The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
Caitlin Marple Blog
10/21/2008 12:00:00 AM | Women's Soccer
Hey Fans!
Although it was a long weekend on the road, it turned out to be a good one for us. We earned our first road victory on Sunday when we beat SMU!
The weekend started on Thursday when we left Bartow for the airport around noon. After two flights, we arrived in Tulsa and headed to a local Italian restaurant for dinner. On Friday, we changed our usual gameday routine to try to make us feel like we were more at home. That morning we woke up and had a late breakfast around 10 a.m. After that, Coach Harbin, assistant coach Allison Graham, Ayana Russell and I went to the mall to walk around for a bit. We ended up spending most of our time at a Halloween store. None of us found a costume, but Coach Harbin bought some plastic cockroaches to prank people. That night, he put one in Danya Barsalona's shoe and one under her pillow in the hotel room. After screaming and trying to get Toni Gockel to kill them, she eventually realized that the reason they weren't dying was because they were plastic!
Against Tulsa, Danya scored early in the game off of a cross from Toni. Although we played hard for most of the game, we missed a lot of opportunities and let Tulsa back in the game. After two overtime periods, the score ended up being a 1-1 tie.
Saturday morning we packed up early and got on a flight to Dallas. After arriving in Dallas, we ate a quick lunch and had a light training session where we played fun games. We probably looked really funny, but it got us loosened up from a long day on the road after a hard game.
On Sunday morning, we got up early and ate breakfast in the hotel as our pregame meal. We packed our stuff up and headed to the field for our game against SMU. Two of our freshmen, Carolyn Polcari and Natalie Watkins, are from the Dallas area, so we had a huge fan base of their families and friends!
We started the game off really slow and finished the first half with a 0-0 tie. SMU scored on us first in the second half, but the big crowd helped us come from behind. When Carolyn came in, she scored two goals and we won 2-1!
This weekend put us in a better position for post-season play because our record is now 4-3-1 in the conference. This weekend we play the No. 1 team in the league, East Carolina, on Friday evening at home. I hope to see you there because we'll need your support! I'm especially looking forward to Sunday's game when we play Marshall away because a lot of my family will be able to be there because I'm from Virginia. Since we play East Carolina in Birmingham this year, the seven hour drive from my house to Marshall is the closest game for my family!
I'm looking forward to seeing al of our fans on Friday at 7 p.m. at West Campus Field!
GO BLAZERS!!
Caitlin
