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This was George Kennedy's 43rd year coaching soccer. The next kid he cuts at tryouts will be the first.

"When people are able to play," the 22-year Western Guilford veteran said, "their love of the game increases."

That's what it always come back to for Kennedy.

As a young coach in Florida four decades ago, Kennedy was scraping pennies as a newlywed but always found a way to help out kids who needed money to play.

Even when he became Wake Forest's first men's soccer coach in 1980, the pay was so paltry that his wife, Janice, had to work in reservations for Piedmont Airlines on top of her teaching job to help provide for their three kids.

"For love of the game," Kennedy said. "It's crazy, isn't it?"

Call it insanity if you want, but the Hornets continue to reap the rewards of Kennedy's one-minded devotion. He coaches the Western boys and girls, the latter of whom were -- as usual -- the last Guilford County team left in the playoffs this season. The tradition is piling up too high to see over.

"The passion is still there every minute," Kennedy said. "The enthusiasm, the love of the game, the spirit we get when we see all these kids learning -- it's such a rewarding game for you to play. To watch everybody get that rewarding experience is one of the neatest things."

Kennedy thinks about retirement these days, of course, with all three of his kids about to be living within 10 miles of each other near Washington, D.C., and a 3-year-old grandson, Noah, just about big enough to lace up some cleats. All three of Kennedy's kids played soccer in some form at college -- "my wife said if I was such a good doggone coach, I better coach our children so they could go on and have the chance," he said -- and now he sees Noah as his next project.

"But you can't retire before I do," Janice tells him.

"So I know I'll be back next year," Kennedy says. "She's an angel."