Tryouts, Round #2

Got back from 2 days of tryouts last night around 10pm. We had two training sessions each day, with a little bit of relaxation in a hotel overnight Thursday night. I'll start at the beginning...

First of all, I really missed Wednesday night's pre-game party with Katie. And the drive up to DC was longer and more boring without her : (

When I showed up on Thursday, and everyone else showed up, there were 30 of us altogether--28 field players and 2 goalkeepers. GK training (well...warm-ups) were only slightly more intense. The rest of the first session was spent in 7v7 games and an 11v11 game at the end. The afternoon session was warm-up followed by 11v11 for the rest of the session.

At the end of the day, the coaches got us together and said that tomorrow would be more 11v11 than we did today... Some players wanted to play different positions, and the coaches wanted to see more decision-making.

Friday, we came out and did all that, playing more 11v11, as I continued to play well.

*A neat little side-fact... the other GK was the starting GK for the Long Island Fury of the WPSL last summer!! We played against each other in the game where we played them at our place. And...we beat 'em 2-1!!!

Anyway... after our last training session Friday, we all headed over to the indoor soccer complex and sat on the bleachers for the coaches to talk to us. Head Coach Jim Gabarra told us about their W-League team, and about their WPSL-affiliate, Hampton Roads Piranhas. He also mentioned that, obviously, they are looking for a few key positions to fill, so even if "you" were the best player at the tryouts the past two days, doesn't mean that we need you.

After all that, he read off 8 numbers that were moving on to next week's preseason camp. And my number was called!!!!!! I was shocked and so excited!!! No one showed emotion though. It was weird. I wanted to smile really really big, but felt like I couldn't.

So, us 8 went off to the side, the coaches congratulated us, and told us to report at 9am Sunday morning to get our training gear, and then for our first training session with the full team from 10am-12pm. I'm gonna be training with Brianna Scurry; Abby Wambach's gonna be shooting on me; and Cat Whitehill will be my defender!!!!!!!!!! Ahhhhh!!! I have pictures of them hanging in my room at home (USA WNT calendar) and in my office at school (calendar pictures)!!!!!!!!!

I'm simply speechless...