Fitzpatrick Leads S. Torrance to Soccer Crown

If you ask Kevin Fitzpatrick, he’ll tell you it really doesn’t hurt.

At least not too bad.

A couple of weeks ago, Fitzpatrick, playing forward for South Torrance High School’s soccer team, went full speed after a header over midfield.

He leaped. A Redondo defender backed away from the play. Fitzpatrick collided head-first with teammate Ben Thacker, who was also at full speed.

After the crash, the laws of physics stayed true to form--to a point. Both bodies came to earth, but only Fitzpatrick got up right away.

He admits he was a little dazed.

“The only problem was my eyesight,” Fitzpatrick said. “Everything got a little dark. It was fine as long as I was running around. But when I stopped, the throbbing started.”

Fitzpatrick stayed in the game. Thacker, who was knocked cold on the play, was taken to the sidelines, but later returned to action.

“Kevin just shook his head and was ready to go,” South Coach Roger Bryant said. “He’s been pushed and kicked and knocked down and dumped. But he stays in there because he’s one tough kid.”

Fitzpatrick’s toughness is one major reason that South (15-6-4 overall, 10-2-1 in the Ocean League) clinched the league title with a 2-1 victory Tuesday over West Torrance.

South wraps up Ocean League play against Morningside this afternoon.

Fitzpatrick leads South with 19 goals. His 19th, the insurance goal against West, was a low kick that hit the left post and spun back across the net to the right corner past the overstretched goalie.

“It was kind of a slow-motion goal,” Bryant said. “Kevin gets all kinds of goals. He can score on the run, from far away, with either foot or his head. He’s not the kind of pure shooter who can kick the ball against the wall 20 times and hit the same spot every time. He’s a high scorer because of his perseverance. He never quits.”

Fitzpatrick’s rude meeting with Thacker’s head wasn’t his first experience with an unidentified flying object.

During the football season, Fitzpatrick was the quarterback in South’s option offense. Against Redondo, he was pitching off at the line of scrimmage when he was spun around and a Redondo free safety buried his helmet into the back of Fitzpatrick’s head.

Fitzpatrick was knocked out for a few seconds, but he got up and tried to find the huddle. South football Coach Don Morrow had to grab Fitzpatrick and point him to the sideline.

Fitzpatrick, who had suffered a concussion, didn’t know that he had fumbled on the play and that Redondo had recovered.

Fitzpatrick, 5-foot-10 and 160 pounds, sat on the sideline for a while with a towel over his head to clear the cobwebs.

“They got me shipshape on the sidelines,” Fitzpatrick said. “I was pretty out of it.”

He returned to the game three plays later, at free safety.

“Kevin did a lot of things that really impressed everyone on the team,” Morrow said. “He’s a skinny kid, but he’s not afraid to fly around and mix it up with the bigger guys. You need a guy like that on a team.”

Morrow needed Fitzpatrick, especially after South’s starting quarterback, Chris Castillon, was found to have a stress fracture in one of his vertebrae after the Spartans’ second game.

Fitzpatrick, who had exclusively played cornerback the year before, took over at quarterback and guided South (5-6) to second place in the Ocean League and the first round of the Southern Section Division VII playoffs, where the Spartans lost, 14-6, to San Marino.

Morrow switched to an option offense after Castillon’s injury and Fitzpatrick responded by passing for 695 yards and six touchdowns and rushing for 605 yards and 11 TDs.

One of his TDs came on a 95-yard run against Redondo that began as a fake dive until Fitzpatrick cut back and turned upfield.

“Kevin’s got a blend of courage and toughness,” Morrow said. “You don’t see that too often in a kid of his size.”

Fitzpatrick is a three-sport athlete. As a junior, he played center field for South’s baseball team. In soccer, Fitzpatrick plays various spots along South’s forward line.

“He just kind of floats around up there,” Bryant said. “People tend to lose track of him and then he turns quickly to beat defenders. That’s when you see his real desire to score.”

Fitzpatrick said he’ll probably give all three sports a shot in college. Most colleges have ignored him in football, his favorite sport, because of his size--except the staff at El Camino College, which sees his potential as a defensive back.

If the major colleges come calling with soccer or baseball scholarships, however, Fitzpatrick says he’ll listen.

“He may not be big enough or quick enough for college football,” Bryant said. “But he’s certainly tough enough.”

Bryant gets to see that side of Fitzpatrick twice a week on the soccer field. Because he’s South’s main scoring threat, Fitzpatrick often gets treated to the flying elbows and shoulders of fullbacks when he goes up for a ball over his head.

“I’ve gotten a lot of bangs and bruises that way,” Fitzpatrick said. “But I try not to let it wear me down and affect my play. It’s nothing that hurts all over, at least.”

Not too bad, anyway.