The Run to the Championship

Hello everyone, I want to start off by saying happy holidays to all. I hope that everyone is enjoying their time with their loved ones. I am still in Israel and probably wont get to make it home for Christmas. It is ok though, I will still have Christmas with my family when I get back there.

Ok let me fill you all in on whats been going on with me over here. This week has been a very tense week. We have been practicing and preparing for Cup play. During cup play it is like the NCAA'S, it is one and done. So throughout the week everyone was really on edge, we were playing Ramla for our first game, and they had knocked the club that I am playing for (Ra'annna) out the past couple of years so it was really important to concentrate on this up and coming game. After all the hard practicing and getting after each other pretty hard, the club treated us to a spa day. Something like a team bonding. We were able to get a full body massage, use the jacuzzi, as well as lay up in a suite and just relax. It was really a fun night. We all felt so good and relaxed after that.

The next day I surprised my teammates with gifts. They do not celebrate Christmas here but they do celebrate Hanukkah. I wanted to try and put the Christmas/Hanukkah spirit within the team and I think it worked. They were all so surprised and so excited. They thought that I was crazy to go out and buy each one of my teammates a gift. This is evidently not something that is done here very often, because they just kept saying that I was crazy. The only thing that mattered to me was that they were happy and that they enjoyed and appreciated their gifts. It was not about the money at all, and the smiles on their faces was priceless. It made it all worth it.
So now it is time for the game and one of our key players was having some knee trouble and before the game we knew for sure that she was not going to play. That was a little nerve racking because she is very important to our team, by the way sorry it is Charde Houston that I am speaking about. Everyone had to give a little more against a team that was almost favored to win anyway. Once the game started, we came out a little slow, but with a not so good performance in the first half, we were still only down by 7 at the half. During the second half once we tied the score the lead change would go back and forth until we finally got up by like 6. From then on we kept the lead, but Ramla who has Tan White and Nikki Anosike on their team as well as Adia Barnes would not just go away. They fought until the end.

This was a really hard fought game and I was so proud of my teammates for the way that we all stepped up and gave a little extra in Charde's absence. Now we sit and wait to see who it is that we play again. For some apparent reason they are going to draw out of a hat the two teams again for the second round. I have never seen this happen before, it is usually the first round and that's it. But not here, plus this year they are doing things a little different. Usually the cup games are spread out to play, but this year they are doing them all in one week. It is 3 games in 5 days. So if we keep winning, which I hope that we will, that will be our schedule from now until the break. I am looking forward to the next game and I am interested to see who it will be. Sorry everyone as of right now I don't know so I guess I will just have to let you all know next time. Ok I am off to bed now. Wish us luck for the cup, hopefully we will come away with the championship.

Please have a safe and Happy Holiday.

Merry Christmas to all!

Meek