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Take a situation where your team is basically blowing every other team in the conference out of the water.
Combine that with the notion that your team just lost the game and although life is still good, there is one person on the team who is more distraught about the loss than anyone else. You may call that person crazy, but for the University of Maine softball team, they know her as Brittany Cheney.
“When you have your teammates doing their jobs, and you don’t do yours, it’s not fair to them,” Cheney said in response to her error leading to UMaine’s 1-0 loss against Binghamton.
Besides a situation on Sunday that left her wondering what she did wrong, its another situation she has been in that is grabbing her attention – a guest America East championship.
In a sense, it was the error that was ironic. The ball went underneath her glove and ended up in left field. The same left field that has a banner detailing the years that UMaine has won America East.
That’s not to say that the error cost UMaine the game, but it certainly didn’t help.
Kristin Johnson, who coaches the infield, says that Cheney is “enough of a competitor, I do not have to challenge her with that.”
The real challenge for Cheney is the next time she has to look at that championship banner. The last time UMaine won the conference title was in 2004 when she was a sophomore. A sophomore year that was good, but nothing like the one Maine is having right now.
This year, the Black Bears are 33-16 and are having the best season in program history.
With that said, it’s the attitude that Cheney takes to the game that makes her revered by her teammates
“At the beginning we had a lot of similar qualities and I think on the field that helps because I look up to her a lot,” said her double-play partner Ashley Waters. “I have watched her do everything and I have kind of learned from her and I went from idolizing and looking up to her to us just clicking.”
And that is at the end of the game.
Not on a Friday afternoon before a game has been played, but after a game where nobody is blaming Cheney for the loss.
Usually when someone becomes a goat, teammates try to distance themselves. But with this group, they are there for one another and with Cheney it shows.
In most cases, every athlete on every team hears the old cliche of there is no “I” in “team.”
That may be true but in Cheney’s case, there is a “ME.” Not as in herself, but “ME” as in the state of Maine. After all she is a Massachusetts girl, she could have stayed home and gone to Boston College but she came here because it was a team that really cared about its players.
Now, one of its players is caring about bringing another title back to Orono.
Who knows, the next time Cheney turns around to look at that banner, the error may not be on her mind, but something else – “2006 America East Champions.”
Bangor Daily News