuss what they did wrong as a team.

Instead of finger-pointing, these girls took the opportunity to tell each other what they did right and to offer up a high-five or a hug to girls who simply just put forth a great effort.

This practice allowed them to not only walk away from the games with their heads up, but always with a smile on their face.

It also encouraged them to keep trying and to never give up; not for the coach or even for themselves, but for the team.

I watched as girls, who consistently struck out in the beginning of the season, eventually started to get a piece of the ball every now and again, and then, started to hit the ball and make it to first base.

By the cheers from the bench area, you would think they hit a home run, which in the last game of the season, one girl did.

The season is over now and this team, as we know it, is no more.

No doubt each girl will take with them something special from the experience that they can then carry with them and who will hopefully, like a seed, replant it and watch it grow in some other area of their life.

We can all learn a lesson from these girls about acceptance, camaraderie, perseverance and what it means to have someone encourage and believe in you no matter what the circumstance.

Lady Panthers, it was a beautiful thing to witness a "team" in the truest sense of the word, both on and off the field.

Keep working, learning and improving; win, lose or draw.

As author Richard Bach once said, "That's what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we've changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning."

You girls truly are a class act and will always be winners in my book.