Sockers Open Playoffs Confident and Cohesive

SAN DIEGO —  Sockers Coach Ron Newman wasn’t necessarily thinking about a seventh league championship, a first-place finish or even more victories than losses at the beginning of this rather strange season. His focus was more on simple identification.

“We tried to find out who in the hell we had on the team,” he said.

Easier said than done. The Sockers, who open the Major Indoor Soccer League playoffs Wednesday night at the San Diego Sports Arena against Dallas, are a brand new bunch this year. To fully understand this team, a look back at preseason is necessary.

Early November.

Branko Segota, the Yugoslavian midfielder with the shot that sizzles, is the returning star. He’s negotiating a contract that will be a great deal thinner than his previous one because of the MISL’s financial problems. Progress is slow. So Newman is trying to figure how the gun of the Sockers’ offense can shoot without its bullet.

And Newman is staring at a host of new faces. Pull out last year’s roster and grab a pen. Cross off Hugo Perez, Juli Veee, Fernando Clavijo, Waad Hirmez, Gus Mokalis, Jean Willrich and Jim Gorsek among others. Put an asterisk next to Hirmez and Mokalis. They’ll be back before the end of the season.

The 1988-89 roster has 13 new names. This is a problem, because Newman’s system is known to be more complex than that of any other MISL coach. Of course, midfielder Brian Quinn has some input on that subject. “If Ron’s is the most complex, God help the rest of the coaches. You don’t don’t need a degree or anything.”

Segota finally signs three days before the Nov. 5 opener against the Lazers. Newman has his bullet back. Briefly. Segota pulls a leg muscle in the first quarter against the Lazers and misses a month of games.

Back to square one.

So it went. Nothing was predictable, least of all the Sockers, who lost seven of their first 10 games and came back, using a patchwork lineup at times, to conclude the regular season in second place at 27-21, two games behind first-place Baltimore. No one was more surprised, and delighted, by the turnaround than Newman.

“Earlier in the year I thought we were going to struggle to stay at .500,” he said. “I’m ecstatic to think we were 27 and 21 at the end of the season. It was a different sort of year this year.”

Perhaps nothing indicates that better than the All Star game in Dallas Feb. 22. Newman was the coach of the All-Star team, which defeated the Sidekicks, 8-1. Five Sockers were selected to the team: Quinn and Segota, defender Kevin Crow and, for the first time in the game’s history, two goalies from the same team, Victor Nogueira and Zoltan Toth.

But just two Sockers ended up playing. Quinn and Toth missed the game with injuries, Nogueira returned from Dallas to be with his wife, Pamela, who was giving birth to their second child. Newman recalls Pamela’s phone call.

“She was quite calm,” he said, “but absolutely determined that she wanted her husband back.”

Newman, about to be short a goalie, was making arrangements for Nogueira’s flight at the hotel reception desk. He bumped into Nenad Zigante, Wichita’s backup goalie, in town for the Star Shot competition (MISL’s equivalent to the NBA’s slam dunk contest).

The conversation went about like this:

Newman: I’m about to make you a star.

Zigante: What, what?

Newman: You are now a star.

Zigante became the backup goalie for the All-Star game. The starting goalie, Cris Vaccaro, was also from Wichita. So Newman was able to Wing it and, with little trouble, replace what was originally to be two of his own players. And since Quinn was hurt, the Sockers were represented by just Crow and Segota. “We were down there with the rest of the also-rans,” Newman said.

Not for long. Following the All-Star game, the Sockers, new and old, began to blend. With the addition of veteran forward Steve Zungul, who rejoined the team as a free agent from Tacoma on Nov. 22, the offense became more effective. The Sockers were a solid if unspectacular 11-8 after the All-Star game but talk among the players now is that the team has gained momentum and learned that it can win even with key people missing.

Segota is still recovering from a March hamstring pull and is questionable for the early part of the Dallas series. That isn’t unique. Playoff time hasn’t been kind to Segota, who missed the championship series against Cleveland last year and has a history of injury problems during post season play.

But with or without Segota, the Sockers plan to make do. Besides, it’s not as if this team hasn’t ridden some bumpy roads to the top in the past. It has even been said the Sockers are a better bet to win when they are complaining, slowed by injuries or surrounded by unrest. Witness last year’s championship, won after the team filed for bankruptcy just before the playoffs. Playing the games, Newman said, was like a pain killer which helped the players escape the other problems.

It appears this team has a slightly different makeup. They’re a little more at peace, maybe.

“A little bit closer,” Crow said. “A little more relaxed. A little more team-oriented.”

Confident, devoid of the financial worries of last season.

“We don’t have the anxiety we did last year,” Quinn said. “I think it’s a more relaxed attitude but I think the intensity is still there.”

A few reasons for the Sockers’ success:

--Nogueira. Played last year for the now defunct Cleveland Force. The Sockers took a chance and signed him, though he tore his achilles tendon last March and wasn’t expected to be healthy until January of this year. Nogueira surprised the doctors and came back to start games in November and December.

In January starter Zoltan Toth was lost for the season with bunions, and Nogueira became the workhorse. By season’s end, Nogueira had set a league record with a 2.86 goals against average and was chosen MISL goalie of the year.

--Crow. Recorded a career high in blocks with 114. More important, he gave a boost to an offense frequently without Quinn or Segota or both, registering career highs in goals (21) and assists (15).

--Zungul. Worked with fellow Yugoslavian Zoran Karic, who finished as the Sockers’ leading scorer this season, with 37 goals. Zungul did OK himself, collecting 42 points and finishing second on the team in assists (24).

All in all, given the circumstances, things have worked out nicely for the Sockers, who enter the playoffs well-rested and, with the exception of Segota, healthy. The experience seems to have balanced with the youth, providing a mixture that pleases Newman.

“You need the players who haven’t won a championship before to give you that little bit of zest,” Newman said. “They’ll drive the other guys.”