rollercoaster

I've been waiting all week to blog about my life this past weekend, but unfortunately school has been ridiculous with papers and tests and junk, but now I am free, at least for a couple days. So I'm gonna take this chance to blog as much as I can.

This past weekend, was a big one to say the least. Our soccer team went to the NCCAA Regional Tournament in Grand Rapids, MI. As you all know my life has been...(is consumed too strong of a word?) yes, consumed by soccer for the past 3 1/2 months and it all came to a climax this past weekend. So all of last week was spent just preparing mentally and physically for this tournament. Our first game was the Semi-Finals against Northland Baptist Bible College.

Let me just give you a little background info first. Northland is our big rival. Every year when we play them it is one of the biggest games of the season. But here's the thing, Moody has not beat Northland since 2001. You read that right, we have not beat them in 7 years. But every season it is a close game.

So needless to say, this was a huge game. We also lost to them in the regular season this year 5-0, so we were really lookin for some revenge. Anyways, the game started and it was 0-0 throughout all of the first half. I'm actually trying to remember the first half, but for some reason it was a blur, I can't remember much of it. But the second half was when all the action started. We scored first, and it was absolutely crazy after that first goal. It is always better if we score the first goal because it just gives alot of momentum and helps us play better. So it was 1-0 and then they scored to tie 1-1. Everyone played seriously to the best of their ability that game and we all pulled together and it ended being a tie 1-1 in regulation. So we went into sudden death overtime. No one scored so we went into the second overtime, and still no one scored. Then we went into a shootout. For those of you who aren't so educated on soccer, in a shootout each team is allowed to choose 5 players to shoot and the teams alternate. Whoever scores the most goals at the end of the shootout wins.

So Northland shot first and scored their first goal. We shot and scored, making it 1-1. Andrew Stoddard (our amazing goal keeper) then proceeded to block 3 PK's in a row, and scored the rest of ours meaning that WE WON THE GAME! It was absolutely amazing. When Stoddard blocked that last goal, we all just rushed him and were yelling and cheering. It was one of the best feelings ever. You had to be there to really get the full experience, but if you knew how big it was to beat Northland, you would be as excited as we were. We all just went crazy. All I could say was, "We just beat Northland!" To just think that no other Moody Soccer team has beat Northland for the past 7 years, and our team beat them. Its just amazing.

So as you can imagine that was an extreme emotional high. We celebrated so much that night. Coach took us out to a Bar B'Q steakhouse which was amazing, and we went back to the hotel. But we had another task in front of us now. We had advanced to the Regional Championship to play Maranatha Bible College, who we lost to in the regular season in double overtime 3-2. So it was a bit of a struggle to adjust to that, but I think that I personally adjusted ok, but I wish I could say the same for the rest of our team. To make a long story short, Maranatha played a different system from the first time we played them, and we did not adjust to it at all. They ended beating us 5-1. It was not a pretty sight. We were so pumped about beating Northland and looking ahead to Nationals in Florida, that we had made the mistake of overlooking Maranatha who had a strong team.

The moral of the story is, this weekend was a rollercoaster. When you go from the highest of emotional highs, to the lowest of emotional lows in less than 24 hours it is a pretty crazy feeling. So the season is over now. I can now have somewhat of a life outside of soccer now. I'm planning on just resting for 2 weeks, just relaxing, and then getting back into running and working out consistently in preparation for next season. I don't feel like there is anymore to say except...

Northland here we come!

winning streak

Well, some good news for the weekend so far. We had 2 away games this weekend. Friday we played Robert Morris (Springfield, IL) and Today (Saturday) we played Lincoln Christian College. These were 2 big games for us considering we haven't had any wins on the road so far, and we were on a 2 game winning streak before this weekend. Against Robert Morris we played exceptionally well, I thought. Our defense had a couple breakdowns, but thankfully we've got a beast of a keeper who saved our butts on numerous occasions. Andrew Stoddard is our keeper and he had a heck of a game on Friday. We ended up winning 2-0 to give us a 3 game winning streak. Then today against Lincoln Christian we had a slow start, I think because some of us were tired from the Robert Morris game (I know at least I was). I did not play well at all, at least in the first half. I don't know what was going on but I couldn't make a pass to save my life, but I picked it up in the second half. It was 4-0 at halftime, and we ended up winning 8-0, a good clean win. And to top it all off Jollypop (a.k.a. Josh Jalandoon) scored the last goal with 16 seconds left in the game. We went crazy just because he doesn't get to play that much and so it was a big deal for him to score. So all in all it was a good weekend. I'm glad to be back home though. I love traveling with the team and my best friends but it just drains me, especially playing two back-to-back games, so naturally I'm wiped now. Maybe I'll write a post sometime about some experiences of being captain. I've learned a ton throughout the season so far, but sometimes its just stressing. But its ok. I'll talk about that another night. Tonight is a night to celebrate. 4 game winning streak. We have our last home game this coming Tuesday against Grace College (Winona Lake, IN), so that is a big game. If you are a student at Moody make sure you come out and support us as we go for our fifth win in a row.

ole' ole' ole'...ole' ole'