There are moments in life that freeze time.
They don’t happen under stadium lights.
They don’t come with a trophy.
But once they happen, nothing ever looks the same again.
One of those moments lives at the heart of A Road No One Traveled – Side Effects of Coaching, and it doesn’t take place on a soccer field. It takes place in a church.
The Eulogy
She stood behind the podium wearing a black dress, but beneath it, she still wore her jersey.
That detail says everything.
Erin Langan, 17 years old, daughter, teammate, and a soccer player had just lost her mother to a terminal illness. Debi, her mom, had spent her final months cheering from the sidelines in a wheelchair, surrounded by the love and ache of a team that played harder just knowing she was watching.
And now, Erin stood at her funeral alone in front of the crowd in a silent room.
And then she spoke.
Coach Ray Kiddy writes about that moment with reverence, still awed by the strength it took. Erin didn’t crumble nor did she stumble. She delivered a eulogy with grace, humor, heartbreak, and poise at an age when most of us are still figuring out who we are.
What struck Kiddy wasn’t just what she said. It was who she had become in the process of losing someone she loved. Her words weren’t rehearsed. They were remembered. Lived. Felt.
And in that space, you could feel it as something sacred, something unshakable.
More Than a Coach, More Than a Game
Kiddy writes in his memoir that coaching, at its core, is being present for the moments you never trained for. No one prepares you to lead a team through grief. No playbook tells you how to support a teenager delivering a eulogy while still mourning herself, but this is the hidden side of coaching. He reveals in A Road No One Traveled—the raw, real, soul-stretching part. The kind that stays with you long after the final whistle.
He wasn’t just coaching athletes.
He was witnessing transformations.
He was walking with them through the fire.
When Kids Become More Than Players
Erin’s eulogy wasn’t just a goodbye. It was a declaration.
That she had loved well, she had grown up, and she was strong enough to carry the memory of her mother and still move forward.
And Kiddy? He got a front-row seat to all of it. Not because he had the answers, but because he stayed. That’s what this book is about, not leadership from a podium, but leadership from the shadows, from the sidelines, from the pew beside a player who’s learning how to be brave.
Read the story behind the strength and order your copy of A Road No One Traveled – Side Effects of Coaching at www.raykiddy.com or reach out via email at Connect@raykiddy.com.
Because sometimes, the most powerful players are the ones who learn to speak through tears and still stand tall.