Yankees… Cavaliers

I can’t even begin to describe how disappointed I am with the State of the Yankees.  Just as everything is going right in “Red Sox Nation” – and all of the sports in GD Boston – everything seems to be falling apart in New York.  It’s old news that Torre is out, but today brought mass devastation to my Yanks.  My main man Alex Rodriguez is out; the he opted out and the Yankees didn’t feel like chasing his ass.  Of course, that is reasonable.  Why would you chase someone who is only in it for the big bucks and can’t even perform in Playoffs?  It’s true that A-Rod is an amazing player, and can turn a game around in the regular season, but once he gets to playoffs, it’s all over.

 More devastation followed as Girardi was selected as Torre’s replacement and Don Mattingly said, “Peace out, bitches.”  Who can blame him?  He’s had his heart set on managing the Yankees since he played for the team.  It’s not that I don’t think Girardi will get the job done – he himself was a former Yankee too – but I absolutely LOVE Mattingly.  I have a feeling that 2008 is going to be a bumpy season for the Yanks.  My last bit of hope is in Jorge Posada sticking with the Yankees in their time of “need.”  I love him more than I loved A-Rod and I don’t think I could stand to see him go.

At least I can now focus my attention to basketball and my Cleveland Cavaliers.  I realize that the Cavs are a random team for a girl from Connecticut to follow, but my explanation stems from my roots; my father is from Ohio.  I spent my life hearing my Dad walk around the house during basketball seasons, singing: “Ohhh the Cleveland Cavaliers are GREAT, they’re number one!”  I obviously picked up on that and picked up on his love for the Browns too.  But even though I used to watch games at the Jake, I never picked up on the love for the Indians – it’s the Yankees for me, through and through.

I’m excited for Wednesday: the first game of the regular season.  Hopefully its on TV here in lil old Rhode Island so I can cross my fingers for James to lead the Cavs to their first victory of the year (although, since they lost most of their preseason games, I’m hoping that I’m not going to be disappointed with yet another sports team this year).  And go Daniel GIBSON, my Cavalier stud/hero!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Rules of the Game

After seventeen years of playing soccer, I am finally hanging up my cleats for good.  My final collegiate soccer season has ended, even though it feels as though it just began.  Throughout my soccer career, I have developed some rules that will help me in the future; not just in sports, but in the real world.  The following are some of the rules that I live by, day-to-day:

Rule #1: Always, always, always have a hair elastic on hand.  There is always an emergency situation where a hair elastic is needed, whether it’s for practice or in the office.  No one wants to be the tool that shows up to practice without one; I’m the tool that knows this from personal experience.  Back when my hair was as long as Jessica Simpson’s, I forgot to bring a hair tie with me to track practice and had to run with my hair flowing in the wind.  Of course, keeping a hair tie with me on all occasions is entirely necessary.  I currently have an internship at Sayer Regan Thayer and Flanagan, LLC (a law firm in Newport) and I was making photocopies for my supervisor this morning.  Out of nowhere, paper in the machine jammed and I had to figure out how to fix it.  If I hadn’t had my hair elastic, my hair would have been in my way when I was trying to get the jammed paper out of the machine – and it sure did take a lot time.

Rule #2: Don’t be afraid to wear sweatpants in public!  Whenever I am having a bad day, or when I wake up in a heinous mood, I quickly throw on a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt and the day immediately looks brighter.  While many people think sweatpants should only be be worn in the privacy of their home, I am an advocate for wearing sweatpants shopping, to the grocery store, to classes and out to dinner.  Sure, there are a few circumstances where my soccer sweats might be inappropriate, such as to my internship… That’s actually the only place that I would never wear sweats…

Rule #3: Never talk back to the coach (or supervisor).  No matter how much the Coach decides to joke around with the players, it is never okay to talk back to her.  When I was a freshman, Coach threw a ball at Breann so Breann threw one back at her…  It was all fun and games until the team had to do Indian Sprints until we learned respect.  Of course, we did not learn respect, we just learned that punishment is the easiest way for coaches to deal with anger.  I’ve never had this problem with a professor or a supervisor… yet.  I just have to remember this rule in the real world and hopefully I never have this sort of a problem.

Rule #4: If you don’t show up to play your hardest, you might as well not show up at all.  I can’t think of anything worse than ending a game knowing that you could have played better.  It’s better to run as hard as possible for 90 minutes than to take it easy and risk injury.  This rule is important in school and work as well; if you leave something for later you’re just going to have more work for another day.  Of course, procrastination is my strong point, so it’s difficult to follow this rule in every day life.

Rule #5: NEVER STAND AROUND!  The less running you do, the more screaming you’ll hear.  In the same sense, the less work you ask for, the less your supervisor will trust you.  At my internship, I always stick my nose in other people’s business so I can learn as much as possible in the time that I have.  They know that they can always come to me with work because I’ll do it with a smile.

Rule #6: If you’re in a bad mood, use it to your advantage.  Playing with rage makes you play 10x harder than playing on a normal day.  Some of the best work can get done when you’re pissed.

Rule #7: Don’t let outside entities get inside of your head.  They will distract you from the game and/or the work that needs to get done.  Whenever we play Wentworth and Coast Guard we spend the game getting heckled by their fans.  I’ve dealt with men asking to marry me and other annoying things, but you have to use it to your favor… Ignore it and sock the opponent.

Rule #8: THROW THE OPPONENT INTO THE DIRT.  Don’t be afraid of hurting someone; they play the game so it’s their own fault if they can’t handle pain.  I spent the season playing through ankle injuries due to getting shoved around, but I did my own share of throwing it down.

Rule #9: Take a dive.  Yeah, it’s sleazy but every so often you have to cheat to get ahead.  “If you ain’t cheatin, you ain’t tryin” and “Anything to win!” are two of my mottos.  I am the master of diving and making it look like I was completely taken out.

Rule #10: Don’t settle for anything less than the BEST.  That’s pretty self-explanatory….

Rule #11: Have fun, and have no regrets.  I am going to miss soccer more than anything else in the world.  I miss my parents and my sisters and my dog but not playing soccer is going to be the worst thing in the world.  I’ve played for 17 out of 21 years of my life, and it’s ending now.  But I have absolutely no regrets in the world.  I would do everything the same.

    

Senior Day

I will never forget how it felt to check in to soccer preseason when I was a freshman at college.  I walked in the Rec Center with my parents at my sides, looking around the room and trying to figure out who played soccer based on looks alone.  The guy in front of me would be trying out for soccer, but that is the only thing I remember about him; I was so nervous, I couldn’t keep anything straight.  I was an obvious soccer player.  I wore my Southeast soccer warmups and my hair in a braid, even though we wouldn’t be playing until the next day.

My parents brought me to my room and we unloaded my stuff.  My mom made my bed while my dad put my clothes away and I put all of my picture frames in a semi-circle on my desk.  Then they left.  Lucky for me, one of my roommates was a soccer player too, so I wouldn’t be alone for the next 2 weeks – the longest 2 weeks of my life.  Unfortunately, my nerves would not go away, even with a roommate to talk to and complain to.  In fact, the nerves stayed with me throughout my entire freshman season.  I was scared of the coach, I was scared of the seniors and I was scared of making a mistake.  But I loved hearing my name announced in the starting lineups and when the men’s team watched from the sidelines; those two things alone made the adrenaline rush through my veins.

When I was a freshman, I didn’t think much of Senior Day.  It didn’t hit home because I wasn’t close with any of the seniors and I was busy thinking about the game and how badly I wanted to play well.  As the juniors read the notes to each of the seniors, I hid behind a poster to continue stretching.  I didn’t want to be the stupid freshman that messed up senior day by not playing hard.  Sophomore year was not much different, but junior year really hit home.  I stood next to Lindsay and said, “I don’t want this to be us next year.”  She wholeheartedly agreed.

Now that I’m a senior and my Senior Day is tomorrow, I feel the same nerves I felt stepping into the Rec Center for the first time as a freshman.  I hope the freshman feel different than I felt.  Well, I hope they show up to play hard, but I hope they will miss us as much as I will miss them.  I can’t believe this is it – I have two more games left and then I could be done forever.  And what will I do without soccer, my life?

I think this is the beginning of a new chapter in my life, and I don’t know if I am going to like it.  Too much freedom… too much spare time.  I will finally have a social life – a college social life!  Imagine that.

I don’t know, but for some reason, I just don’t want to…

Flash.

Not too long ago, stress was a minor problem that could be solved by sitting on the couch with the TV on, with my computer on my lap and my best friend and roommate sitting next to me.  And no matter how much time I spent in fround of the tube and how little time I spent with my books, I would always ace exams and quizzes.  I had always been proud of my ability to procrastinate writing a paper: I would work all night the day before a paper was due and turn in a perfect paper.  School was easy.  It didn’t matter that, as an athlete, I rarely had time to do homework until mid-November when the season ended or that I would go home for the weekend, “forgetting” to bring my books with me.

Fast-forward to senior year.  Procrastination is impossible; now that the LSAT is over and done with, I have a lot on my plate.  There’s applications to fill out, midterms to take, papers to write… but who could forget the most important paper of all — the dreaded personal statement.  I’m not going to lie, I lead a pretty boring existence.  Every Monday and Wednesday I wake up, go to my internship at the law firm, go to class, go to the gym and go to practice – and Wednesday means night class, so I return home at 8:30 (just in time for Gossip Girl).  Every Tuesday and Thursday I go to classes and then practice.  Friday brings practice and team dinners and whatnot, while the weekend brings a game every Saturday and of course the night life, which cannot be written about in an application essay.

I’ve considered writing about soccer, but I decided that is way too cliche – every college athlete is going to use that subject for their statements and I want to be different.  My essay has to be special; it has to break through the mold… it has to impress even those that cannot easily be impressed.

This brings me back to the beginning; the stress of senior year cannot be resolved the same way that it has in the past.  Relaxation with the TV is just not cutting it.  I’ve got to do something (other than soccer) that will get me on my feet and my heart pumping.  Maybe when the soccer season ends I will be able to find something that will be a fabulous stressbuster, but right now I can’t even add one more thing to my jampacked schedule.

Luckily, this is my last year.

But it is just my luck that it’s really just beginning.

Will it Ever End?

My last entry was written prior to newspapers and news broadcasting companies getting their greasy little paws on the Initiation scandal.  Salve Regina University is being criticized for a lack of disciplinary action in the matter.  The three-game suspension was moved to a five-game suspension, ridiculously enough.  This means that the men will have to win four out of five conference games left in order to even make the playoffs.  With teams such as Roger Williams to play, this is going to be quite a challenge, but I have faith that they will be able to pull it off.  Of course, yesterday we discovered that four men were kicked off the team.  It is still unknown whether the four men will be expelled from the school.)  Three of those men were starters and one is nationally ranked among Division Three players.

You’re probably asking yourself what could possibly have happened to influence Salve’s disciplinary action; the news could not have been the only reason that greater action has been taken, right?  Apparently a couple sophomores were walking back to their dorms with a junior; the sophomores were wearing shirts that had racial slurs on them and they happened to pass by a group of African-American men.  One of the sophomores was punched in the face and when he hit the pavement, his head was kicked in.  Help came before anyone else was hurt.  The junior that was with the two sophomores is one of the players that was kicked off the team; no one knew that he played such a large role in the Initiation until the new roster was submitted.

Yesterday was the men’s first practice in a week.  This means that all of the punishments must be the final punishments, so I am currently waiting to hear about the expulsions.  The Salve student body does not seem to be too amused by this incident; a car zoomed by our practices (we were on the big field and the men were on the practice field) with a kid leaning out the window screaming, “YEAHHH GO HAZING!”

I fully support the men; it was just 15 months ago that the women’s team underwent such a scandal; the school just kept it hush-hush when it was us because it wasn’t a big deal, just a few pictures.  The men’s first game will be a week from Saturday against New England College and their first home game will be Wednesday October 17th against Roger Williams, our rivals.  Hopefully Salve students will get over themselves and support the men.

On a happier note, the Salve women won our first away game at Regis College, lifting us to 4-3 within conference play.  We’re gearing ourselves up for an all-out battle against #2 ranked Gordon College on Sunday; hopefully we come out on top.  A big win like that would definitely lift our confidence for teams like Endicott and Roger Williams.

Scandal.

The Salve Regina University athletic department should be ashamed of itself.  Last year, a total of 17 alcohol violations were committed by athletes.  This year, the athletes have already committed over 50.  (Of course, the men’s soccer team accounts for a good number of these, seeing as each member has been tagged with at least one violation this year due to Initiation.)  And now that I mention Initiation, I am pleased to inform you that it looks as though the three boys will be safe from expulsion, but I would guess that they have been kicked off the team.  The remaining members of the team have fulfilled 2/3 forfeits, all three games being ones they should have won.

The women’s team finally managed to pull a win, keeping us undefeated at home in the Conference (3-0), although we have yet to win an away Conference game (0-3).  The good news is that if we can keep at least a .500 season, we should be able to safely make playoffs, and hopefully have an easier seed in playoffs (because honestly, who wants to lose to Endicott in the first round?).

The Yankees will be taking on the Cleveland Indians this year for the playoffs – my 2 teams. Go Yankees – but go whoever wins!!!