Bellevue vs Mount SI - 9.24.26

bellevue 0 - 2 Mount Si

2nd min 0-1 Mount Si

14th min 0-2 Mount Si

51st min Bellevue Red Card

Mt. Si are the defending 4A state champions. They feature 13 seniors on their roster and are currently undefeated and untied this season. They are tough, organized, athletic, and play a distinctive brand of soccer that is ruthlessly effective. We knew this from our pre-game video review, and from our previous visits to play the Wildcats. We had a plan to manage the intensity; but plans often change once the opening whistle sounds. 

And two minutes after the opening whistle, we experienced our first change of plans. We started brightly, connecting several passes down our left wing to get the ball into their defensive third in the first minute. Very encouraging. Then the ball boomed back into our end, the Wildcats earned a throw-in that was pumped into a crowded midfield, and after a flick header forward, the lone Mount Si forward was the first to the loose ball 30 yards away and simply turned and fired an unexpected rocket of a shot towards our goal that Elena did her best to parry, but the velocity was just too great. 0-1 Mount Si. Ouch. That hurt. And it got worse, in the 14th minute, we gave the ball away deep in our defensive third, numbers down, and the two Wildcat attackers executed a perfect one-touch give-and-go to get behind our last defender and score from 8 yards at the near post. 0-2 Mount Si. Ruthlessly effective.  

The game had an electric energy, as the home team advertised free pizza for their student section if they attended the game (clever), and not surprisingly, got a loud, enthusiastic group of partisan teenagers eager to cheer their team and heckle the opposition. Pizza works. It was a tournament atmosphere that felt more like a knock-out playoff game than an early regular season contest. It was a useful dress rehearsal for the types of games that we'll need to play in late October and early November. It even rained, mimicing late autumn conditions. And after the second goal, their stadium was rocking. Very Colosseum-like (in a high-school-soccer-type-of-way) but with Wildcats instead of lions. There were lessons for us everywhere in the experience. Being able to turn an aggressive opposition crowd into positive personal energy and confidence (rather than axiousness) is something that is very difficult to simulate in practice. It's something that has to be experienced, and I'm thankful we got a dose of aggressive crowd chaos well ahead of when it really matters.   

The balance of the half wasn't a game for soccer purists or neutrals. Instead, lots of boomed long balls. Balls sent intentionally out-of-bounds. So. many. throw-ins. The tempo was certainly not being set by us. And whatever tempo the game did have, didn't suit us. However, we regrouped at halftime, discussed how to get back into the game, made some positional rotations, and started the second half well, putting the Wildcats under some sustained pressure. But against the run of play in the 52st minute, Mount Si had a break-away one v one against Katelyn in goal. Fortunately, the Mount Si player took a heavy last touch and Katelyn simply picked up the loose ball with her hands, no slide, no sprint forward, no near-collision, just a simple scoop...danger averted? No. Much much worse. Because the Mount Si field is the only one in our league with light-grey boundary lines (not white, not yellow, not red, but faint gray, and faint gray against a gray end zone at each end), our keeper mistakenly wandered outside the box when she picked up the ball, thinking the bright yellow lacrosse and football lines criss-crossing the field were the soccer boundaries. Nope. The referee immediately judged that this was a DOGSO situation (denial of an obvious goal scoring opportunity), and by rule, DOGSO infractions are punished with a red card. Sigh. It was a momentous decision that had an enormous impact on the game. Did the referee have the latitude within the rules to give a yellow card for the hand-ball given the context? I thinnk so. But he didn't. (my view: given the heavy touch I don't think the opportunity was "obvious," plus it wasn't an intentional infraction given the unique field markings...but intent is in the eye of the beholder, and therefore referees are instructed to follow the laws as they are written. I get it. It's a judgement call, and I understand the logic/law, I just don't agree with the interpretation in this particular case. In my view, it was very, very harsh). And so 0-2 down, but playing better, we had to finish the remainder of the game with 10 players. 

But life isn't always cuddles, flowers, and birthday cakes, it also comes with scraped knees, rain on a wedding day, and red cards. And so we rebalanced the team, sacrificing one of our holding midfielders (sorry Tanna), and carried on. The only choice when things don't go our way. Keep calm, and carry on. And then, surprisingly given our 10-player situation...we proceeded to outplay Mount Si for the rest of the game. We'll never know if we could've turned the game around if we had been at full strength, and it doesn't really matter. In the end, despite several great chances and near-misses, we lost the game. 0-2 to Mount Si. 

I was extremely proud of our girls in defeat. No unnecessary post-game quibbling, whining or complaining. Disappointment? Of course. Frustration. Ab-sol-ute-ly. But no finger-pointing. We gave it our all and never gave up, even when playing the last 30 minutes short-handed.

And so we move on. And in a massive vibe-shift, on Sunday we host our annual free clinic for little girls from our local soccer club. Our players will serve as coaches for 80 girls between 5-11 years old. The goal for the event is to give back to our local community, teach some basic soccer skills, and most importantly, share some laughs and giggles with aspiring young soccer girls, some of whom might wear the navy and white someday. And yes, there will be pizza for all. It works with little girls just as well as with heckling teenagers.  

We host two home games next week: Woodinville on Tuesday (last September game) and Newport on Thursday (October here we come). As I've written before, every game in our regular season requires our best effort. No cupcakes in Kingco.

Peter

ps. for context, at this same point in the season last year, our varsity had a 4-1-2 record. What's our record for 2026? 4-1-2...it's a nice reminder that seasons are a campaign, not a singular game. We might have games in the regular season that don't go our way, but our campaign is still marching in the right direction.