Veterans Field House memories

After some 60 years of use, the Veterans Memorial Field House in Huntington is being torn down.
I don't have a whole lot of memories of the Field House, but the ones I do are pretty vivid.
I played indoor soccer at the Field House for a couple of seasons, and I remember when it would be raining outside, it was also raining in certain spots on the indoor pitch (which was a slab of concrete).
Same thing for snow, although my teammates and myself were never sure if it was actually snow or flakes of asbestos drifting down. I never caught a Field House snowflake on my tongue to make a firm conclusion.
So, when I heard Marshall University was tearing the Field House down to make way for a new soccer complex (a clever subterfuge for a new indoor football practice facility) I wasn't heartbroken. I just don't have the catalogue of memories so many others in the community possess.
I do remember my buddy Christian and I getting fired up for indoor soccer.
I didn't really pick up soccer until college, so I'm not great, but I'm not terrible either (opinions may vary, side effects include streaky goal scoring, occasional bad passes in the defensive half and temporary lack of energy. Ask your doctor before adding Ben Fields to your soccer team)
Of course, no one remembers the goals I scored, or the shots that I stopped when I was in net as keeper.
What they do remember is a single incident that proves I am in no way sexist when it comes to sports.
A teammate and I were on a break away. All he had to do is make one square pass. All I had to do was get my foot on the ball. An easy goal.
But I made the classic mistake that applies to every sport, I took my eye off the ball. I saw the goal before I actually scored it. So, I whiffed.
I was flooded with embarrassment. In a split second my mind hardened on the idea "If someone else gets this loose ball before me, they are going to pay."
The ball careened off of the hockey boards that were still in place around the "pitch," a leftover from the former arena football team that had once occupied the Field House.
This time I kept my eye on the ball, not my opponent.
Turns out she was a young woman, slight of frame.
I took her into the boards. Hard.
Christian's girlfriend, who was in the stands above, said she actually saw the boards buckle inward with the impact.
"Jesus Christ!" the girl yelled from the ground. Someone else helped her up before I could. I just looked at the ref, who had pulled out his blue card (indoor rules are different from outdoor) and asked how long my penalty was.
"Two minutes!" he declared with a look of disgust on his face.
I was on the far side from our bench, so I had to make a walk of shame back to our side. My teammates were jeering me.
"Wrong sport, Lemieux!" one of them yelled.
"Hey, Wendell Clark, you left your gloves on the ice," another shouted.
The manager of the other team actually came over and apologized to me for some reason.
After the game, I apologized to the girl. She was wearing an Ohio State shirt, so I made the lame apology "I went to Purdue and whenever I see a Buckeye shirt I lose it."
She was well over it after the game. Although the next week she did have a bruise running down the entire right side of her body.
But let it never be said that I treat female athletes any differently than male athletes.
Well, that's not entirely true. 
In softball during the ensuing spring, I hit a grounder to first and the woman playing the position tried to tag me out instead of stepping on the bag. I slowed up and let her tag me.
As I headed to the far dugout, my teammates (many of whom were the same from soccer) were jeering me again, saying they expected me to take the woman out.
That's not the kind of tag I want hanging on me. The term "lady killer" isn't bad if you spend a lot of time in bars. On the pitch, it's not so flattering.