Inside The Circle - Week 7
10/16/2001 8:00:00 AM | Field Hockey
Oct. 16, 2001
COLLEGE PARK, Md. - Welcome to this week's installment of "Inside the Circle," an inside look at Maryland field hockey. Each week throughout the 2001 season, junior Kateri Simon (Fallston, Md.) and senior Autumn Welsh (Macungie, Pa.) will combine to bring you the latest Terp happenings from the student-athlete's point-of-view.
Use Kateri and Autumn's journal to follow the Terps' 2001 campaign all season long. If you would like to submit question to our authors about field hockey, the Terps or anything (within reason!), send us an e-mail.
Kateri reports on the Terps' ability to make a winning situation out of the previous Sunday's 1-0 overtime loss to Old Dominion. The Terrapins played well from top to bottom, and learned a lot about becoming a more cohesive unit as the season begins to come down the home stretch. Kate also comments on one of Maryland's newest fans, the 20-foot high inflatable Testudo the Terrapin, who was present at Sunday's match.
This weekend the 2001 field hockey team made history. Never before October 14th have the Terps so clearly dominated the ODU Monarchs for an entire match. Forget about the score! I think everyone who attended that game can't remember the score anyway...I know my team has forgotten.
What we do remember was an awesome contest between two ruthless hockey teams. We remember the things that really matter: how it feels to play like a team, to push ourselves to physical exhaustion for each other, to play with heart and desire, to forget about everything else but our trust in each other and why we love this sport.
So yeah the score might have been...what was it? Well, I can't remember, but not in our favor, but that doesn't mean we didn't win anything from this weekend. We won the courage to be able to step out on the field for every remaining game this season and absolutely know, without a doubt, that we are capable of playing the way we did on Sunday.
But the exciting thing is that is doesn't stop there. We are always seeking to take our game to a new level and will challenge ourselves to get there, to keep going up. After two months of trying so hard, but stumbling, our team finally took the first baby step towards being the best we can be.
And completely aside from all the emotion, it was just a beautiful weekend for hockey! I believe our largest fan ever was in the attendance on Sunday. Testudo was there and 25 feet tall! (a huge inflatable terrapin was blown-up at the far corner of the field-really fun to see) The sun was shining, our hearts were pounding, the fans were cheering, and our team was amazing...we couldn't have asked for much more.
