That was an instant classic of a game. The entertainment value was thru the roof. More to come later.

Who Dey!!!!

20 minutes ago, FrankNicodemus said:

That was an instant classic of a game. The entertainment value was thru the roof. More to come later.

Who Dey!!!!

Watched the last half of the game. It was a very interesting, hard fought game. A high intensity rivalry for sure. Thanks for posting the link to the game.

Don’t want to steal @FrankNicodemusthunder but…great, very hotly contested game. Pandas came out firing and with a lot of energy. McGraw scored about 4 minutes in on a corner. IMO, NDA controlled the first 10 minutes. Much more even the next 30, Frannie Smith diced up the right side of the Panda defense for the equalizer for the birds with about 12 minutes left in the first. NDA did have a great shot from the top of the box hit the crossbar and dropped almost directly down, with about 5 minutes left in the half. Unfortunately for NDA much like last game the Birds really controlled the second half. Lots of very, very good opportunities, by my count the Birds had at least 4 crosses go across the face of the goal, inside the 6. Luckily, the panda defense and more specifically goalie Joelle Hentz was just good enough to hold off the constant pressure from the birds. The Pandas have to be better in the second half if these two see each other again. 
From an intensity perspective, 5 yellows and 1 red were issued. Scary enough even with 6 total cards I am not sure the officiating crew ever had control of this match:(. I felt like they let so much go early that they were forced to issue cards to attempt to get it under control, but just my opinion. 
 

The Tower Park Address

Like I warned everyone this was potentially going to be WWII against these 2 teams.  Both NDA and Highlands has really been playing extremely good soccer since they last meet on the battlefield in Lexington.  Prior to the game I thought it was interesting that Fort Thomas finest was surrounding the complex to make sure there were no shenanigans with NDA players flying around in jeeps during their arrival for battle.....NDA must have been aware of the increased law enforcement officials so the dramatic entry was squashed.

The field was set and we were ready to have this sequel to start.  Unfortunately, for the Birds they seemed like they were not ready for the quick punches that NDA came out delivering.  Highlands seemed like they were playing on their heals with NDA really attacking well against our defense.  As @Legacy26 NDA struck early on their corner kick that McGraw was able to sneak into the back of the net.  

After the goal it seemed to wake the Birds up and things finally got settled down with very equal positions amongst both team.  The Birds finally got on the board by a really nice strong drive by Franny Smith coming up from her Right Back position, she drove super close to the corner flag took a hard left to head thru the box and found a small opening to the far post to get it past the NDA keeper to even up the score, 1-1 with 12 minutes left in the half.

The rest of the game as stated in several publications circling out there was a game that was very physical but in my opinion not dirty.  These were 22 strong athletes on the field grinding with everything they had to come up with a win.  I disagree with Coach Woeste's comments that he thought the ref "could have done a better job getting it under control".....  I don't think it was ever not under control.  Soccer is a physical sport.....He blew the whistle several times and he carded 5 players (3 Birds/2 Pandas) + the NDA coach.  Unfortunately, one of the Birds cards was a different card that isn't yellow.  Birds defender during a throw in took out some frustration with a throw in that hit an NDA players chest with some force.....the force was enough for the ref to pull out the card in the back of his pocket......this occurred with less than 3 minutes left in the game.  Luckily for the Birds playing a player down due to the Red Card didn't impact NDA getting a last second goal.   

Game over, fun times at the Fort!

Until next time....

Loved the Norris quote, "When you have two of the top programs in the state playing each other, you know it's going to be a fantastic game, I think we gave the people what they paid for."   They sure did Chris!!!!

The future looks fun as well as the undercard matches were both highly contested games:

Freshman:  Birds won 1-0

JV:  Pandas won 1-0

**Fact check correction:  I think the Birds actually had 4 players carded:  3 YC and 1 RC.  My mistake above.