A Quiet Force, Haaskivi Is Key : MISL’s Third All-Time Scorer Has Talent to Bring Team Back
Kai Haaskivi, probably the best soccer player the Cleveland Force has had, stood in a doorway outside the visiting dressing room of the San Diego Sports Arena Friday night, talked to a couple of teammates, then turned to go through a door to the showers.
All around him, it seemed, things were falling apart. Game 2 of the Major Indoor Soccer League championship series had been a demonstration of the Sockers’ superiority, and the Force, the youngest team in the league, was staring into a 2-0 deficit in the best-of-seven series.
Some players dressed quietly, and others just sat in front of their lockers looking straight ahead, perhaps trying to picture a change of fortune when the series resumes with Game 3 at the Richfield Coliseum here tonight (4:35 PDT).
In the midst of the rubble, Haaskivi remained solid. With not a hair out of place or a bead of sweat dropping from his brow, Captain Kai tried to raise the spirits of his forlorn teammates.
“When he talks, the rest of us listen,” said John Stollmeyer, a second-year defender. “He’s been around a long time, and he knows so much about the game, it’s hard not to pay attention to him.”
Sometimes, however, it’s easy not to notice him.
Haaskivi, 32, is the MISL’s third-leading career scorer after just eight years in the league. He has been named all-MISL four times and won the Most Valuable Player award in an All-Star Game.
He has more career assists than any player except Steve Zungul, and when the Kansas City Comets conducted an informal poll to name the MISL’s all-time team, he was on it.
All this, it seems, Haaskivi has accomplished without lifting a finger.
“Kai Haaskivi is one of the most elegant players you’d ever want to see,” said Ron Newman, Sockers coach. “The way he moves around out there, so quietly and in control of everything, you would think he thinks this game ought to be played in tuxedos.”
Newman was told that, after such a stroll, Haaskivi still hits the showers.
“It wouldn’t seem he’d need to,” Newman said with a laugh. “He’s such a tidy player. He doesn’t do anything real flashy, but he’s one of those players everybody who plays in the league has to respect.”
But one thing has eluded Haaskivi: A championship. And after the first two games of this year’s final, he’s still four games away.
“When you win a championship, of course more people recognize you,” Haaskivi said. “But we can’t worry about that now. We’ve got to get ourselves back into this thing.”
Haaskivi, from Finland, came to Cleveland in 1982 after playing two indoor seasons with the Houston Summit and two outdoors with the Edmonton Drillers. He has been a guy the Force could count on ever since.
He has 249 goals and 304 assists to trail only Zungul and Branko Segota on the all-time scoring list. This season, he led the league with 35 assists after 34 games but then missed 17 games because of an ankle injury.
By playoff time, he was at full strength, and his team-leading 15 points in nine games helped the Force beat Dallas and Minnesota and advance to the championship series for the first time.
In two games against the Sockers, Haaskivi has been limited to two assists, and the Force is foundering.
“Believe me, he can get it going in a hurry,” Newman said.
And if he does, it’s a good bet the Force will follow.
“As far as a team leader goes, nobody in this league matches him,” Socker defender Kevin Crow said. “He sees everybody on the field, and it seems like he knows what he’s going to do three steps before even the other players on his team do.”
In Game 1, Haaskivi flashed a bit of his brilliance with a quick pass off a restart to Gino DiFlorio, who headed the ball in for a goal.
“We were back talking about who we were going to defend, and we left a little opening for him,” the Sockers’ Fernando Clavijo said. “You can’t give him even that, or he’ll beat you every time.”
So far, the Sockers have kept Haaskivi under wraps. But this is a guy who’s still dangerous when he’s quiet.
Socker Notes
The Sockers’ Branko Segota finished second to Wichita’s Erik Rasmussen in the balloting for the 1987-88 MISL most valuable player award, which was announced Saturday. Rasmussen, who led the league in scoring with 112 points, received 45 points in the voting to Segota’s 44. Socker goalkeeper Zoltan Toth finished third with 28 points. Segota, despite being the league’s second-leading all-time scorer, has never won the MVP award. . . . Hugo Perez, who has scored four goals in the first two games of the series, hurt his right hip late in Friday’s game and is questionable for tonight. . . . Seventeen Sockers made the trip, including forwards Zoran Karic and Keder and defenders Hormoz Tabrizi and Brian Schmetzer. Karic and Keder split the first two games at forward. Tabrizi and Schmetzer split the first two games on defense. Newman wouldn’t say which players will start tonight. . . . Are the Sockers just too good for the Eastern Division? Along with beating Cleveland all four times during the regular season, the Sockers compiled a 17-3 record against the East.
