Nov. 15, 2007
We ended the season in a great way with senior day last Saturday at home. Five girls were honored for their hard work and dedication to the program including Brit, Kendall, Snelly, Tina, and Chioma. This was a really hard day because those were the girls I came into school with four years ago, and I'm so proud of what they have done and wish I could of been out there celebrating and playing with them. The team played well for them on their day, but it ended up that two of the seniors made the biggest impact in the game. First, my roomie Kendall was on fire. I don't think the girl stopped running to catch her breath all game. She played so well and worked so hard making her deserve the two amazing goals she scored about 30 seconds apart. Not only did she break a school record for quickest consecutive goals by a single player, but Snelly decided to join in on the fun and score our third goal of the game just 8 seconds after Kendall's second. I really thought everything was in fast forward because it happened so quickly! It was a really exciting 38 seconds and game which is what my senior girls all deserved...love you chicas!
I always think the season goes by fast, but this year really seemed to fly by. Now is the really exciting part...playoffs! The Monday after our last regular season game is always the tournament selection show. This year the show was much later in the day, moving from around lunchtime to 5 o'clock made for a lot of sitting around for us all day. I was so antsy to know who we were playing and watched the clock all day just wishing it was 5 p.m. already. Our whole team, members of the athletic department, and some of our guys soccer team all met in The Bronco to watch the unveiling of the brackets. It is always exciting to sit their in anticipation of what's to come the next weekend...this year was no different. Everyone was making predictions about who we were going to play and when...and most were correct as it was revealed shortly after 5 p.m. that we would be facing Cal at Stanford on Friday. What an exciting match-up! After that we headed over to Buckshaw to start preparing for the game and we could all just feel it in the air...it's playoff time!
So lastly, I have to tell everyone to come out and watch your Broncos take on the Bears Friday at 4:30 p.m. at Stanford...Go Broncos!
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Posted: Nov. 7, 2007
Our team is always up to having a good time. So, halloween last week was a good opportunity for us to dress-up and be silly. We pre-celebrated the holiday on Monday with Brittany's 21st birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese. We all got dressed up in various costumes including a cowgirl, baseball player, gymnists, ninja's, nun's, inmates and many more. We dominated the dance dance revolution stations and skee ball machines to win some pretty awesome prizes for the birthday girl (a.k.a. a scorpion ring!). Two days later we were ready to dress up again for Halloween night. We had an early practice the next morning, so some of us went out for a little to make our rounds and show off our costumes. It is one of my favorite nights of the year because you can really see how creative everyone is. Since freshman year, Brit, Kendall and I have teamed up in the invention of our halloween costumes. This year was no different. The three of us and our roommate Frankie were American Gladiators! Storm, Zap, Ice and Siren to be exact! We had so much fun impersonating them all night and Zap even got into a funny jousting battle with Kevin Madden (a male American Gladiator and memer of the baseball team), where she won...of course! Now I can't wait for Halloween next year to see what we will come up with next!
On a different note, it's hard to believe we only have one game left in our regular season! Senior day is on Saturday and we are all getting ready to make it amazing for our five seniors (Brit, Kendall, Snelly, Tina and Chioma). After our 1-0 victory at USF on Sunday, we were rewarded with two days off to rest not only our bodies, but our minds. Today we are heading back onto the field to get some work in and prepare ourselves for our last game against Saint Mary's on Saturday. Today is a special day for me because I got cleared on Monday to start working my way back into training. So at practice, I get to warm-up and play some possession with the team, which I so excited about! Since it is our last game on Saturday we would really appreciate all the support from our fans. Our seniors have given so much to the program over their four years here and deserve all the appreciation they can get! So, come on out to Buck Shaw on Saturday at 1 p.m. to see your Broncos play the last game of the regular season!
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Posted: Oct. 27, 2007
Brrrrrr! Standing through yesterday's game was an extra chilly experience. Although it was better then some previous years at Gonzaga (Tina was talking about a snow-lined field her freshman year), the wind was chilling me to the bone. In the first half, we played well, dominating possession but unable to score a goal. The beginning of the second half didn't go so well as we let in a goal in the first couple minutes off a corner kick. After that, we had countless opportunities but it just wasn't our day. Kiki scored another great goal for us to tie it up, but unfortunately Gonzaga ended up scoring another goal a few minutes later and winning the game 2-1. A disappointing result for us, but we are going to work for redemption later on this weekend.
Even though we all weren't really in the mood to do anything, especially act like we were happy, we decided we had to be good friends and go support our volleyball girls in their game against Gonzaga. We took the short walk over to their high-school-like-gym and cheered our girls on! I like to think we were a big reason why they won...but let's be real, they are really good! The team won in three games and played really well. It was fun to get to see them play and cheer them on while they are on the road. We had a great time and even made it back just in time for our favorite show...Grey's Anatomy.
Today we hit the sky again and flew to Portland to get ready for our Sunday game. The team did a recovery practice including lots of jogging, stretching, and passing. After practice, we took a walk around on the game field and started to prepare for the amazing atmosphere that it is going to produce on Sunday (a sold out crowd of 5,000! So exciting!).
Once again, it seems like where ever we go one of our families are nice enough to have us over for a delicious dinner. Tonight we are heading over to Kendall's Aunt's house in Portland to have an amazing Salmon and Filet Mignon dinner (doesn't get much better then that!). On that note, I think it's almost time to leave so I better get going but just wanted to remind everyone to watch our game Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m. on ESPNU! Go Broncos!!!
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Posted: Oct. 17, 2007
We have been traveling out of our minds the last few weeks, so I haven't gotten a chance to update everyone about what is going on. So here is a quick briefing:
We traveled down to Cal Poly, playing one of our best games of the year and winning 4-0. Tina scored twice, while Court and Lexi both found the back of the net once. That Sunday we played Cal at home losing 2-0. The following weekend we faced the two highest ranked teams in the country Stanford and UCLA. The funny thing was we only had 12 healthy field players. I guess it's not really that funny but our team worked together and got a good result against Stanford on Friday tying them at their home. The game was so fun to watch because it was two of the best soccer teams in the country and also the atmosphere was amazing with fans packed in the stands and squeezing in on the end lines. The amount of work the girls put into that game plus a trip down to LA the next day and only having two field subs made our game against UCLA on Sunday pretty difficult. Enough said.
Last weekend, we traveled once again to southern California to face Fullerton and USD. Lexi's family was nice enough to have us over for a home-cooked pre-game meal when we arrived on Thursday night. Her mom made us all Lexi's favorite dishes including some of the best fried rice ever! I think we all go a little carried away and ended up with some pretty full bellies afterward. But luckily they had a ping-pong table so we could work some of our dinner off. For at least an hour straight, about ten of us played a really intense game of around the world ping-pong. Of course, being the athletes that we are, we all got really competitive wanting to win and ended up sweating more then we did at practice that day! A few of us learned we should stick to soccer (Jessie and Lisa) and others found a secret talent (as Brittany brags to me about how she did pretty good!).
The next day we played Fullerton at 7 p.m. so we did a walk through earlier in the morning. The highlight, or lowlight, for everyone is when Snelly decided it was a good idea to accept a dare and eat the worm we found on the field. We were all cracking up making our walk through a little more fun then normal. That night we took the field at 7 and played a good game against Fullerton. Kiki started us off in the second half with a goal which was quickly followed by Chioma's first goal of the season off a corner kick. I'm just gonna say it got a little crazy after that and they ended up tying the game back up with three minutes left. But once regulation was over, I just knew we were going to win because the team was in the zone. Everyone had their game faces on and looked like they wanted to score a goal and get the game over with. Katherine was the lucky one who scored not even three minutes into overtime. It was a really exciting game.
The next morning we traveled down to San Diego to play USD. We played a tough game there, losing 1-0 but playing pretty well overall. It was a good weekend, not the start to conference we had hoped for, but we have seven more game to make up for it. On that note, we are finally back at home this weekend so we hope to see everyone out at our games. Our schedule this week at Buckshaw is:
Wednesday: UCSB @ 7 p.m. (Kendall's birthday...Happy Birthday!!)
Friday: Pepperdine @ 5 p.m.
Sunday: LMU @ 12 p.m.
See you all out there!
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Posted: Sept. 27, 2007
Sorry about the delay, but I'm back with another blog! We played in the Stanford Tourney two weekends ago where we faced Rutgers and Missouri. Both games were a battle and we came from behind to win both 2-1 (Rutgers in overtime). The games were good because the girls never gave up and battled back from behind to win both games.
After a tough weekend, it finally happened...school started! It's always nice to be at school at the beginning of September because we get to play and relax the rest of the day, it almost feels like we are pro soccer players! But now that school started, it will be nice to have a set schedule and get back into the swing of things. Four days after we went back to school, the team took off for our first away trip. We got to go to beautiful Arizona! Ok, that was a little sarcastic, but we did get to see some really pretty sunsets (that was about it). The day we arrived was rather hectic as we flew to Phoenix, straight to practice, and finally made it to dinner at former Bronco Tiffany Roberts' house. And what a feast we had! Tiff's family was kind enough to have us over to their house and cook us a yummy spaghetti dinner. We all took advantage of the cooler night weather and hung outside on the hammock and around the table for some good eating and lots of laughing. The next day was game time versus Arizona State and we had another great meal, this time at Lindsey Johnson's family's Italian restaurant. All I have to say is it was delicious! Once game time rolled around, we were pleased to see the quality of their field and the great atmosphere it created. The first half we were on our heels and didn't create very many chances. After halftime, Kiki turned it up a notch and was determined to score a goal. About thirty seconds into the half, Kiki found the back of the net with a great finish to the far post. The girls battled through the rest of the game and were able to add another win to our record.
Saturday morning a few of us got up at 2 am to watch the women's national team take on England in the quarterfinals of the women's World Cup. We had to support our former teammate Leslie Osborne because she was starting the game. After an early morning, it made the two-hour drive to Tucson look like a good opportunity for a quick nap. Once we arrived there we laid low the rest of the night, which included a team meal, a Cold Stone ice cream run, and watching game tracker to get updates on the boy's game against UCLA. We were bummed we couldn't make it to the game so we watched in on the computer and we were so happy for the boys when we saw them pull off a big win like that! I think we were all happy when Sunday rolled around so we could get back on the field. The team came out strong and pumped against Arizona. We created a lot of good opportunities but never really anything on goal. The team kept trying though and it wasn't till the second overtime when we got a good scoring opportunity. I can always tell when Tina is going to score a free kick, and her body language was telling me to get ready to celebrate. She struck a driven ball into the far side of the box from the right side about forty yards out. Lexi got her hip on it and popped it back into the mix where Brittany was ready to score her forth goal of the season. We were all really happy to come out of a tough weekend like that, where we play two good teams, with two wins under our belt.
This weekend we once again face two good teams. We will travel to Cal Poly on Friday and play at 7 p.m. Then Sunday, we are back home to take on the Cal Bears at 1 p.m. on good old Buck Shaw. After the game there will be an autograph session with the team, so be sure to stick around to meet your 2007 Broncos! Hope to see you all out there!
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Posted: Sept. 13, 2007
After a strong start to the season two weeks ago, we came out of our second weekend with two solid performances. We played in our Santa Clara Classic last weekend where we faced two top 10 schools. Our first match was Friday night under the lights against No. 2 Notre Dame. They are always a very solid team with many talented players who year after year prove to give us a good game. However, this time around things went a little bit differently for us. The game wasn't a pretty soccer game by any means (although it did have it's moments). I would call it more of a battle. Bodies flying, tackles being thrown, but there were a lot of beautiful goals being scored.
Kiki started us off in the first ten minutes as she threw one of her infamous flip-throw-in's into the net. A few minutes later Kiki created a dangerous opportunity in the box, which put the ball on Courtney Lewis' foot with nothing left but to put it into the net. Just like that we were up 2-0 against a very good Notre Dame team. However, less then five minutes later they finished a good goal to bring the game within one goal. But that was the closest they would get for the rest of the night as the girls refused to backdown. Before halftime, Snell finished a solid shot to increase our lead back to two. At halftime I was so pumped. My veins were pumping full of adreniline because I couldn't believe the effort and heart my teammates were laying out there on the field.
As the second half started, the positive vibe the team was giving off just continued to increase. Our fourth goal was my favorite, probably because I have never seen a girl strike the ball with as much power as Snelly did. After she beat her defender on the right side of the box, she cut back to her left foot where she let go of a rocket shot that hit the upper 90 far post. It was amazing! I still get the chills thinking about it today because it's one of the best goals I have ever witnessed in person. One of my favorite parts of the game came next as Courtney gave us all a little laugh. After a good tackle, she was fixing her hair when we got control of the ball and started counter attacking. Court saw something open up and couldn't pass up the opportunity to go forward. So, she was sprinting down the field with the ball as her glamorous hair swayed in the wind! It was definatly a Michelle Akers flashback. But it seemed to work as she got the second assist on Brittany's clever goal when she chipped the keeper from 20 yards out. Brit struck again a few minutes later with a rumble in the box that she bumped in with her belly. Lastly, Kiki struck for the second time with a well placed finish to top the night off 7-1.
Overall, the score of the game couldn't describe the feeling I got from my teammates. We have had a pretty rough start to our season with five injured players out for the season, and many people playing in different positions. But on Friday night, my girls truly united and proved how far heart and determination can get you. They left everything out on the field and were willing to go the extra mile for their teammate standing next to them. I have never been so content on just watching a game in my life because they all made it feel like I was back on the field with them. Each and every one of my teammates made me very proud to say I am a part of this Bronco team.
Sunday we faced off against a very good Virginia team. We put in a good fight ending up in a 0-0 tie. We created some good opportunities in the game but couldn't quite finish one off. But our back line really kept us in the game and proved to be our best line this past weekend (great job girls!!). On top of our two big games, we also had what seemed a gazillion recruits including five commited seniors and about 20 juniors just visiting the school. It was a good weekend for them to all come in and watch us perform in two good games. But I'm sure I wouldn't be the only one to say that it was a pretty tiring weekend.
During our day off on Monday, we spent the evening enjoying the beautiful view from the house of some of our greatest fans, Bill and Susan Carter. They were generous enough to invite the team over for swimming, some Wii playing (Linds and Jessie can tell you all about that!), and a delicious dinner. The rest of the week has been spent in practice and doing some film sessions in preperation for the Stanford Tournament this weekend where we face Rutgers and Missouri. So if you can come and watch us Friday night, 5 o'clock at Stanford we would love to see all you Bronco fans out there!!
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Posted: September 7, 2007
I've got good news and bad news. Definatly more good news then bad, so I'll get the bad out of the way. We had our first game last week against San Jose State at Buckshaw and played a pretty good home opener. Unfortunatly, we lost another teammate and friend to the dreaded knee injury. Hayley Siegel, one of our veteran center midfielders, tore her ACL in the last few minutes of our game. Just wanted to let everyone know so we can all, as a Bronco community, can keep her in our thoughts and prayers as she progresses through her recovery and rehab.
On a lighter note, we won our first game 3-2! It was an interesting game to say the least but was filled with a lot of potential. We had a few sequences during the game where our team looked in-sync and produced some good opportunities. Tina scored the first goal off a free kick in the 5th minute to start off her "second senior year" with a bang! Brit added with an awesome diving header (and almost bicycle kick!) in the second half and freshman Jessie Baddley scored the winning goal for us! The game was a good starting point and the girls were ready to improve on some things throughout the week in preparation for our tournament. The week was filled with some tough practices and video sessions in order to work out some kinks from our first game. With that said, we are all ready for our tourny where we will face Notre Dame and Virginia, both top ten teams, at home this weekend. We had our pregame dinner of Maggianno's at my house last night which means only one thing...its game time! See you out there friday night, 7:30 at Buckshaw!
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Posted: August 31, 2007
Hey Broncos Fans! Women's soccer's Jordan Angeli here to keep you all updated with what's going on with our team this year. First, I just wanted to tell you a little about myself. I am a senior, but I will be redshirting this year because I tore my ACL during our spring season. I have played forward for the past couple of years but recently moved back to center back. Enough about me, let's get to the team...
Fall is here...finally! I know this is how a lot of us felt coming into the season after a long and hard winter/spring training. We reported back to school three weeks ago to start our preseason training. It involved some intense double day practices, lots of sore muscles and a lot of bonding. We always go on a preseason trip in order to come together as a new team and this year we decided to do something different. The coaches surprised us with a trip to Lake Berryessa. So, we showed up like zombies at 5 o'clock in the morning last Wednesday to leave for our fun two day adventure.
The coaches rented a big house boat, equipped with a slide and a fun ledge to jump/flip off of, and a speed boat, for waterskiing, wakeboarding, kneeboarding, and tubing. If we weren't spending time on the speed boat, we passed the time lounging on our floaties (Sammie the shark, Crusty the crab, and Larry the lobster), trying to stump a "20 Questions" gadget that Kendall brought along with her, and, of course, eating. Jerry pulled everyone along on the tubes at least once, even us gimps, and even got tossed off the tube by Curtis once. But the best spill of the day would have to go to Lindsey Johnson with her three kartwheels on top of the water before finally sinking in.
That night we set up camp along the water and had dinner while Tina, Poach, and Snell shared with us their amazing voices and guitar playing skills around the "camp fire" (it was too dry to actually make a fire so we all sat around a lantern!). After a few scary stories, the noises of the night definitely got to some of us (a.k.a. me). But I later learned that I had a right to be scared (those of you who know who the Zodiac killer is, know what I'm saying). Also, Jerry forgot to tell us until yesterday that there were five mountain lions killed on our campgrounds the week before we arrived! Yikes! After our preseason camping trip, we only had a week left until our first game. Now, a few practices and days later, we are here on a Thursday night getting ready for our first game tomorrow night against San Jose State. Come out and support us at 5:30 p.m. at Buckshaw!!
Go Broncos!