everyday heroes

Most Valuable Coach

by Ellie Spielberg

Nov 17, 2005 4:46 PM

‘Warrior’ queen guides her scholar-athletes in the game of life

You know, soccer? That game where everyone runs around a field, and whichever team kicks the ball the most times into that net thingie on the ground, wins?

Whether you’re a card-carrying non-jock or a fanatic who can name every World Cup winner since 1950, you’ll find yourself rooting for soccer coach Joyce Simonson, once the greatest non-soccer mom who ever drove to the Staten Island shopping mall.

She didn’t know soccer from a hole in the ground.

And furthermore, she didn’t care.

But this fall you’ll find Simonson reigning over the huge field at Curtis HS, arms crossed, calling out strategy as the boys move into position, scowling, smiling, punching the air, twisting, turning, yelling her lungs out, giving the thumbs up — a fierce warrior queen commanding her small army of wild, pumped-up athletes who whoops when star player Mohammad Madave scores yet another goal.

“I know the game inside out,” says Simonson, who, as far as she knows, is the only woman coaching boys’ soccer in the New York City public schools. This spring she’ll be out in the field coaching the girls’ team, a challenge she took on five years ago.

Scratch the surface of the samurai persona and you’ll find a coach who is throwing her heart into the game and into the lives of the Curtis HS Warriors, boys who year in and year out come from all over the globe, who speak different languages, who have different customs, who do plenty of in-fighting and who Simonson must make into a team.

“The different cultures, that’s one of the things I love about the team. Some years I haven’t even had any American-born players, this year I do,” she says. “This season three of my African boys were observing Ramadan, including Madave, who was fasting and not drinking water all day and scoring like a machine.”

She’s proud of him and the other kids who scored one goal after the next, leading to a victory over Stuyvesant HS on Nov. 1 in the opening round of the Public Schools Athletic League playoffs at a home game in St. George. Curtis also won its second game with visiting James Monroe HS on Nov. 3 and its quarter-final match against South Shore HS on Nov. 8 before suffering a heart-breaking loss to Martin Luther King HS in the semifinals on Nov. 11.

Simonson treasures the wins, and lets the boys know it. But what she really wants to talk about are the human treasures who changed her life, like Tombo, and about the tragic tale of Sameer, the captain of her first team nearly 17 years ago, who to this day is an angel on her shoulder telling her when she’s messing up in life.

It all started in 1989, when this scholarly history teacher and dean saw a notice saying that the school needed a boys’ soccer coach or the team would be dropped.

“It seemed strange to me that we’d drop a varsity team at a big school like ours,” Simonson said.

She thought long and hard about it. Among her considerations were:

• I’m already old.

• My three children are grown and married. Do I really want to take on a bunch of unruly teenagers?

• I never played one single sport in high school, I was a baton twirler, I wanted to be glamorous — hah!

“Well I made up my mind and when I told the athletic director at the time I was willing to coach, after he stopped laughing, he saw I was serious,” Simonson said.

“I’ll read books, I’ll talk to people, I’ll get to know the game,” she told the AD.

“Joyce, the season is right now,” he said.

So they called a meeting of the kids in Simonson’s office.

“They looked for the new coach,” she said. “I let them do that for around five minutes until I said it was me. One boy actually left the room, saying ‘a woman?’ They all called me ‘Miss.’ Well that boy came back and he wound up being my biggest supporter.

“I asked the coach at a nearby private school if I could watch practice and he gave me some books. I took two kids with me to practice because I didn’t have a clue.”

Fortunately for Simonson, she had 12 experienced seniors on her first team. “That made a big difference, technically,” she said. “But the problem was they weren’t a team. They didn’t even know each other’s names. So I took them bowling on Fridays, we’d watch soccer films together, go out for pizza and soda. I made them a team.”

That team made it all the way to the New York City B Division championship game.

“We lost, but we were runners-up. The kids were thrilled to death. That first year was so absolutely incredibly special, there was nothing like it, it’ll never come again,” she said. “I thought it would be like that all the time, sure, you win, win, win and go to the playoffs every year. Hah!”

According to Simonson, that incredible first year, and uniting as a team, could not have happened without her captain, “an Egyptian boy, Sameer Rafla-Demetrious. He was an incredible all-around kid, into everything, into music, extra bright with a full academic scholarship to Harvard, terrific charisma. He was great with the kids; would have them over to his house. His family brought cookies to every game.”

The incredible all-around kid graduated in 1990. In his first semester at Harvard, he died in his sleep.

“No one knew how it happened, even his father, who’s a doctor,” said Simonson. “His heart just stopped. He had just been home on Christmas break and the next time we were together it was at his funeral.

“This sounds so trite, so drama-queen, but the memory of that boy helps me do the right thing, keeps me grounded. It’s that small voice inside that makes me see what’s important.

“During the game with Monroe the other day I really yelled at a boy and the look on his face haunted me. I don’t know why I yelled. In the car home I heard that little voice, it was Sameer saying, ‘Why did you do that to that boy?’ I didn’t even wait until I got home, I pulled over, called the boy on my cell phone and apologized,” Simonson said.

“She’s a harsh coach,” said student Emmanual after the game with Stuyvesant HS. “If you do something wrong she’ll scream at you. When you do well, she makes you feels good, she appreciates you.”

“She’s hard on you when you make a mistake,” said Jon, “and rewards you when you do the right thing. That’s a good coach.”

“She’s our teacher, not just a coach,” said Palas. “We’re not allowed to wear do-rags to school, so when we come to practice we can’t wear them. She likes discipline. Even if you’re the best player, if you didn’t do the right thing in practice, she’s not going to put you in the game.”

When those comments were read to Simonson she roared.

“They’re right on the mark,” she said. “I was dean for 19 years and discipline is second nature to me. If you’re not doing it my way, you’re on the wrong team. I tell them that this is not a democracy. That we don’t make decisions together. There’s the queen, and there’s the rest of you!”

But the warrior queen is also wise and kind.

Some years back, when told that one of her players, Tombo Berete, was sleeping on his desk every day in his AP physics class, she sought him out.

“I had to pull the story out of him with both hands, but found out that Tombo, who came here from Guinea in West Africa, was living by himself in a boarding house in Port Richmond, was working the overnight shift at a McDonald’s in Manhattan, getting the 4:30 a.m. boat back to Staten Island, then traveling to Port Richmond to catch one or two hours’ sleep before going to school.”