Local soccer pals kicking it in Kansas

How's this for a story: Five girls from Las Vegas become teammates on one of those summertime soccer teams for 12-year-olds. They go their separate ways, only to be reunited -- not all at once, but one by one -- at a tiny private school founded by Swedish Lutheran immigrants, situated in a tiny Kansas town, also founded by Swedish Lutheran immigrants, where a sixth soccer-playing pal from Las Vegas joins them.

I know what you are thinking. This could only happen in one of those "Hangover" movies.

It also has happened at Bethany College in Lindsborg, Kan. Literally translated, the name of the town means town (borg) of Linds (the names of the Swedish immigrants who settled it, in 1869).

Lindsborg is situated almost smack dab in the middle of Kansas, exactly smack dab in the middle of nowhere, as former Legacy High School midfielder Shannon Singleton discovered three years ago after Bethany coach Steve Moore discovered her at one of those soccer showcases in California.

It was she who led an exodus from a city that never sleeps to a town that wakes only for Svensk Hyllningsfest, the biennial tribute honoring Swedish pioneers that is the highlight of the Lindsborg social calendar.

"When I left her there for the first time," said Tom Singleton, Shannon's father, "I thought I was going to have to pry her off my leg to get away."

This was Shannon Singleton's first impression of Lindsborg: "They didn't even have a Walmart."

She was without friends, without car and without Walmart, the closest one being in Salina, 18 miles away. She also was without a clue as to how she was going to get over being homesick before the big game against Kansas Wesleyan.

But small towns have a way of growing on you in a big way, and Lindsborg, Kan., population 3,458, soon began to grow on Shannon Singleton.

She learned about Swedish culture, became fond of Swedish Dala horses, these brightly painted equine statuettes carved of wood, and, like everybody else who plays sports for the Bethany College Swedes, developed a powerful dislike for the Coyotes of Kansas Wesleyan University. With the closest Walmart being 18 miles away, and the closest Station Casino being 998 miles away, she also spent a lot of time studying. (This is the part about Bethany College that Tom Singleton, who read in a brochure that 90 percent of Bethany grads are admitted to graduate school, likes the most.)

And then, one by one, Shannon Singleton's soccer-playing pals from Las Vegas joined her. And then she wasn't so homesick anymore.

Riley Council, Singleton's roommate and BFF, is a sophomore forward at Bethany. Amanda Lopez is a sophomore midfielder/forward. Shaunice Huffman is a junior defender. Tatiana Garay is a junior forward. Bryanna Rodriguez is a freshman forward.

Council attended Northwest Career and Technical Academy; Lopez, Durango High; Huffman, Coronado; Garay, Las Vegas High; Rodriguez, Centennial. All except Rodriguez played for Carlos Lopez, Amanda's father, and Tom Singleton on Nuesport 91 (the year the girls were born) Green as 12-year-olds. Rodriguez played for Heat FC. All quickly discovered that it is 18 miles from the Bethany campus to the nearest Walmart.

The six Las Vegas girls comprise 25 percent of the Bethany roster. The rest of the Bethany players hail from places such as Yankton in South Dakota, Flower Mound in Texas, Keenesburg in Colorado and Smithville in Missouri, places where the lights aren't quite as bright, places where most of what they know about Las Vegas comes from Laurence Fishburne and Marg Helgenberger or Lindsborg's VFW post, whose members once took a junket here on a fancy tour bus.

"My first year, one of the girls asked if I lived in a pyramid," Singleton said. "I got all sorts of questions. Do they have houses in Las Vegas? Do you learn how to gamble in school?"

But Singleton and the Las Vegas girls also learned something from their teammates and their shared experience at Bethany. They learned one doesn't have to be as good as Mia Hamm or Brandi Chastain to play college soccer, and, if you wind up playing at a tiny private school founded by Swedish Lutheran immigrants, you soon will develop a powerful dislike for Kansas Wesleyan.

And you also will make new friends, and when strangers pass you on the street, they will smile and say "Hello."

There's something to be said for places like that -- and for kids from big cities with bright lights who become attached to places like that.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow him on Twitter: @ronkantowski.