By Thea Jarvis

Hank Datelle’s 80-year-old mother couldn’t make it to the Southeastern regional finals for her son’s Tophat soccer team of 16-year-old girls in Memphis last month. So she offered some advice to get him through the shaky moments the tournament was sure to provide.

“Say the rosary,” she counseled.

It was something she had done during the last series of regional games she had attended in 1986. Between shouting at black-shirted referees and cheering for the girls, Carmela Bisonti Datelle had clutched her rosary, praying for healthy players and hot-footed goals.

When tournament time rolled around this year, Datelle’s girls, a hardworking contingent from metro Atlanta schools, turned out to be the team to beat. They danced their way through a blanket of Memphis heat into a grueling final match that pitted the Georgia team against powerful opponents from North Texas, the Dallas Sting.

Datelle was prepared. Not only had he trained his team well, telling them to expect no mercy from their victory-hungry opponents, but, from the start of the June 12-16 tournament, he had followed his mother’s suggestion.

“I knew we had a chance to win, and praying would help” said the coach, who began a rosary on the seven-hour drive from Atlanta to Memphis and continued the prayer throughout the tournament.

Before games, Datelle wandered out to the hotel pool and said the rosary in the early morning quiet. Sometimes the girls would join him.

“Two or three of them would come and sit beside me,” he said, “I told them I was praying. We’ve never played a game without saying a prayer,” so they weren’t too surprised, he explained.

The game against North Texas was a dogfight.

“They have a very prestigious organization,” Datelle said of the Tophat’s regional rivals. Paid coaches, high player fees, a full schedule of out-of-state tournaments made the Texans “a really formidable foe.”

“Before the game, we decided to strengthen the defense a bit and not try to score a lot of goals. We were a little more conservative,” he said. “In retrospect, it was the right decision.”

With four minutes to the final whistle, the Tophatters had tallied a single goal against a scoreless Texas team, which nevertheless continued to hammer relentlessly at the Georgia defense.

“We were clearly on the edge of disaster,” Datelle recalled. “It was pretty nerveracking, to say the least.”

His son and assistant coach, Marc, voiced his despair. “They’re killing our fullbacks,” he told his father.

“The only thing you can do now is pray,” Datelle replied.

A final score 1-0 told the Cinderella story. The Tophat team flies to Omaha this month, the first under-16 girl’s team in the history of Georgia state soccer to make the grade. The ladies will represent the South in national competition July 24-28, facing championship teams from the North, East and West regions of the U.S.

“Our competition will definitely be a notch above what we have played,” said Datelle of the upcoming tournament. But, in Omaha, his philosophy will remain basically the same.

“You have to be well-trained, well-prepared,” he said. “The greater the challenge, the more you need God on your side.”

Datelle, a Connecticut Yankee who played baseball and basketball in high school and college, holds a doctoral degree in education and is a teacher at heart, he says. When not volunteering on the soccer field, the Cathedral of Christ the King parishioner develops computer-based educational programs at Knowledge Engineering, Inc., an organization he co-founded and now heads. His wife, Kathy, daughters Lisa and Coleen, and son Marc have all played a part in the company’s growth.

“Being around kids helps me function better as a person,” said Datelle, who takes paternal pride in his team’s spirit and their conduct on the playing fields. In a sport dominated by aggressive, disciplined players, he feels the Tophatters have distinguished themselves without losing their sportsmanship or femininity.

“They’re impressive. They don’t let anyone push them around, but they are always very kind in victory or defeat.”

The team began five years ago with an inauspicious record of winless seasons and a plague of injuries. They affiliated with the Buckhead-based Tophat Soccer Club, the only all-girls’ league in the state, and began competing in the Athena I division of the Georgia Youth Soccer Association.

The girls have come a long way, said Datelle, adding that the tradition of pre-game prayer has been a building block of their positive attitude.

“We certainly don’t win every time we say a prayer and we don’t pray to win,” he said, but prayer “gives you the extra advantage, gives you confidence” and gratitude for the opportunity to play.

Gratitude was in good supply after the girls’ regional win, which has been followed by daily practices, careful diet and a plethora of calls to local businesses requesting sponsorship for the upcoming trip.

Carmela Datelle, among the first to hear of the Tophat success through a phone call to her Connecticut home, reacted to her son’s happy news with expected enthusiasm.

“I knew it, I knew it,” she cried.

And then the critical question “Did you say the rosary? I told you. Listen to your mother.”