Preview of fall schedule

Ahead of our first game this Sunday, I thought it would be interesting to take a look at our schedule.  It's a tough one.

Like last season, we start off the first week playing our rivals and co-equals, Tsunami.  I'm sure everyone remembers our close 2-1 loss to them last year in that first match.  It turned out to be accurate prediction for the season.  Tsunami finished 3rd behind Itchy & Scratchy and LUA and we finished a very close fourth.

Labor Day Weekend we are off as usual so there's an early bye built in.

When the season begins in earnest we will have the first of two night games this season.  Those 9:00 p.m. games will be late, but I expect really strong attendance because everyone is home from traveling on Sunday nights.  In those early games, we will be playing DC Divided and DC Thunder, teams that we're pretty familiar with by now.  We have even records versus both teams so it's a coin toss on paper.  But you can be sure we can't rely on chance to win.

We have four games at the league's new field at Galludet University.  Combined with our Trinity game, that's five games in the same general part of Northeast DC.  We'll be getting to know the neighborhood.  My neighbor plays for Geezers, a 3rd Division team that is being promoted.  That's our 9/26 matchup at Galludet.

We finish the schedule with three hard games - Quick, LUA, and Taz.  Quick and Taz have beaten us, but we have also beaten them.  Quick, of course, scored a 6-0 victory against us before they were relegated two seasons ago.  That one was bitter because it was a meltdown on our part.  LUA we have never beaten.  We played them once about 4 years ago and then 3 times recently.  Each time it's a LUA victory, although the margins are getting thinner each time.  When is that going to end?

Our late bye is six of one, half dozen of the other.  It should allow us to get healthy. But if we are in position for the playoffs, it will result in awkward breaks in the action towards the end of the season.  Our nonstop run of several games in the spring proved to be important to our success.

Any thoughts of your own on this sked?

It will be fun and very competitive.