Once a Myth, Now a Legend

The late great Wilt Chamberlain once told Michael Jordan, “the difference between you and me is that they had to change the rules so I couldn’t dominate. They changed the rules for you so you could dominate” and that’s how I feel talking to these younger Carmel cats. I don’t want to get stuck focusing on prior to the match but to truly understand what happened that day y’all are you going to have to get an idea of who I am. This may take a bit to get out so sit back, enjoy the ride but this is what happened from MY eyes.

Growing up I was bred into North Central tennis. My oldest brother Ryan won State doubles and 3 team titles at North central. He was apart of the first IHSAA team to win singles, doubles, and team in the same year. My other brothers Craig and Kyle also played on the team at North Central, along with my sister Stacey, and Kyle’s matches are the first tennis matches I remember watching. Liza, could’ve been the best but played softball instead at Cathedral. Cathedral comes in later in the story keep that in mind.

When I was young me and my future teammate JT Wynne would paint up and go over to the John Shirley invitational. Our role was to be like small mascots, just go crazy for the team and be as loud as we could. Every other sport has fans and fans cheering, tennis does not, but it’s not illegal too. People just don’t. But North Central Tennis indeed does. And WE always have and let me tell y’all, it’s fun as f***. One thing North Central Tennis has is a lucky goose, Alfredo, and so young JT and I bought a goose call to bring to all the matches growing up, however once again during our times playing the rules were changed and the goose call was forbidden. The reason I’m telling y’all this is to understand how much it meant to JT and I. We grew up North Central Tennis and were raised in it, it’s who we were and it’s what we had lived to do.

Now that y’all understand a bit of the past it’s time to bring it back to 2015 and my lone season as a panther. I was having so much fun, winning every team match we played en route to a state championship, along side my best friends growing up JT and JJ Kroot. The team state final is the week before the individual and we get there and there’s barriers set up. Barriers? we thought. We’re on the team why are there these f****** barriers. There has not ever been barriers at a state final ever, and now there is? So JT clinches to beat Carmel en route to a state title, damn right we knock the barriers over and start climbing the fence.

So we win team state and the next weekend JJ Kroot, Jon “Turkey” Tuerk, and I were back for for state individual finals. Looking to be the first and only other team since 1995 Ryan Christie’s North Central Panthers to win singles, doubles, and a team title. To win state you have to win 3 matches that final weekend. Apparently IHSAA, had enough of our fun and before the first match of the State Finals, the officials told my coach that the universal gesture used forever to pump the crowd up of lifting my arms toward the crowd would not be allowed. Taking away the team aspect of the game, and more important taking away the fun from the sport. However I say whatever and move on with my quest. But on that board of IHSAA directors are two people, me and my sister Liza’s old athletic director at Cathedral Chris Kaufman. I’m not saying he was behind it, but it’s funny that he definitely didn’t go one inch for me to have my back when my other AD, the late legend Paul Loggan stood up for anything a NC athlete did and ALWAYS had our backs. God works in mysterious ways.

But It’s the first match that weekend and I’m playing Ian Landwehr. Getting murdered. Down 61 1-0 i finally win a game and i do the motion towards the crowd and i don’t care i had to do it. I needed some emotion from my fans and needed energy in this match. Them knowing i wasn’t allowed to do it made it even crazier i think. So i took the warning for that and knew if i did it again the rest of the weekend I’m losing a point. So 0 chance I’m taking that chance again and risking the weekend i had worked my whole life for. I go on to win the match 16 61 62. Bullet dodged. In the meantime JJ and Turkey are cruising to the finals.

Next round I have Eric Hollingsworth from Richmond, Indiana. I swear the guy was playing like wawrinka that day, passing me left and right. I weathered the storm and he eventually calmed down, I win 63 62.

So now the fun begins. I know, all that reading for the fun to just now begin. I pull up to Park Tudor High School for that final match against San Concannon, but it starts raining. The match is moved to Concannon’s coaches club, my old coach who kicked me out of his program for cancelling a private lesson on my moms birthday when I was less than 13 years old. Great. But whatever another barrier IHSAA put up, I’ll just knock that shit down too, is how i thought. There’s more people than I’ve ever seen at a high school tennis match. Literally. Maybe just being on the court made it that much more realer but it was LIT. Almost everybody I knew was there and I was ready for this moment.

In the state finals everybody has a chair line judge, a referee for their court. My referee wasn’t the lady who made the rule up, Linda Hinshaw. Concannon is serving at 3-3 and it’s a long deuce game. I finally hit a backhand down the line return winner for a break. Moved forward, smacked it, fist pump towards all my friends and fans and kept running to the changeover. (0 issue, something I’d done my whole life, watched others do before me, and have watched others do since me. As well with the rule they made up for me). Out of the corner of my eye i see Linda walking on the court and I know exactly why she’s doing it because she’s smiling while doing it. I’m telling my assistant coach Jami “it’s about to happen. She’s really about to do this” and he didn’t even know what i meant! And bam, Linda’s on the court telling my referee to give me a code violation. For something i didn’t do. In the biggest moment of my life, and right when i took control of the match. Since I got a warning against Ian this is now a point penalty.  I lost it.

What happened in the minutes after that is a blur, I just remember asking if I could leave the court, and go to the bathroom, feeling like i just wanted to throw up and get out of there. I walk to the bathroom and a friend Parker Reist meets me in there trying to keep me sane because there is steam literally coming off of me. That was my worst decision yet. I walk back on the court and the amount of people seemed like it went from 200 to 20,000 and at one moment it just seemed “what have i done. These people watching barely know tennis and thing I’m a lunatic and don’t know what actually happened” so now I’m finally telling it. I couldn’t play with any fire again and couldn’t make a fool out of myself again so i wanted off that court as fast as I could before something else went even worse. I felt I let JJ and turkey down. I let JT down. I let my brother Ryan down. I still tried to win but I couldn’t play tennis the way I was raised and there was no fun, and almost no chance to win for me playing with no emotion. I go on to lose the match 76 61.

The worst part is. I didn’t even do whatever the rule they implemented was. If I thought i might have even done it i wouldn’t still think about it every single day. I made sure my celebration was within the new rules and even still I got in trouble. When I did it against Ian in the 1st match, I admitted to it. I did it. This one, i will never admit, because I never did it, and i will never get over, because I never did it. I’m sure there’s tape somewhere from that match and I’m dying for someone to pull it out.

Due to this match I wasn’t able to go to a school that I would’ve once laughed at going to like IU or Purdue considering I had head University of Texas coach Michael Center and head TCU coach David Roditi watching my matches at 14 years old. I had surgery on my elbow when i was 15 and couldn’t play for 2 years. My only leverage at IU or Purdue was a state title, which i unfortunately couldn’t get. Instead the only division 1 school who even emailed me back was IUPUI which I'm forever grateful for. I was even willingly accepting a walk on, from 20 in the country, to a walk on, but still was crickets from every single power 5 school, and probably 30-40’othrt schools i had interest in. I’m not saying that day is the reason why, but I do believe it is part of the reason, since the Marquette coach walked out of my match the second that went down. Not that i would’ve gone to Marquette anyways, but instead I settled to play on a team that included 1 stars. I felt like I could’ve played there when I was 13 years, but looking back know it was still a great opportunity.

Since then Linda has become somewhat of a meme for everybody who knows her. There have been jokes made about egging her house. When I see her I just try to kill her with kindness and to this day no words have been spoken since the Final about that day between me and her.

I didn’t write this as a pity party but I wanted everybody to see that day through my lens. I wanted y’all to know what actually happened on that day and the effect it had on my years after that. I have thought about it every damn day, and am hoping by writing this I will get some kind of solace and begin to move on. I wish this had a better ending but with Linda she does everything she can to make sure all endings go her way.

-Steven Christie