It was time for the big trip of the year and this year we
were going out to Indiana to play last year’s national champion IU and then the
butler bulldogs. We all knew Indiana would be a challenging game but we also
learned that butler would be just as tough. They recently beat Louisville and
would be well rested while we had a game Friday night. With all this knowledge
we pulled out of Brown knowing it was going to be a battle this weekend. So how
did we prepare ourselves once the bus pulled out of the OMAC parking lot? We
slept…then ate…then slept…then ate. This pattern went on for the whole day. We
slept on the bus to Boston then ate in the terminal while waiting for our
flight. We then slept on the flight to Atlanta, got off the plane and grabbed
something to eat then quickly passed out for the flight to Indiana. We then
drove to our hotel, which was very nice and glad to have us. Jameson was immediately
banned from the complimentary cookies so he was a bit saddened but everyone
else seemed rested and ready to go. That night we had the best hotel meal I
have had in my entire life. Again Jameson was a bit hurt because he was banned
from the dessert part of the meal but since the food was so great he got over
it quickly. We did the typical
scout after dinner then hurried off to bed since we were very exhausted from
all the sleeping and eating we had been doing that day.
It
was finally game day and everyone was excited. We woke up had a great breakfast
(this hotel was truly killin it with the food…my kind of place) then went off
for a training session. The session ended with a 1-touch volleyball game. The
Martin Movement put up a good fight against the Blueberry Waffles but the
Waffles ended up winning by 2 games to 1 off of some very questionable referee
calls by Coach Biggs and some unwarranted ejections in crucial moments by Coach
Laughlin. Then it was time to rest and get ready for the big game that night.
The
game was a great atmosphere with a beautiful stadium, a band, loud crowd, and
two good teams. . I can tell you though that the second half was the best
soccer we have played this year. We had Indiana on their heels the entire
second half. They couldn’t get the ball out of their half. Finally Jason Pesek
came on and served in a beautiful ball and Pepechino’ (Jose Salama) netted the
ball with a beautiful header. Unfortunately
Indiana countered and scored within the next minute and despite our continued
attack we just couldn’t get another. We may have lost to Indiana but we saw the
potential our team had. We then
had to focus on getting a lot of fluids and food and to start recovery for the
next game.
The
next day was a very typical recovery day consisting of a lot of eating, light
practicing, drinking, resting and nothing of much interest. We did go have a
light practice at Butler’s facility and did change hotels but those were about
the only times we left our hotel rooms for more than an hour. We had a team
dinner and film later that night. Jason as always killed it with his clips during
film and Coach Nuss once again proved he had a skill for getting us food we
truly enjoyed while keeping it all under budget. That night consisted of going
to the local gas station to stock up on Gatorades and then watching Bridesmaid
to get mentally ready for the game the next day.
The
butler game did not go as well as the Indiana game, which was disappointing
after showing so much potential against IU. There isn’t much to say about the
game other than the fact that we lost 3-0. We can say it was because of fatigue
or maybe just an all around poor team effort but it just wasn’t our day. After
this we boarded the bus to start our journey home. Once again the pattern of sleep,
then eat, then sleep again took over until we finally pulled into the OMAC
parking lot to end our trip at 1 AM. We didn’t get the 2 wins that we were
hoping for but we did show some great potential and we had some excellent
individual efforts which are both two positives things that came out of the
trip. I think this trip will benefit our play greatly and will help us to get
some big time wins once we start playing Ivy League teams.
-Ben Maurey
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