Wild Thing

-17-

Game on...

Kasey takes her place on the field and jumps up and down three times while she waits for the referee to blow the opening whistle. 

"Anyone interested in placing a bet on the winner?" Ashlyn asks the players around her and gets no takers. "What about you KO, you wanna put some money on your girl?"

Kelley looks at the goalkeeper, "Alright, the 20 you still owe me on Kasey and Capital City, winning." She and Ashlyn shake hands, "Deal. Guess I'm cheering for ... what's the other team?" 

"Limestone College, Harris." 

"Right, let's go Limestone!" 

They all laugh at the goalkeeper's sorry attempt at cheering for the visitors.  

The whistle finally sounds and the Limestone Lions player taking the kick-off turns and passes it back allowing them to begin moving forward. The game plan instilled in them by their Coach, to come out flying and catch the home team on their heels. The visitor's pass, pass, pass and one pass too many find Sarah intercepting and looking for someone to pass off to. Not having any teammates making moves, she passes it back to Jen in hopes that the midfielder can get them moving. Jen passes the ball over and then sees the ball passed back to Hayley playing high in the box before it comes back to her. 

Hayley seeing Emily with space in the midfield sends a long kick in her direction and then watches as her teammates join the rush. The Crusaders play the ball back and forth, short passes looking for space but only seeing a wall of red bodies in front of them. Jen accepts the ball and then looking, decides to send a shot from distance and surprise everyone with it. 

Striking it hard, the opposing keeper is able to get her gloves on it and knock it down, but unable to secure the rebound before another shot, courtesy of Sarah comes her way, a body gets in the way of the shot and the ball remains loose in the box until Kasey is able to get her foot on it and direct it to the netting. 10 minutes into the match and the crowd cheers for their hometown team and Captain as she notches her 15th goal on the season.  

A replay of the goal shows on the large scoreboard as the players make their way back to the midpoint of the field for the restart, followed up by the announcement, "Crusaders goal scored by your Captain, #5 Kasey ..... Wild!!" The words "Wild Thing," flash on the board and the crowd gets loud, cheering. 

25 minutes into the game and the Crusaders turn over possession in their own end, with the Lions pouncing on the open ball. A shot on target dings off the post and unfortunately for them the rebound comes right back to a player in red, who is then easily able to tuck it past a prone Hayley, tying up the match at 1. 

Kasey can tell her team is starting to tire with the running game of the opposition keeping them moving. On the backline, Hayley was keeping her teammates in the game, making a couple of difficult saves look routine. Having just knocked a shot over the ball for a Limestone corner, the Crusaders were getting into position with Kasey calling out instructions to them. As the ball came in, Hayley was able to track it and attempted to get her gloves on it, only to have her jump blocked by one of her own teammates, who didn't hear her calling out. The ball went across the box and was headed into the netting, putting Limestone on top 2 - 1 just before the end of the half. 

"These teams are really close in skill, no wonder the match up has received so much attention." 

Kelley nods in response to Alex's comment and adds, "I'm sure Kasey's face being plastered all over the place and on-screen had nothing to do with it." 

Alex looks at her friend and laughs, "You've got it bad for her, don't you, Worms?" 

Kelley looks at her rather sheepishly and smiles, causing Alex to laugh at her.