Preseason - Day Six

by Jen Soo Hoo (First-year med student, '10)

After a good five days of two-a-day practices and team bonding activities, the last day of pre-season culminated in a scrimmage against Denison University. Denison has typically been in the top 25 teams Division III teams every year so we knew it was going to be a good game. Everyone was extremely excited to put everything together and see where we were at. I was especially excited to see how the team would look in the 11 v. 11. I came in hurt to pre-season so I was able to watch and observe the entire pre-season practices. From what I had observed, we seem to be miles above where we started out last season, which is extremely exciting. Everyone seems motivated and eager to compete and play their hardest. We also have a really nice group of freshmen come in which added a lot more depth to our team.

Despite the end of two-a-day practices, we all still had to get up fairly early to make the bus, which left promptly at 9:00 AM. I’m happy to report that everyone made it on to the bus on time, including Garber (sorry, I don’t think you will ever live that one practice down). The bus ride over was a fun time. We stopped at Panera, everyone’s favorite place, to get breakfast/lunch. I swear every time we walk into a place to eat the workers there look like they’re about to faint as thirty plus people come swarming at them. We all got our food without a problem, nonetheless. The whole rest of the time was full of laughs as a bunch of us played M.A.S.H in the back of the bus. This game basically spelled out what your future was going to be ranging from who you were going to marry to how many kids you were going to have to who you your only friend was going to be. Some people’s futures unfortunately didn’t look so bright. We learned that Steph was going to marry her cousin. We also learned that Yule was going to have ten kids with one of the freshmen boy soccer players, while living in a box, with Ana as her only friend (really sorry about that one Yule). Coach Tiff, we learned was going to have twenty kids with Otto with Ronald and Donald as her only friends. It was extremely funny learning about everyone’s lives.

We arrived on Denison’s campus with plenty of time to spare. Everyone got ready and headed over to the field. After some initial controversy, we finally figured out where the field was over the hill. We ended up playing four quarters of thirty minutes. The first quarter went extremely well. We played a 4-4-2, which was a different formation from last year, but we adapted really well. We possessed the ball extremely well and switched the field. It was apparently obvious that the players on Denison were in EXTREMELY good shape. I literally thought they could run up and down the field all day long. Despite this, we held our own really well and dominated the play at some points. However, the long week of two-a-days on burning turf started to take its toll on the team as was expected. The latter parts of the scrimmage were not as fast-paced or concise as the first quarter, but it was still evident we were a good team and could move the ball around well. I was extremely excited watching us play. I couldn’t help thinking about the start of our season and how well we can do during our season and UAA’s. This scrimmage showed us our potential as a team as well as things we need to work on in order to continually improve. It was a solid end to our pre-season training, and I’m extremely pumped to see how the rest of our season turns out.

The ride back was much more uneventful. We stopped at McDonald’s for food and arrived back to Case around 8:30 pm exhausted but happy. Pre-season is officially over. Great job girls!!!!