Riverview Rams vs. Cardinal Mooney Cougars

Recap

Well, that little ball inside the referees whistle got a workout tonight! I think that ball was bouncing around more than the yellow one on the field; which is really saying something because that yellow ball on the field had more ground time than an over-worked UPS driver. Let us not get too excited about our win tonight… we need to face some music… even if that music is from the wind family of instruments powered by the zebra shirts calling the rules. Those referees did a great job keeping things safe. There may not have been any yellow cards handed out tonight but it wasn’t for lack of trying. Charging, Pushing, Sphere Violations, Shooting Space Penalties… participation in the penalty jubilee did not fall entirely within the realm of the Rams. There were a few whistles directed toward the Cougars as well. Let’s call it what it is… Sloppy Play. The weather was cold, the wind was blowing and as indicated by the slipping and sliding of cleats, the grass must have been a bit wet. Facts are facts… and numbers are numbers… “37” is a number. Let’s look at that one. “37” is the combined number of times we forced the ref to blow a penalty whistle and/or simply hand the ball to the Cougars because… well that’s just it… Because.

Let’s move on and get right to Congratulating the Cougars who really played a hard game tonight. This can not possibly be the same team we beat so handily at the beginning of the season. This team defended their home turf with volumes of energy and team spirit. They won on Draw Control, they won on Turn Overs and they won on Ground Balls. They had us fighting from the beginning and they kept pressing right to the last minute of the game when the Rams slowed down and controlled the ball, thus controlling the clock and letting it tick off the remaining seconds.

The game ended with Gabriella Connelly performing a balancing act on the sideline, thus completing the stall which started after Ronni McCurdy’s free-position shot and score with 1:53 remaining in the game. Goals were also scored by Riley Springler, Marisa Souchak and Kate Zoltak.

We can’t sugar coat this victory so I will simply end it with another number: 4. That’s the number of weeks the Rams have until we will likely face off once again …against the Cougars… in the district Semi-Finals. They have their sights set on victory. We better set our sights on winning Ground Balls.

Let’s hope the weather warms up for this weekend as The Rams head up to Tampa to take on The Gryphons at Sickles High School on Saturday, March 24th @ 12:00 Noon.

Let’s GO RAMS!