Needing a resounding win the Thorns got just what they needed – The Chicago Red Stars came to town.
Hi, chumps!!
Portland went medieval on the hapless visitors, thumping three past them in the first half hour and cruising to a 4-nil win.
Our punters profited from the pummeling, too; two players – Daniel Stratton and Thrakkorzog – got the exact scoreline, and nearly everyone got something out of the hurley-burley.
Of the two top savants Daniel Stratton edged Thrakkorzog by a single point for guessing one more assist. SincFan was scarily prescient with a tale about Kling exhorting the squad to “just play” and find their fun (which sort of devolved into mayhem, but that’s Tori Penso for ya…) to nick the story points.
| Name | Last Match Total | This Match | Season Total |
| Thrakkorzog | 27 | 12 | 39 |
| ABell4 | 19 | 5 | 24 |
| Roses | 15 | 8 | 23 |
| Pastabake | 25 | 6 | 31 |
| Constant Weeder | 11 | 0 | 11 |
| SincFan | 19 | 6 | 25 |
| Daniel Stratton | 19 | 13 | 32 |
| Timber Dave | 10 | 0 | 10 |
Thrakkorzog continued a string of hitting it big between lulls to jump out to a seven-point lead on the table; the remaining five players (Constant Weeder and Timber Dave seem to have kind of drifted away…) are tight in the race for second, and there’s still a lot of season to go.
This week is a sorta-short-rest; Friday the team has to meet San Diego in SoCal. The Wave are coming off a 0-3 demolition of Houston but have been up and down recently; before that last game and a similar beatdown of the hapless Current the week before the Wave had dropped two in a row; losing away to the then-unbeaten Spirit in May, but more shockingly dropping a 1-3 clanger to Orlando at the end of April.
The Wave are are level on points with Portland (15) and even on GA (10), but the Wave have found goals harder to come by, so they’re third on GD because of GF (15 vs 22). Part of San Diego’s problems are their sick list:
Abby Dahlkemper (SEI – back)
Meggie Dougherty Howard (thigh)
Giovanna DeMarco (knee)
Taylor Kornieck (abdomen)
Emily van Egmond (back)
Kelsey Turnbow (back)
QUESTIONABLE:
Makenzy Doniak (thigh)
This should still be a clash of the top-of-the-table titans, and I think a lot will depend on whose backline can lock down the other earliest and longest.
How all this works:
Add a comment to this post. As your first line, put your predicted result, for example 3-1 Thorns.
In the body of your comment, start with the goals and assists, like so:
Smith (Klingenberg)
Kuikka (Free kick)
Moultrie (Unassisted)
Marta (PK)
Next, name the first yellow card recipient: Jess Fishlock
Then a red card. (NOTE: no points awarded for correctly calling a red-card-free match, so take a guess.) Madison Pogarch for mimicking mooning the referee after getting an undeserved yellow.
Make your fun prediction,and give a “thumbs up” to anybody else’s prediction that tickles your fancy:“Pogarch gets the start against her former club. She gets through 70 minutes without fouling her former teammates until she can’t take it anymore. She pushes over Hina, gives Weaver a wedgie, gives Sinc a noogie, then flips off the Riveters and runs out of Providence Park, never to be seen again. The ref issues a red card, which she later contests, and loses.” (h/t to ABell4)
Scoring:
· Correct score: 5 points
· Correct result (draw/win/loss): 3 points
· Each clean sheet: 2 points
· Each goal-scorer: 1 point
· Each FK/PK/assist/lack of assist: 1 point
· Goal/assist bonus: 1 point
· Player with the first yellow card of the match: 1 point
· A player with a red card: 1 point
· Most liked/most outrageously accurate prediction: 2 points
Some ground rules and explanations/clarifications (the fine print):
Comments must be posted before kickoff, but you can edit or amend an earlier prediction right up to the starting whistle.
Keep your scoreline predictions realistic. No crazy scores just to pad out your odds of getting goals and assists.
The goal/assist bonus is an additional point if you predict the correct scorer and assistant on the same goal, for example, you say Hubly scores from a Boureille assist and that is exactly what happens. P.S. if you say exactly that, and it happens, I will hunt you down and buy you a beer!
Be clear whether you think a goal will be unassisted, assisted, or from a PK/FK. Unassisted = no assist, run of play; Assisted = player who got the assist; PK/FK = not in run of play. For the purposes of this thread, Penalty Kick and Free Kick are the same thing. No entry means unassisted.
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- 2024 Final Grades: Forwards - December 17, 2024
Both of these teams have potent attacks and questionable defenses this year. Both have let in 10 goals over 8 games. This has last team to score decides the result written all over it.
3-3
Morgan
Kornieck
Bixby (og)
Hina (Weaver)
Dunn (Smith)
Smith
YC Colaprico
RC Dydasco
Trip to San Diego includes a trip to go surfing as team bonding. Due to the temperature being highs in the 60s and overcast this gets canceled and the team goes into sea world pulling off a movie level Ocean’s 11/Free Willy caper freeing orcas.
2-1
Dunn (Moultrie)
Weaver (Sugita)
Morgan (Jakobsson)
YC: McNabb
RC: McNabb
I hope we have Kling, the availability list is updated to show Kornieck available and Kling questionable.
This game is the clash of the titans. Smith and Girma footrace each other back and forth across the field. Moultrie and McNabb clash repeatedly in this game, and both choose violence. Dunn and Morgan are both pressing hard for more goals. The referee doesn’t start laying out the yellows soon enough, and the game spins wildly out of control. A Thorns fan has spent a year training a goat to walk on two legs, and play soccer on all four. At the game, they put a long coat, hat, face mask, and sunglasses on the goat, give the command to walk upright, and get it past security. When Sinc takes the field in the 65th minute, the Thorns fan unleashes the goat onto the field. The goat scores twice on San Diego, and would have been MVP of the match, if not for the whole defecating on live TV thing.
Thorns 3-2 Wave
Smith (Dunn)
Coffey (Sugita)
Moultrie (Dunn)
Shaw (Colaprico)
Morgan (Kornieck)
YC: Coffey
RC: Jakobsson
Shaw scores first and shows off her signature surfing celebration. The other scorers are inspired:
– Smith starts with the Jordan-shrug and then morphs into a Tina Turner dance and head shake homage
– Morgan, prepping for the World Cup and manifesting a Canada elimination goal, mimes chopping down a tree. Southland Irregulars take this as a Roger Levesque callback and are deeply offended
– Coffey one-ups Morgan’s famous tea-sipping by doing a hot-coffee-sip complete with that burned-my-tongue-hand-waving thing
– Moultrie pays tribute to her hoops-mad sister by draining a jumpshot
2-2
Smith (Dunn)
Hina (Weaver)
Morgan (PK/UA)
Ali (Doniak)
YC: Westphal
RC: Pogarch
In a training experiment gone wrong, Norris decides to install small electrodes on Kling and Rocky’s concussion devices delivering small shocks to their necks when they are out of position, pass poorly, lose a 50/50, or miss a goal attempt. By the 30 minute mark both players’ movements are so erratic that they have to be subbed out…it take four months of therapy before they can return to the field.
Thorns 2-2 Wave
Dunn (Sugita)
Dunn (Moultrie)
Morgan (Jakobsson)
Shaw (Morgan)
Ignore my actually scoresheet…Thorns score the first goal in the 5th minute, prompting a singular Thorns player to do the “paddle-out-and-surf” celebration that we typically see from the Wave. Again, Thorns score in the 85th minute to go up 2-0 and this time, the entire Thorns XI does the paddle/surf celebration. This enrages San Diego, and Taylor Kornieck is put on as a sub in the 87th minute. She scores a header first on a corner kick and assists an Alex Morgan goal, because, of course. The game ends in a draw.
Oh, forgot YC/RC:
YC: Colaprico
RC: Kuikka
2-2
Sophia (finally) – Weaver
Dunn-Hina
Morgan- jakobsen
Korniak- Morgan
YC- Coffey
I’m in SD now- I envision the score as us down by 1 in the 93 minute and my extreme angst 2 miles away from Snapdragon gets the ball in the net
With the Reyes goal we now have 12 players who have scored in the regular season this year. 14 if you include the 3 preseason games. Not including any own goals.
That is more people scoring on the team then have not scored.
Non Scorers include
2 goal keepers and 11 outfield players.