By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
When Bossier senior goalkeeper Logan Bamburg finds himself in a penalty kick situation, he knows the odds are against him in trying to prevent a goal. “It’s so unfair,” he says.
Two years ago, the odds were against him when he was just a sophomore and found himself as the keeper for the Bearkats in the state championship match. Not a whole lot of sophomores are equipped to take on that pressure.
But beating the odds are what Bamburg has been about literally since the day he was born. In the United States, the odds of being a twin are about 1 in 250 pregnancies.
You see it all the time.
The odds of triplets are about 1 in 10,000. Definitely rare, but you’ve probably met some.
Stay tuned.
Next Wednesday, Logan Bamburg will celebrate his 18th birthday. So will his brother Aidan. So will his other brother Ethan. So will his sister Evey.
That’s right … quadruplets. Odds of that? About 1 in every 700,000 pregnancies.
Bossier coach Orlando Medellin remembers when Carrie Bamburg told him that she had a son who played goalkeeper and was about to be in high school. “I said that was good because we were going to need one,” Medellin remembers. “And then she said he had a brother who played defense. And then she said he had another brother who played (soccer). And there was a sister who also played soccer.
“It’s one of those things you don’t believe until you see,” Medellin adds. “It’s crazy.”
Carrie Bamburg knows a little something about athletics. As a softball pitcher, she was the first female to make an All-State team at Loyola in any sport when she led the Flyers to the state semifinals in 1994.
She and husband Mike (who played football at Loyola) have had plenty to cheer about in the last few years. Logan has been a three-year starter for the Bearkats and is a two-time All-District selection. Aidan and Ethan are both on this year’s Bossier team, which is 13-6-1 overall and currently No. 3 in the Division III power rankings. They’ll play No. 1-ranked Loyola, their parents’ alma mater, Monday to close the regular season.
“They are a great family,” Medellin says. “They are very disciplined kids. You tell them to run through a wall and they’ll do it. As a coach, that makes your job really easy, especially to have somebody in the back that you know is always going to be composed, no matter how much pressure there is.”
That would be Logan, who says “I don’t even mind the pressure.”
Mainly because his perspective of playing goalkeeper comes down to one thing. “It’s fun,” he says. “It’s a really hard job and it’s important, but you just have to do your thing.”
And the main thing is to keep the ball out of the net. Bamburg says he’s proud of a save he had on a PK earlier this year against St. Louis to preserve a 1-0 win for the Bearkats during a part of the season in which they won 10 of 11. During those 10 wins, the Bearkats allowed zero goals
Zero. In 10 matches.
So what is Bamburg’s reaction when he looks back into the net and sees the ball? “Next play,” he says. “You’ve got to get over it and keep playing.”
For the record, Logan was the second to arrive on Jan. 29, 2007, after Ethan but before Evey and then Aidan. Being a quad “is great because we always had three people to play with,” Logan says. (Not to mention another sister, who is five years older.)
And he does realize how special it is to beat the pregnancy odds. “I’ve met some triplets,” he says, “but I’ve never run into any quadruplets.”
You also don’t run into three brothers who all make the Academic All State Composite team (seniors who have 4.0 grade point average), but that’s what Logan, Ethan and Aidan have done this year. There are only 85 boys on the Composite All-State soccer team. Three of them live in the same house.
Logan also plays centerfield for the Bossier baseball team. “He’s very athletic,” Medellin says. “He’s one of the toughest kids I have coached and really strong mentally. He always stays positive. I wish I could have him for another year.”
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com
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