My friend Brian wrote me an e-mail this morning to say that our JV football coach, Gary Price, had passed on from this world. Coach Price was very active with students at Monta Vista in other capacities as well; he worked in food service at the school, coached the women’s basketball team, even coached baseball before I was in high school. My words will never convey quite as much as what Coach Price taught us personally, but I want to relate a few stories about him that can say a little about the kind of man he was:
1) We were not a very good football team our freshman year. We started off the season with a bunch of losses, and we were losing at halftime to another team (I don’t remember which one). Coach Price finished up his halftime speech, and concluded with this: “Alright. We’re down 14 to 0. We’re gonna come back and win this game, and we’re gonna start doing things right!”
That in itself wasn’t special; every coach motivates his team in a similar fashion. The difference with Coach Price was that he was relentless in his optimism. Every Thursday, he would tell us: “Alright. We’re oh and [however many games we lost]. We’re gonna win tomorrow, and we’re gonna start doing things right!” Even up until the last game at halftime, when we were 0-9, Coach Price kept a rosy outlook on the season and on life. I always appreciate that worldview, that we can’t change what we have done in the past, but what’s important is what we do from this point on in our lives.
2) A personal story: I quit the football team my sophomore year the weekend before school started. I hated practice and I didn’t see myself playing very much anyway. Coach Price found me in the locker room that Monday and asked me why I quit. He didn’t make any promises about playing time (I was a backup on offense and defense), but he said he needed me on the team.
Why would he go out of his way to keep a player who wasn’t going to help him that much during the season? I’m not going to make the argument that he did it so a husky 14-year old would understand the idea of commitment, but he taught me something regardless.
3) A fun story: In that freshman football season, when we couldn’t win a game, Coach Price gathered us all together one Thursday at the end of practice. We all took a knee on the JV football field, and he started talking to us (and I’m paraphrasing from memory):
“You guys are on the football team. You guys are supposed to be the stars…you’re supposed to win. But who’s gonna want an oh and nine team? Who wants to date an oh and nine quarterback?
(he looks around, and in the distance he takes note of a few students walking towards the pool, and he cracks a smile)
“See those guys over there? Those water polo boys in their speedos? Those guys are gonna get the girls. Those water polo boys are gonna steal our women!…Shoot! You guys gonna let that happen?”
By this point, the entire team is cracking up, Coach Ray is doubled over, and Coach Price is restraining his smile, trying to keep things light on the eve of our last game. That’s my personal lasting image of Gary Price, keeping us in good spirits when we needed it the most.
Thanks Coach Price for all your hard work. May God bless and comfort your family and friends still in this world!