Stop talking about the men!

Both the ref report and Goff, who I suspect got it from the ref report, credit the Cal men's team with lifting our spirits during halftime of the Davis match. If it were true, I'd be fine with it being mentioned but that's the thing. It's NOT true. I know that at other schools the men's and women's teams have close ties and that sometime the guys help coach the girls and that the teams often party together. That is not the case at Cal. We practice all over the city of Berkeley because we often can't get grass time on campus. We consider Treasure Island to be our home field. And yes, we have to pay a bridge toll to get there. Once or twice a year we're allowed to use the men's scrum machine but we have NEVER played a game on Witter Rugby Field. We're hoping that our game against Reno will happen on Witter but every year we hope that we'll play a game there and it never happens. The women's team would welcome friendlier relations with the men's team but until that happens, STOP talking about the men! It takes away from our achievement. We came back from behind because of our own determination and hard work, not because a few boys showed up.

Injuries & Ref Reports

Two of Stanford's players, a locke and their starting flyhalf, sustained season-ending injuries this past weekend in the game against Chico. It must have been a brutal game and I'm sure both teams were playing dirty. Chico always does and Stanford did this year in their game against us. This year just seems to be the year of serious injuries for multiple teams.

I really like referee reports when they're informative. I hate the ones that mention all about how the ref was feeling that day and whatnot but only say about two sentences about the game. The ones that I love are the cheesy reports. The one for our game against Davis is over the top. It's hilarious. The ref latched onto the fact that we are the Bears and ran with it. He called one player dangerous like an angry bear and then referred to the rest of the team as den mates. CORNY!

Cal vs. Davis

We won! It didn't look like we were going to and it did come down to the wire but we won all the same. Davis scored twice on us in the opening minutes but once we buckled down and got our heads in the game we dominated. They did score off a penalty and for a bit we were really suffering from lack of discipline but we had the momentum for most of the game. In the end we won 17-15 and that final try was amazing. We were all on pins and needles hoping and praying that it would happen and then the ball was sent wide, our wing just ran it up the side, and the game was ours. I'm so glad we won. This is the game we needed to win. Last weekend against Humboldt was beautiful but that game didn't mean nearly as much as this one. Stanford is the traditional rival but we also have a rivalry with Davis. They're the team that we battle for a spot at Sweet 16s and it always feels good to win against them.

The blue side match was also a good game. We lost but we were able to score a try and make the conversion kick. Our blue side players are really coming along and some of then are developing at such a fast rate that they are going to be vying for gold side spots soon.

It really was a weekend of upsets. I don't consider our win a complete upset simply because I think that Davis is on about the same level as us but I know that outsiders would have bet on Davis beating us. Also, Chico beat Stanford 25-5 which is a HUGE upset. Of the teams in our league, Chico would be the one to beat Stanford but that they beat them by 20 points is stunning. I think the dynasty is crumbling. Maybe it's a bit premature to be saying that but they aren't as solid as they were before.

UBC

We played UBC yesterday on Treasure Island. They're a really good team and they shut us out. I'm not sure what the final score was but it was a lot to nothing. The side we put out was interesting though. We rested a lot of our starters because we play Davis on Saturday and we want them ready to go for that. At the same time we couldn't put out our entire B-side because some of them aren't ready to play a team like UBC. Plus, a bunch of people couldn't make it because of classes and midterms. So we put in an odd mix of A-side and B-side players with alumni/All Blues players to fill out our numbers. It was actually really cool to see old friends back on the field and the game looked like a lot of fun to play even if we lost. We got pretty close to scoring a few times but UBC plays a hard, physical game and they were fitter than us by a lot.

The Davis coach was there scouting us. He even taped part of the game. It made me laugh because that was no where near the team we'll be putting out Saturday.

Cal vs. Humboldt

We trampled! We killed! We WON! And it was beautiful to watch. Something clicked and suddenly there was continuity, ball retention, and everything else we had been lacking at times. The final score was 48-0. We scored more than either Chico or Stanford did on Humboldt and unlike those two teams, we shut them out. The other great thing about the score is that those tries were scored by so many different people on the team. Forwards scored, backs scored, and they were all team tries with beautiful punches and set ups.

We needed this more than anything. The energy was amazing. It is one thing to be told that it is okay to lose the first two games because they were against the two hardest teams in our league but it is an entirely different thing to believe it. This game made people believe. You could almost see the faith and trust form on the field. It carried over into the B-side too. We might have lost 0-12 but Humboldt played most of their A-side and our girls played hard.

Things are looking good and if we take what we did this weekend and improve on it, we are gonna rock Davis.

In other news, my surgery is scheduled for the week before Spring Break. Here's to being hopped up on Vicodin during my week off. Boo, but it will give me plenty of time to recover before heading back into school.

Cal vs. Chico

Yesterday was our league match against Chico State. For the first game, our B-side combined with Chico's B-side to play Sac State. It was a good and exciting game and our combined side came back big for the win. The A-side game ended on a slightly less spectacular note. Our playing improved greatly over last weekend but we ended up getting shutout 0-29. Now we have a two week break before Humbolt and hopefully in that time we can shake off our two losses and focus on making the improvements that will allow us to play our game.

The MRI confirmed that I have a completely torn ACL and there is some damage to my meniscus too. Watching the games this weekend was painful. I have never wanted to be out on the field more.