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After gathering his team for a postgame talk, Pollock approached the parents in the parking lot before they scattered to find an air-conditioned lunch on Capital Boulevard. He reminded them of the toll the heat took on their injury-depleted team and asked them to make sure their sons stayed hydrated at the hotel.

The Holiday Inn swimming pool should be off limits to the players, Pollock told the parents. Even goofing off in the pool would deplete their energy for the following day's game, he told them.

Soccer with dinner

A few wrong turns later, a caravan of Tennessee Futbol Club players and parents gathered at the Carolina Ale House. Alex Blanton and two of his teammates groaned like old men as they pull themselves out of the minivan.

Inside, there was little time spent rehashing the missed opportunities in the tie game. The big-screen TVs engulfing the dining room walls played the European Championship quarterfinal between Turkey and Croatia.

Parent Jon Emerson grimaced slightly when he learned over lunch that today's game will require driving an hour to Wilson.

"It's crazy, but you get your kids doing it, and they bust their butts," said Emerson, who runs an irrigation contracting company back home. All three of his sons play soccer, and he and his wife frequently split up on weekends to travel with different sons' teams.

Still, he knows the end is near. Three more years, and their son Ford will be out of the house in college. The time they spend traveling together is precious, he said.

"When we're traveling on these soccer trips, we're together the whole week," he said.

Which is why he didn't mind heading with the Blantons and the other team parents back to the soccer complex after lunch. One of the team's players had an older brother playing.

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