Summer League Tournament (aka We Made the Finals!)

Saturday was the end of summer league tournament (boo!) It was down in San Pedro, the same park as last year. This year, the wind was kinder to us, blowing the foul smells away from the field for most of the afternoon. And the bathrooms were finished. Once they opened them, they were much nicer than the outhouses we had last year. But the weather was still hot. Fortunately, one of my teammates brought a portable shade stand, so we had a little shade on the sidelines.

Now, as you read this, keep in mind that team purple was ranked 9th out of 12 after the regular season. But that means almost nothing as the day will show.

We started out playing Team White at 9 AM. They were ranked 8th, and were the team we tied a few weeks back. We actually started out with a lead and maintained it the entire way through the game. They did get close to us at the end, but ultimately, we won 9-7. (Games before the finals were supposed to be to 13, but ours was shortened because of time.)

That meant we immediately got to play team Grey. Now they were the number one rated team in the league and hadn't played any games yet. They were also missing a few key players. Unfortunately for them. We pretty much ran away with it. I think it was something like 13-7 at the end. And boy were we jazzed at that point.

We had a third round bye, but we came back strong against team black in the Semi-finals. The score was closer. Maybe something like 13-10? All I know is I scored one of our points. And we won.

That's right. WE MADE THE FINALS!!!!!!

I still can't quite believe it. I fully expected to be done by mid-afternoon and home in time to hang out with some friends at a pool party. But I don't care because we got to play in the finals.

Unfortunately, we fell apart. We lost one of our male subs. It was our fourth game, and everyone was tired. The other team had more subs and had played one less game than we had. They scored the first point and we answered back. But after that, we didn't score a thing in the first half, ending it 1-8. (The finals were to 15.)

In the second half we had another sub injured. But we still managed to score 4 points, making the final score 5-15 (same as last years score, I noticed by rereading that blog post.)

And I'll admit I lost it. After listening to the snarkiness of the sidelines by the blow out score, I did snap about someone. I should be more sorry than I am, but loosing that handily was hard enough as it was. We didn't need those complaints.

Of course, the other team, team Tan, was extremely good, too. They were fast and great all around players. Plus their greater number of subs really made a difference.

But you know what? We made the finals! I can still hardly believe it. Or did I say that already?

The party this year was a "booze cruise" in the harbor. As much fun as the cruise sounded, I wasn't interested in spending the money to go (it was costing extra) or trying to drive home at 11:30. Plus there's the fact that I wouldn't drink anything. So I left when the tournament was over. Still, I didn't leave until after 7. And I had to stop by Downtown Disney and buy some more pins. I hadn't been for 10 weeks. I was going through withdrawls. As a result, I didn't get home until after 9 tired of mind and body. In fact, I barely got to church yesterday morning. But it was all worth it.

Why?

Because we made the finals!