Small in size, M. Soccer's Brown plays big

Hustling midfielder Reggie Brown nears the end of his senior campaign as Quakers co-captain. Of all the goals Reggie Brown has scored in his 17 years of soccer, the most memorable was the one three years ago that never got recorded on the scoresheet. Penn was trailing Lehigh by one with five minutes remaining when then-Quakers-coach George O'Neill sent in Brown, then a freshman midfielder, for his first action of the game. For the next four-plus minutes, nothing transpired. Just before time expired, however, teammate Austin Root tried a desperation cross from midfield. And somehow, someway, by some miracle, Brown slapped it in to tie the game and force overtime. Or so it seemed. The referee disallowed the goal, saying it occurred after time had expired. Much like George Brett in the infamous pine tar incident, the 5'7'' freshman went absolutely ballistic. "It took three people to hold Reggie back from the ref," Penn senior Jason Karageorge said. "That just shows you the heart and passion with which Reggie plays." · For Reggie Brown, soccer is almost an obsession, something that was evident from the very start. Brown is the middle child in a family of five -- and every one of them played soccer. But Melvina Brown, Reggie's mother, has no trouble naming Reggie as the most intense, dedicated player of them all. Whether kicking the ball in his basement or playing in an open space in his yard, Reggie always had soccer on his mind. "Reggie was just out and out soccer," said John Bouman, Brown's coach at Glenelg High School. "He took it very seriously, and in a way that was good because it made him such a good player, but sometimes he also put a lot of pressure on himself." Brown is just as serious about training off the field as he is on it, though. In nearly every team fitness run the past four years, the slender midfielder has finished first. "I think I came into my senior year in really good shape and then I got lapped by Reggie," said Karageorge, who stands an inch taller than Brown at 5'8''. "I used to use my short legs as an excuse but I can't do that with Reggie." Brown does have a good deal of natural running ability -- he was on a state champion 4x800-meter relay team in high school -- but it's his fanatical commitment to fitness that has made him the Penn player with the most endurance. And he never fails to try to rub that fanaticism off on others. "I think he's been a motivator for my two youngest sons," Melvina Brown said. "My fourth son [Randal] was getting ready to go into high school and Reginald wanted Randal to make the team so they got up at five o'clock in the morning and they ran each morning before work. And, because of Reginald, Randal made the team as a freshman." · The only college Brown applied to was Penn, but the Elliott City, Md., native certainly did not start out committed to playing in Philadelphia. O'Neill saw Brown in a Memorial Day tournament in Reggie's sophomore year of high school and told him to consider coming to Penn. But Brown was confused the next fall when he got a letter from the University of Pennsylvania. "Reginald thought it was Penn State," Melvina Brown said. "I said, 'Reginald, that's an Ivy League school.' And it was almost like he was disappointed." · Brown only started once in his first two years but he has been on the field for the opening whistle every game since, scoring three times. Still, Reggie is more of a playmaker than a scorer. All too often he has frustrated the opposition with a quick fake, leaving a defender in his wake as he dribbles downfield and sets up a cross to a teammate. "He was quite an unselfish player," Bouman said. "A lot of times he would be close to the goal and would pass it and have someone else score." This was most evident in the game against St. Francis last year. Penn scored three goals and Brown picked up the assist on every one. But when Reggie does score, he does it with a flair unlike anyone else on the Quakers team. His first collegiate goal, against St. Joseph's in 1996, is indicative of this flair. "There was this ball bouncing around the 18 [yard line] and I faked like I was going to make a move on it and I didn't touch it all," Brown said. "The [defender] went for it and then I hit it inside the netting." · In Brown's first year at Penn, the Quakers posted an 8-6-1 record, but the team has won just 11 games over the last three years. Back at Glenelg High School, Reggie won a state championship in his freshman year but the team never quite made it that far in the next three years. "[Brown's] most successful years in terms of team results were the first couple of years," Bouman said. "His third and fourth years individually he did very well but the team was a little too young." And, with 12 freshmen flooding the 27-player Quakers roster this year, it seems as if the cycle is repeating itself. That's good news for Penn, however, as Glenelg won two state championships after Reggie left. But once again, co-captain Brown will not be around to see the young talent mature. "Everything is going in the right direction, and being a part of something like this is going to be really memorable when I look back and see how well the team's doing in a year or two," Brown said. "We joke, 'If I could have one more year?' but I've had a great time and my time's up I guess," he said. And just like the Lehigh game three years ago, nothing Brown says or does can turn back the clock. But with two games left on the Quakers schedule, there's still time for one last Reggie Brown goal. Penn has long since been eliminated from the title race but Brown has hardly stopped hustling. Maybe time will be running out in a scoreless game against Harvard on Saturday, and just when the clock hits zero, he'll nail a 20-yarder into the back of the net. And he'll look at the referee, who will signal that the goal is legal. And this time, there will be no need to hold back Reggie Brown.