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Friends remember 2004 Magruder graduate Jason Roth as "always smiling," "very inclusive" and "a lover of life." On Friday, his alma mater will honor his passing the way he would have wanted it.

At 7 p.m., Magruder will host the Jason Roth Memorial Soccer Game, commemorating one of its greatest soccer players in school history. Roth, 22, of Damascus was killed in a car accident while driving on Laytonsville Road on November 22.

Admission to the game is free, but donations are encouraged for the Kim Allen Fund, Race for Hope-D.C. and "Every 15 minutes" a two-day program focusing on responsible driving for high school students.

"Jason was not only a phenomenal soccer player, but a phenomenal person," said Magruder head coach Steve Pfeil. "What his mom, Pat Roth, eventually told me was that Jason would want one more opportunity for the people he played his whole life with, 11-on-11 soccer or maybe 40 people total, to play a real game the way they used to play."

Roth's death was the third tragedy to hit the Colonels soccer program in the past decade. In 1999, 15-year-old varsity player Doug Abel died of heart failure; the school hosts a soccer tournament in his name each September.

In March 2007, head coach Scott Alexander succumbed to a brain tumor at the age of 36. On April 10 of that same year, Magruder sponsored a fundraiser game that attracted more than 1,000 spectators and raised roughly $26,000 for his family.

Roth, a 2003 All-Gazette first-team forward, still has a share of Magruder's all-time single-season goal-scoring mark with 21, tied with 2008 alumni Draymond Washington and Alex Lee.

But according to his former teammate, 2003 Magruder graduate Ryan Diehl, what stood out more than anything about Roth was "how inclusive he was." Diehl played three years of varsity soccer and went on to play at Wesleyan College (Conn.).

And he owes it all to his best friend.

"I was a sophomore and he was a freshman, and he gave the coach a call to ask if I could come out and play goalie," said Diehl. "We used to play soccer down in his basement. I mean, he was the only one that got me into soccer. … I did pretty much everything with him. I think [May 15] is going to be a pretty emotional night, especially at the end of the game."

The rosters for the game have yet to be set, though Pfeil expects "many of Magruder's best players from the early 2000s" to be involved. A possible matchup could include Roth's former Colonels teammates on one side and his former club teammates from the Potomac Soccer Association on the other.

Another graduate, two-time All-Gazette first-teamer Mark Eisinger, was also particularly fond of Roth. Currently a senior at George Washington University studying abroad at the London School of Economics, he will not be able to attend the game, but helped plan the event along with Pfeil and other members of Magruder's athletic department. Like Diehl, he remembers Roth for what he was both on and off the field.

"Jason was by far one of the most talented players that I had a pleasure of playing with," said Eisinger. "Year after year, he was at nearly every playoff game to support the current team. To me, Jason is synonymous with what Magruder soccer is all about."