Comets-Steamers: It's Not Ordinary
by Arnold Irish (2/18/1983) St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"This is going to be a cauldron of a game." That was Steamers Coach Dave Clements' assessment of his team's Major Indoor Soccer League match with the Kansas City Comets at 7:35 o'clock tonight at the Checkerdome.
"Bring next-door neighbors together for a match and something interesting is bound to happen. No, this isn't your ordinary game," said Clements, who listed the following reasons:
*The Comets' lineup includes five former Steamers - MISL West All-Stars Greg Makowski and Yilmaz Orhan, forward Greg Villa and defenders Bob Bozada and Kevin Handlan.
*Eight of the Comets are from the St. Louis-area -Makowski, Villa, Bozada, Handlan, defender Tim Clark, midfielder Gary Amlung, forward Craig Stahl and defender Joe Filla.
*Geographically, the teams are natural rivals.
*Comets Coach Pat McBride coached the Steamers (including 11 players still with the club) the first two years the franchise operated.
*Both the Comets and Steamers have led the frantic Western Division race in the last week.
What Clements has no way of knowing, at least not in depth, is that several of those ex-Steamers left the club screaming and kicking, and that they remain bitter toward the organization. They will walk into the building with blood in their eye.
Makowski and Orhan are enjoying the best seasons of their careers. Orhan has 28 goals and 21 assists for 49 points. Makowski, an offensive-minded defender, has scored 18 goals and 21 assists for 39 points.
"Orhan has matured," Clements said. "He's always had a lot of ability, but he hasn't always played to the best of it. But there's a time in a soccer player's career - what's Orhan, his late 20s? (27) - when he comes of age. Suddenly he sees the game ina different light, and apparently now that's happening to Orhan. He's something to be looked at."
Clements knowa more about Makowski, having drafted him No. 1 when Clements was coaching the now-defunct Colorado Caribous of the North American Soccer League.
Orhan and Makowski aren't the Comets' only scoring threats. McBride has three other thunderfoots in Villa with 17 goals and Charley Carey and Elson Seale with 15 apiece.
The Steamers are not without firepower of their own. Don Ebert and Tony Glavin have knocked in 28 goals apiece.
The Western Division race, with two games separating the top five teams, ranks with the tightest ever raged in any pro sport. The underrated San Diego Sockers (17-12) are in first place at .586. The Phoenix Inferno (18-13), even in the games-behind column, trails San Diego by five percentage points. The Comets, 16-12 and .571, are third, a half-game back. the Steamers, 14-12 and .538, are 1 1/2 games out. The Wichita Wings, 13-12 and .520, are two lengths off the pace.
Tonight's combatants are both coming off losses, the Cmets have bowed to the New York Arrows, 9-2, Wednesday and the Steamers having dropped a 7-6 decision last Saturday at Cleveland in a game that left Clements and his troops embittered.
The Steamers somehow tunneled through the Great Eastern Blizzard to Baltimore last Thursday only to discover that their Friday game had been postponed to March 8 because the Blast was marooned in Cleveland. Then, in a highly unusual decision, MISL Commissioner Earl foreman ordered the Steamers to play their Saturday game at Cleveland, in a part of the country where sports of all sorts were being canceled.
The Steamers spent 6 hours on buses, journeying from airport to airport, finally caught a chartered plane to Cleveland and arrived so late that the game's starting time had to be delayed 1 1/2 hours. Bone-tired, the Steamers were a step short all night and lost their first-place lead.
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