Soccer player’s performance under pressure stems from football past
Sophomore defender Jessica Greer has high school football experience.
Published Oct. 15, 2010
As the Missouri soccer team moves deeper into conference play, it's hard for the players to ignore the great importance of the next few weeks. But for sophomore defender Jessica Greer, pressure is nothing new. It's something she's known since high school.
In fall 2008, the Smith-Cotton high school football team fell flat in its first game of the year, losing by two points after missing three extra point attempts. Greer attended the game, filming the team along with one of her soccer teammates. After some prodding from his quarterback and son, Bryce, Smith-Cotton coach Mark Johnson decided to try something completely different at kicker.
"We were waiting for all of the boys to come out of the locker room to go home on the bus, and coach Johnson asked me if I could kick a football," Greer said. "I was like 'I've never kicked a football before, but I mean, I can try.'"
Johnson invited her to practice the next Saturday and ran Greer through multiple kick attempts. Although she was an experienced soccer player, Greer said it took awhile to get the hang of kicking a football.
"My first tries were terrible, and I didn't know how to kick it," Greer said. "Whenever we played (for fun), I tried to kick it sideways so I could kick the fat end. But then it got easier, and it just stuck."
After attending enough practices to become eligible, Greer was given a chance to kick an extra point in her first game. As the only female on the team, she was given her own locker room before the game. When she came out for her first attempt of the season, the crowd was chanting her name.
"The crowd was cheering, wanting her to kick," Bryce said. "I go out and put my knee down to do the hold, and I look at her and go, 'You better not miss.' It put a little pressure on her and she ended up making it, and it was uphill from there."
Although the thought of a girl playing football might have been a strange idea for some teams, Johnson said the Smith-Cotton squad knew exactly what kind of girl Jessica was when she joined.
"She's a competitor, for one," Johnson said. "That's what I liked about her. When she'd miss (field goals) in practice, nobody would get mad at her, but she would get mad at herself. That's just her competitive nature. Everything she does, she pursues perfection and she wants to win. That's the big thing, she's a winner."
Greer attended every practice after school, and right afterward would drive to Kansas City to go to her soccer practice. Most nights, Greer wouldn't get home until almost midnight.
"I don't know about the other guys, but I know for me that was really unbelievable," Bryce said. "That just goes back to her character. It's not about her. She's just worried about the team. And I think that's what drew the guys to her being on the team, because she had such a passion for it."
Greer finished her career having made 91 PATs, and received multiple all-conference and all-district awards for her efforts in football. Bryce said the awards say a lot about the respect Jessica earned.
"For them to give a girl an award like that, not because she's a girl but based on her skill and how effective she was as a kicker, I think that really says a lot," Bryce said. "But she's very humble, she loves what she does, and she's very competitive. And that's how we see Jessica."