(Editor's Note: This is the first in a series highlighting the finalists for News-Times Scholar-Athlete of the Year. The finalists will be honored and the winner announced at the News-Times Scholar-Athlete Awards Banquet on May 31.)
By Tony Burns
Sports Editor
Some believe sarcasm is the lowest form of wit. There’s also research that says, basically, sarcastic people are simply smarter than you.
If asked, Meredith Coan would probably concur with the latter.
A senior defender/midfielder on El Dorado’s soccer team, Coan has a personality that is … well … uh … different?
“Laid back,” was how she described it. “Casual,” was another word she used. Perhaps, “nonchalant” would be an apt description. If Coan were any more relaxed during her interview at the El Dorado News-Times last week, she would’ve fallen asleep.
She casually pooh-poohed her academic accomplishments, although she quickly pointed out the grade point average submitted had actually risen to a 4.3077. Athletically, she summed up her love for soccer succinctly.
“I like to hit people.”
Care to expound?
“Technically, soccer is not listed as a contact sport. But, it definitely is. I think I play it more physical. It probably should be done more tactical. But, I rely more on physical,” said Coan, who at 5-foot-11, towered above a lot of the other players on the field.
“I think just because I’m bigger than most people, if someone runs into me, they’re going to fall. Or, I can hit you and really make you fall.”
Naturally athletic but not necessarily fast, Coan used her size and strength to excel in a sport based on speed. It helped to play with some, self-created, anger issues.
“In soccer, people can’t really blame you. You can walk up and kick some girl in soccer and they’ll just be like, ‘Eh, they were playing soccer.’ But, you can’t walk up and kick someone in school. You’ll get in trouble.”
Coan’s bone-dry wit was sprinkled over most of her responses, which were usually followed by a laugh, shrug or raised eyebrow.
She wasn’t joking about the physical play, though. A day after the state tournament, she sported black, blue and purple bruises all over her body, including one slightly larger than softball-sized on her thigh which, she said, was the result of an opponent’s knee. A slightly smaller but deeper gash on her opposite leg was from a cleat and there was also the indentation of a shin guard a little lower on the same leg. Not to mention a pair of painful looking bruises on both of her arms.
Coan, who received a yellow card in her final game, proudly displayed the battle wounds and even showed off a picture she had on her phone of her foot from earlier in the season, which was swollen and discolored to the point it didn’t look like it belonged to a human.
Ironically, the back brace she played with had nothing to do with the rough play on the field.
“One of my hips is, like, two inches higher than the other one, which causes my back to be curved. They tried to work it out with physical therapy but one of my legs is longer than the other. It made it worse,” she said. “We never really fixed my problem. My hips pop out of place every time I take a step but I don’t feel it because it happens all the time.
“So, that’s a problem.”
That Coan talked about her physical condition, which sounded so painful, with a shrug and a sly smile, was a bit unsettling. It made sense when she revealed her father often called her, “Sunshine.” She continued. “I’m impatient and it didn’t get better with, like, six months of physical therapy so I just stopped. Now, I just play with a back brace and take an ibuprofen before every game and I’m fine.”
Coan dabbled in many sports before settling on soccer, including basketball, swimming, volleyball, tennis, dance and cheerleading. She threw the shot and discus and ran the hurdles in track and field.
“I was pretty mediocre at about everything I tried,” she said. “I wanted to try everything. For swimming, my sister (Marshall) did swim and I wanted to be better than her.”
How did soccer win out over all the other activities?
“When I was little and I was playing soccer, I got to pick our team name and our team color. So, I was like, super pumped about it,” she answered dryly.
Thirteen years and 26 seasons later, Coan admitted soccer was a major part of her life.
“It’s been pretty big,” she said. “I started in Dallas when I was little and I still talk to a couple girls from that team. My best friend, actually, her dad was our coach.”
Coan displayed a much less brutish behavior off the pitch with even more effective results. El Dorado’s Senior Class President, she was active in a number of other clubs and claimed to be at, nearly, every one of the school’s functions.
“You’re not allowed to be president of more than one club. Before I knew this rule existed, I tried to run for NHS President and Student Council,” she said. “I like to make decisions. I can make stuff how I want to do it.
“I do get kind of frustrated because I try to make everyone happy and I’ve realized, you can’t make everyone happy. But, I still try. Like, I’ll have to design the t-shirts for Homecoming. I’ll make a couple different designs and send them in a group message with 300 people. You have people arguing over it. I try to give everyone a vote, a voice. We’ll have a meeting before we order the t-shirts and I’ll be like, ‘If anyone has any ideas, bring them forward.’ And, they won’t bring any so I’m like, ‘O.K., here’s my ideas. Let’s vote on them.’”
Coan said she plans to attend the University of Arkansas and study architecture.
“I’ve been taking AP Art for the past few years. I’m good at math. I went to this design camp last summer at the U-of-A and we got to build little scale models and stuff and walk around the architecture building and go to museums. It was just really interesting to me,” she said.
“I want to do houses and stuff but my dad says that’s unrealistic and I’ll just be making like box buildings. But, I want to do houses. He’s an engineer so he works with people who build boxes and like gas stations - just normal, every day stuff. But, I don’t want to do that. I also have thought about doing, like a minor in interior design. So, I would be able to do both aspects of it and not have to hire out a different contractor or designer and I could do it all myself. I think it would be fun.”
Designing things and doing projects was something that just clicked with Coan, who said she designed El Dorado’s formal this year. She was more proud of it than anything she did in the classroom or on the soccer field.
“The theme was, ‘Happily Ever After,’ and there was a lot of pink flowers and greenery. I made this sign that was about 17-feet long, about 10-feet high and it said, ‘Happily Ever After.’ I had to cut it out of foam board and paint it. And, I made this chandelier out of hula hoop and a bunch of fake flowers. It was really good.”
Did she have any help?
“I did the sign by myself. And, I did the chandelier by myself, too,” she said. After a pause she added, “But, other people were in the building.”
The daughter of an engineer and an algebra teacher, getting good grades were just a given for Coan, growing up. She shrugged off her grade point average as if it were last month’s shade of nail polish.
“To me, on paper I feel like it looks fine. But, to me, it wasn’t really that hard,” she said. “I feel like it’s kind of an expectation more than an accomplishment, personally. To a lot of people, it would be a great honor. And, I’m proud of myself for my grades. But, I feel like it was an expectation.”
That, sometimes, happens for teacher’s children. She credited her mother, who teaches at Barton Middle School, for a lot of her personality.
“We butt heads a lot because we’re alike,” she said, and then added, “I dropped out of her class. I took it for a year and then, in eighth grade, I dropped out. Well, her side of the story is, the teacher removed me. But, I asked if I could be removed from that class.”
Coan laughed as she told the story. Of her relationship with her mom, she said, “We’ve gotten better.”
Her tone was more serious when she talked of the first ‘B’ she ever made, in chemistry as a sophomore.
“It was like an 89-point something. I did this bonus project and she put it in and it ended up bringing my grade down. I had spent, like, four hours on it. I was so mad.”
Coan gave anecdotes for most of her answers. She even offered a few unsolicited.
“The other day … you’re going to call me weird, again,” she said with a laugh. “The other day, my friend has this huge teddy bear that’s like, five-feet tall. We were bored so we just cut into it and got in it and started walking around. We went to Wal-Mart. A couple of people asked to take our picture. When we went to Wal-Mart, she was in it. I was pushing the buggy.”
When asked why, she smiled and shrugged her shoulders.
“You have to find fun stuff to do in a small town.”