I surprised Ron when I suggested Wingstop for dinner before the Soccer
match between the Aggies and the Portland State Vikings. It’s well known that I don’t like wings. However, I’d seen that they were offering a
new Chicken Sandwich with a parmesan and garlic dip, so I wanted to give them a
shot. At the restaurant, we were told
that it would be a 45-minute wait. That
was even after I slipped the maîtres’ d’ a $20 (just kidding). There were only two occupied tables in the
restaurant, but I guess they were busier than they looked with the employees
mostly standing around the register.
Luckily, Roadrunner
Pizza was next door and they had a pie ready in 15 minutes. It was excellent. Ron loved it, but had an upset stomach for
the rest of the evening. Outside, a
gentleman was rummaging through the trash.
He found a bag of Wingstop takeout and started to eat the
leftovers. Well, somebody got to eat
Wingstop. Perhaps I should have asked
him how the Chicken Sandwich was. For
anyone cackling that this is a symptom of “late stage capitalism,” I’d remind
you that every stage of socialism involves standing in line for bread.
Well, suitably humbled by that display, we took off for
the Soccer Complex. During dinner, we managed
to solve a mystery from Thursday. Ron
was trying to remember the name of an actress on a sitcom, but couldn’t
remember her name or the show. We
finally managed to piece it together from memory and figured it out. It was Kristy
McNichol on Empty Nest. I also solved a mystery when Ron picked me up
for the game. I’d been hearing a weird
bird call for a couple of weeks at my apartment building, but never seen the
bird. I heard it again getting into the
car and finally saw it was an exotic bird in a neighbor’s window.
I told Ron that I thought the Aggies had a good chance to
win tonight, but I wasn’t guaranteeing anything, unlike Thursday against UTEP. Portland State was likely here because Coach Baarts knew them from when he was
working at Portland University. (I’ve seen the Portland Volleyball team here (9-13-19).)
It was another beautiful night, cool with a slight breeze. The crowd was smaller than on Thursday, but
good. Attendance was officially listed
at over 500, which was about the same as the UTEP game though (?). (I think there were about 1,000 people on
Thursday.) Unlike UTEP, Portland State
did bring some fans. There was also a
family in University of Utah shirts. (Were they lost?) The Band
wasn’t here and they were missed. Some
ball kids were employed on the sidelines.
Meanwhile, Assistant AD Herb
Taylor looked concerned at the damaged protective netting in front of the
scoreboard. It must have happened during
practice. They couldn’t do anything
about it at the moment.
First
Half
The Portland State (PS) girls were full of spirit before
the game. The Aggie girls took a long
huddle beforehand. The Vikings struck
first with 43’ left in the half with a solo attack. Aggie goalie, Makenna Gottschalk, caught it.
Makenna also accidentally kicked one out-of-bounds on a pass.
Behind us, some fans were talking about Super Fan Tom’s
cheering at the last game. He wasn’t
even there tonight. Without the Band and
Tom, I could just about hear Coach Baarts yelling on the opposite sideline. The Aggies and Vikings traded a couple of
attacks. After a call against the
Aggies, a fan yelled at the ref, “I disagree vehemently, sir!”
36’ the first best chance for the Aggies came as Xitlaly Hernandez had an open shot
after some good passing. PS goalie, Sidney O’billovich stopped it. 28’ a PS attacker broke through two defenders
and took a shot, but Makenna caught it. 22’
Sofia Beerworth took a shot, but
Sidney got a hand block on it.
The teams would trade more shots. The Aggies were passing well, but seemed offensively
tentative. The ball boy in front of us
dove for a ball getting loose on field.
The crowd gave him a round of applause for the effort.
9’ Score! Mya Gonzales fed Sydnee Johnson, who found the top shelf for a 1-0 Aggie lead. The Vikings stormed right back within the
next minute. Makenna made a great jump
save on a shot. I put an asterisk on
that play at the time. Now looking back,
it may have been the pivotal play of the match.
The time ran down on the half without a threat. Sydnee turned around a PS player at midfield
in a little too obvious foul. There was
a ball that went into the stands right before the whistle.
Halftime
Let’s check some out-of-town scores. I found out the next day that on Thursday night,
former Aggie Baseball player and
current Oriole, Kyle Bradish, had had another win.
This one was over Cleveland and
was his second consecutive quality start without giving up any runs. He’s looking good.
Aggie
Volleyball swept three matches in an East coast tournament,
including beating host, Davidson,
who’d beaten Virginia Tech last
week. Freshman Ryleigh Whitekettle was among the team leaders in kills. Mia Peterson (pictured),
my co-worker’s future girlfriend, had 10 kills in one match. The story in my mind, from looking at the
stats, was Coach Jordan assembling a
front line with Lia Mosher, Molly Johnson, and Taylor Snow. They are
racking up the blocks.
Meanwhile at the Borderland
Invitational Tournament in El Paso that the Aggies weren’t invited to (because
the Lobos won’t play them?), the Miners lost all three of their matches,
each loss taking five sets. The UTEP
Volleyball team also announced their full support of a Duke Volleyball player, Bubbette Wallace, who is engaging in a
racial hoax for personal publicity. I
can only hope this story ends quickly before the Aggies somehow end up
participating in it.
The on-field entertainment for halftime was watching some
guys with a tall ladder sitting in the back of a truck fixing the netting in
front of the scoreboard. They did
it. Some little girls selling
fund-raiser chocolate bars worked the front of the stands. I bought one.
Some athlete guys down front (I wasn’t sure what team) bought a
bunch. That pretty blonde former player
was back tonight. (She has great legs,
too.) She bought from the little girls
as well and knelt down and interacted with them sweetly. (Good with kids. Wife material.)
Second
Half
There was a Portland goalie warming up during halftime, Enya Hernandez. They switched goalies for the second half. I didn’t notice until I saw the official
scoring. There might have been an injury
to the starter, maybe on that hand save.
43’ Enya got work immediately, as she had to come out on a solo
breakaway by Mya G, fighting her way past two defenders.
41’ on a free kick
outside the PS box, Brooke Schultz nearly
curled one in, but Enya made a great save.
38’ Xitlaly had nice kick on defense, but also on the field, one of the
Vikings went down. (Though one of the
shorter players on field, I couldn’t help but notice that X seems to win every
head ball in the air.) Play continued
for a moment before the ref finally blew the whistle. The girl had to be taken off on a cart.
The Aggies kept up the pressure on offense. They had a three-on-one that was broken up on
missed pass. On another series, they had
two corners and a free kick, but came away with no shots. Later, they weren’t able to make a shot on an
open net. The Vikings immediately
countered and Makenna had to stop a rolling shot.
21’ Sydnee was subbed out to a nice round of
applause. There was a shot into the
scoreboard net. Good thing they just got
that fixed. 18’ Tania Tapia gets the Hustle Award for running down the length of
the field and sideways across it chasing the ball. She was on a mission.
14’ it was a thing of beauty. It was a quick strike down a broken field as Bianca Chacon and Sofia passed it to Loma McNeese (pictured), who tapped it in in front
of the net. 2-0 Aggies. PS had been working up momentum on attack
right up to that point and were vulnerable.
11’ during a play stoppage, the ref gave Coach Baarts a lecture on the sidelines. No idea what that was about.
9’ off a free kick, there was a scrum with a dozen bodies
in front of the PS net. There was a
delay, then the ref called it a goal.
Enya had the ball and fell on it, but it probably went over the line in
the process. The PA made an
announcement, but didn’t sound sure. The
official scoring had Bianca with an assist by Brooke. I sure couldn’t have figured out the scoring
without a slow-motion replay. 3-0
Aggies.
6’ an Aggie girl tripped a Viking girl for a foul. From down in front, “That was all ball, ref!” After a PS foul, “That’s her fifth foul! Card her!”
I never did figure out what team those guys were presumably with. Aggie subs had been steadily coming in, but they
kept up the attack. Ron was acutely
interested in one pretty blonde sub, Megan
Sheehan. 1’ on the final attack, the
ball danced around the PS net, but somehow didn’t go in. We’re done here. Aggies
win 3-0!
The PA wished Portland State "Good luck" on the rest of their season. I could identify the Football
team. They were sitting on one of the
side bleachers. I hadn’t noticed them
until they came out to applaud the girls.
In the final stats, both teams had 4 Shots on Goals. The total shots were 14 to 5. Like I said, I think Makenna’s save after the
first goal was instrumental to the win.
There was some great passing by the Aggies in this game, as exemplified
by Loma’s goal. It was another great
team effort.
However, it wasn’t all victory. After the game, I talked Ron into going to PQ Treats. I told him that ice cream would settle his upset stomach. When we got there, we found it was now closed. Now I hate Circle K and their buyout of Pic Quik, now that it directly affects me. And Ron was going to give me his ticket, so I could get that Two Goals/Get Free Raising Canes deal for lunch with dad the next day, but forgot about it. Well, it was still a great evening. (Translation: I still had ice cream at home to eat.)
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