It was raining in Vegas. It never rains in Vegas.
Mike Zaher, now a junior on the men’s soccer team, was
miles away from his desert hometown, playing for the 2002 U.S.
Regional Team in Cocoa Beach, Fla. when he got an early-morning
phone call from his dad.
His older brother Joe had been in an accident the night
before.
The car he was riding in hydroplaned going into an intersection
and slammed into an electric pole. He was hit straight on,
shattering his femur, fibia and tibia.
“(My dad said on the phone,) “˜It’s OK, Mike,
stay there and play. Joe was in an accident. He shattered his leg.
He might not be able to play soccer ever again, so he’s
really going to need you,” Zaher said.
Joe Zaher, a year and three months Zaher’s senior, had
just finished his freshman season at Oregon State and was home for
Thanksgiving after leading his team to the NCAA Tournament.
Knowing his brother was in surgery, Zaher went out and played in
the game, only to get a second call when he got off the field.
“Joe’s not doing so good. He’s losing a lot of
blood. The surgery is really complicated,” he remembers his
father telling him. He immediately got ready to be on the next
flight home.
As he was packing up his things to rush back to Nevada, a
horrible feeling came over him.
“The next call didn’t even come. I had a terrible
feeling and I needed to know what was going on,” he said.
“I went through my whole phone list and no one was answering
their phone ““ my dad, my brothers, my aunt, nobody was
answering.”
He finally tried his club coach, who was close with the family,
and his father picked up.
“The moment my dad answered my coach’s phone I knew
something was wrong. And I just knew. Everything else was … we
make the best of it.”
Joe Zaher died after complications during an eight-hour
surgery.
“He was everything to me,” Zaher said. “He was
my best friend, my brother, my soul mate, he was it. (Losing him)
was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to experience.”
Zaher remembers it being especially tough that he was on the
other side of the country when his brother died.
“I couldn’t be there for him when he needed
me,” he said. “The hardest thing I ever had to do was
get that phone call from my dad when I’m not there that Joe
didn’t make it.”
Mike and Joe were as close as brothers can be, growing up
sleeping in the same bed, and sharing the same group of friends
throughout high school.
When Joe started playing soccer at age 4, his parents sneaked
3-year-old Zaher onto the team even though he was technically too
young to play. The older brother pushed the younger one along as
they stayed on the same club team for much of their childhood, with
Mike being forced to play two years ahead when Joe skipped ahead
one.
The two were reunited on the field as teammates for two years at
Bishop Morgan High School.
“I owe almost all of my accomplishments to the fact that
he set my goals so high,” Zaher said. “He expected so
much from me being his little brother, and it really shaped
me.”
Zaher got a lot of his strength to deal with the loss from his
father, Jack, who had unique insight for his son. His dad had gone
through almost the exact same situation, losing his own older
brother Joe when he was a teenager.
“We have a pretty open family, so it never got to a point
where we didn’t talk. It made things easier. I knew what he
was going through, (and told him) he had a much bigger family unit
to deal with it,” Jack Zaher said.
The whole family banded together to hold each other up. Maureen
Zaher, Zaher’s mother, is the oldest of 10, and all of their
cousins acted as a support group for Zaher and his other three
siblings.
“We were always family-oriented, but after this
we’re unbreakable,” Zaher said.
From this experience and his family, Zaher gets his
strength.
“I know with my family and friends behind me then I can
survive anything,” he said.
Now Zaher carries his older brother’s memory on ““
both on his back and around his neck.
Between his shoulder blades is a tattoo of his and his
brother’s interlocking arms, with the two rings Joe wore on
his hands. Around his neck hangs a necklace with a laser-screened
image of his brother on it. The only time it comes off is during
games.
The necklaces were made by a family friend and distributed to
the entire extended family at the inauguration of the soccer
complex in Las Vegas named after Joe.
Zaher wore the necklace when he went to Europe to play for the
under-18 U.S. national team, and he wears it on campus now.
Family remains the most important thing to Zaher.
It’s a big part of the reason he almost transferred to
Oregon State at the end of his freshman year. Zaher, who converted
to a defender in the process of making the national team, was not
feeling welcomed by the older players on the Bruins.
He saw the close bond of the players on his brother’s
college team, demonstrated by the multiple players who got tattoos
in Joe’s honor after only knowing him for a few months.
The idea of playing at Oregon State seemed like a return to
family in a way.
“Mike felt at the time like that was the place he needed
to be to find a little more peace, and be more comfortable in his
personal life,” UCLA men’s soccer coach Jorge Salcedo
said.
In the end, he did not make the move. He was told that if he
decided to transfer to Oregon State, there was a 50 percent chance
he would have to redshirt and sit out his sophomore year. Zaher was
simply not willing to take that chance, and decided to tough it out
in Los Angeles.
And if there was anyone capable of doing that, it was him.
“Mike is tough,” Salcedo said. “He’ll
take a knock and he’ll fight through it. He’s physical
so he often gets hit and kicked, but he’ll keep playing the
same way, (even) though he might have an injury.”
Zaher’s true strength seems to be in his balance. While he
is competitive on the field, once he’s off the field he goofs
around and appreciates his teammates.
“He’s really intense the whole time we’re on
the field,” junior midfielder Greg Folk said. “Then the
second we’re off the field he turns back into Mike and talks
loud.”
Zaher’s unique ability to be both serious and laid-back
with his teammates makes him an effective leader.
“He’s a great leader, always encouraging the
freshmen to step up,” freshman Ryan White said.
When asked about his personality, Zaher noted that sincerity is
most important, whether it is serious or lighthearted.
Asked now whether he has found the family at UCLA he had been
searching for, the answer was clear.
“Absolutely.”
As one of the team’s upperclassmen, Zaher has helped
create a closer-knit group that he felt was lacking as a younger
player.
“The crazy thing (at UCLA) is that we know we’re
going to get talent (coming in),” Zaher said. “But
talent doesn’t always win you national championships. In
fact, talent very rarely wins you national championships. Talent
will win you a lot of games, but when it’s on the line in the
games that really matter, you need guys that are willing to fight
for you on the field. Are willing to do whatever it takes when you
mess up to make up for it.”
While Zaher is a vocal leader, persevering on the field is one
area where he leads by example, playing hard from whistle to
whistle.
“This year we have what we’ve never had in the past
““ a family out there,” he said. “I can look at
everyone on the field before a game and say, “˜I don’t
need to worry about him, him or him.’ They’re going to
do everything they can, and I’ll do the same for
them.”