Stripe Out for ALS
Game 1: (1-0-0)
26 August vs. St. James at Saint Thomas Aquinas (3-0)
It was, yet another, cool BWhite Event. Stripe Out for ALS with its emphasis on the Whigham and Hopfinger families will be hard to top.
As both families were receiving special recognition from PA Announcer, Leo Brown, both teams executed the, now, traditional walk-out through the crowd and on to the field. After the prayer, followed by the STA choir performing the Star Spangled Banner live, and the introductions, we always stop for the joint picture, including all the players and coaches from both teams intermixed throughout. It's a cool moment.
And then we play soccer. All that was good. We honestly were all over the Thunder statistically for the entire match, even when we were playing 10 vs. 11 after a somewhat, odd, red card had been given to our keeper (Check it Out).
But the ball was not on the turf enough, so although St. James had probably one legit chance to score late after we turned the ball over in our own back third, their intent to disrupt play did limit many 4-5 pass possessions for us. And we also contributed to our own lack of good possession with the ball being up in the air way too much.
As Coach Hammons said we got through those first crazy ten minutes of the game—exactly ten minutes scoring off a Saint Thomas Aquinas ball at the 30 minute mark. Swags t'ed it through the Young dummy for Ryan's back post finish. Just perfect.
We missed a PK and some other good chances, but we led 2-0 at half, adding a third goal before we dropped to ten players. And honestly, we had several great chances to score while we were playing with only 10.
We did, as I mentioned, give the ball away late, but Seger just made one heck of a save. Check it out!
We got several outstanding performances from several different guys. So. Nice opener. First games are never a team's best performance, but this performance will go in the solid column as games go. We will need to show a lot better possession to down #2 in the city, Rockhurst, next Thursday.
Also, I recommend the Halo Broadcast of the match, featuring Sydney Watts and Lilly Ellwanger, two soccer girls, one the 2022 Gatorade Kansas Player of the Year. Sydney's commentary during the issuing of the red card is worth hearing and rehearing.
Stats:
First Half:
Saints: Shots: 11 (8) Corners: 2 (Welsh, Kitts)
30:00 Ryan (Muck intercepts, immediately goes wide to Swags who t's it through Young shield dummy)
13:55 Kitts (Ethan's drop pass creates the Garcia through ball that finds Kitt's feet)
Thunder: Shots 3 (2) Corners: 0
Second Half:
Saints: Shots: 10 (4) Corners: 2 ()
27:13 Young (it starts a again with the Muck intercept and quick turnaround to Young who goes wide to Ryan who squares Kitts who hammers it off the keeper for the hustle follow)
Thunder: Shots: 2 (1) Corners: 1
*With Mrs. Gress still laid up, Mrs. Bissen and Beth Sabers came off the bench to get us so many great photos of Stripe Out for ALS 2022. We thank her so much.
**Shoutout to the boys for some of our best shirt sales ever (and those sales create the bulk of our donation). (We also had some nice individual donations and change jars all over the place to add to our donation to fight ALS.
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