Oct. 25, 2005

Freshmen Lindsay McCoy and Mo Redmond travelled to Boulder, Colo. and Lubbock, Texas for games against Colorado and Texas Tech with the rest of the Mizzou soccer team. Mo discusses the first leg of the trip while Lindsay recounts the final two days.

THURSDAY

Today I woke up at 8:30 a.m. because we planned to leave at 9:30 a.m. on the bus. I finished packing my stuff and packed my bags in Mal's car. We arrived at Mizzou Arena and packed our stuff on the bus. Soon enough we were on our way to the St.Louis airport, where we were going to depart for Denver. I was very excited to go to Colorado because it is so beautiful there. I checked my bags in and went through security. Thankfully I made it through the metal detector without setting it off. I am always afraid of that. We got money for lunch at the airport so Ashley Hamblin and I went to go get some stuff to eat. Then we ventured throughout all the little airport stores and found some pretty cool things.

We returned to our departure gate where the rest of the team was and finally got on the plane. It was sooo small. I got to sit by Amber Swinehart though. The flight was good because I slept the whole way but my plane buddy Amber has a little fear of planes and was a little stressed so I woke up from my nap briefly to reassure that we would be OK. I am sure I helped her A LOT. The plane landed and we were on the bus off to Amber's house, where we ate a WONDERFUL meal provided by the Swinehart's. I loved their house, it was so pretty. It made me miss home a little because her family was so nice and welcoming. I love going to my teammates' houses though because it is neat to see where we are all from. Amber has a dog named Sarah who was my little buddy for dinner.

After dinner we had some team bonding time watching Oprah. Coach Blitz of course picked Oprah. We left the house and got on the bus. Before getting on the bus we made sure to have a little snowball fight with the snow on the ground. Kat Tarr got me good. I love my teammates!!!!! We rode to the Colorado soccer field where we played handball and soccer tennis to get a little sweat going since we had been sitting on the plane and bus for a long time. We had our laughs and giggles. It was good to run and stretch.

We got back on the bus and went to the hotel. I found out that my roommate was Lauren Grice. We all love trying to guess our roommates. I did not guess right but I was happy to be with Grice. We went up to our rooms and got settled in and then we had team bonding at 8:30 p.m. It was a lot of fun. We played a Mafia game. It was very exciting, and we had many good laughs. We then returned to our rooms where many were disappointed with the Cardinals' socre. I ended my day by hanging out with Ashley and Lauren watching TV.

FRIDAY

It was game day against Colorado today. We woke up at 8:30 a.m. and went to breakfast, which consisted of cereal, bagels, orange juice and an assortment of fruits. Grice and I went to the room of the team managers, Dan and Piz, and collected our breakfast items. We finally left for the field at 1:45 p.m. I sat with my traveling buddy Ashley. We arrived at the fields and walked out to the bench to put our stuff on. We ran across the field and started our routine warm up. I was out of breath by the time we ran across the field and back three times. This was because the altitude in Colorado affects your breathing. We had worn our warm-ups all week at practice to help us adjust. This helped a little bit.

We finished our warm-up and started the game. We did not have the best half and were down 2-0. During the second half we put up a good fight but lost 3-2. This was a very hard loss because we really needed a win. I was very upset and hurt by this loss.

We rode back to the hotel on a quiet bus because everyone was so disappointed. I took a shower and got ready to go out to eat. We were given money and we got to walk around downtown Boulder. Ashley, Dan. Piz, William (Ballantyne, athletic trainer) and I decided to eat together. Dan acted like he knew where he was going but really didn't. After walking around the town for about 40 minutes because of Dan's great directions, we arrived at the same place we started. We decided to go to Mongolian BD for dinner. It was OK not the best. After that we went to Ben and Jerry's and got some ice cream. On our way to Ben and Jerry's we saw some crazy fire throwing people. It was entertaining and Ashley, like always, took pictures.

Mo

SATURDAY

On Saturday morning, we all woke up at about 7:00 a.m. and went down to breakfast. After eating, we packed up and loaded the bus to go to the Denver airport. It was about a 45 minute drive so Kat Tarr and I took a bunch of crazy pics to pass the time. Pretty much everyone else slept. We finally got there, checked in and just hung out until the flight to Dallas. On the flight, we all slept, listened to iPods or talked, you know, normal plane stuff. After that flight we had to catch a connecting flight. Before we did though, we went and ate. I had some amazing Taco Bell from the airport food court... yum!

After that we all sat around the airport until we had to take a train to a different terminal. We finally got to our tiny plane for our flight to Lubbock, where Texas Tech is located. The plane was really small and our team almost took up the whole thing. It was a short flight, but very fun. We took pictures again (I carry my digital everywhere!) and made each other look so crazy in them. We did really weird hairstyles and faces and stuff.

After that we arrived in Lubbock. We rented three 15 passenger vans to take us around. I ended up with Bryan (Blitz, head coach) and Kelly (Noonan, Director of Soccer Operations) as driver/navigator. It was kinda funny. We blared some 80's music and just had some fun. We went to the field to check it out after that. We did a little workout, more of a jog and strech kind of thing and some ACL prevention drills. They connsist of a lot of balance and jumping drills to strenghen the knees.

After that, the coaches took us to eat at an Italian restauraunt. I love eating with the team because everything goes so fast. You put your order in ahead of time and you don't have to wait very long. After eating there we arrrived at the hotel. I was rooming with Aria Hudetz this weekend, so we found our room and began unpacking. One of Aria's friends came to visit her at the hotel, which was cool for her. While she was doing that, I did a little homework on my laptop and then went and got my massage. It was very nice and realxing. After that I did treatment and then talked with some of the girls until it was time for bed.

SUNDAY

The next morning, we woke up and ate breakfast. We had some free time so I decided to lay back down until we had to get ready to leave. We packed up, and headed to the game. Warm-up went well and the team was really motivated to prove ourselves after Friday's game. We all wanted to fight back.

Things started out really well and within the first 10 minutes we were up 1-0 with and awesome goal. However, right about that time, I tore my ACL. Consequently, I was taken into Texas' training room and remained there for almost the rest of the game. The doctor came and looked at my knee and suspected that I tore my ACL, but we wouldn't be for sure until i had an MRI. So, they gave me some crutches and a brace and I headed back out to the bench to watch the remainder of the game. We got a win and redeemed ourselves from Friday night.

Things didn't go quite as smoothly on the way home simply because it was really hard to do everything while on crutches. I had a lot of help from the girls though. Mo did everything from put my pants on to carry all my bags in the airport. She was SUCH a big help. Everyone was there in some way for anything I needed. We made our way to the airport and got checked in. We had some spare time so I decided to call my parents. They knew very littl e about the injury because I didn't have time to talk to them when I got hurt, so I felt this was a good time.

We then got on the tiny plane back to Dallas. I was lucky enough to get a seat right in the front though, so I didn't have to worry too much about how I was going to bend my knee on the plane. I had plenty of room and the flight went about as well as it could have.

When we got into Dallas, Derek (Pittman, assistant coach) suggest I be pushed around in a wheelchair because the airport was so big. That was actually fun. Jennifer Nobis was awesome and pushed me everywhere. She had to run because we kept losing the group. We had to take elevators instead of escalators. Once again, we looked so stupid, so of course I had to get some pictures. After that, Jennie took me to some food places and I ate.

We had a good flight back to St. Louis and loaded up the bus when we got there. Once again Mo carried all my stuff, and Ashley helped too. We finally arrived back in Columbia and Anne Baxter took me over to Tom Taylor to turn all our stuff in from the weekend. Then finally, I went home. Mugzy (Meghan Pfeiffer), who tore her ACL earlier this season and is also my roommate, was a huge help. She gave me some pointers on what would help. Although the weekend didn't end too well, it was a fun trip and great to spend so much time with all the girls.

Lindsay