I thought this game was a must win for us.  If we lost we could possibly be sitting 5^th going into the last week of the season.  We seemed to have a pretty good game plan going into the game.  Mikko had a start and a win under his belt and we felt pretty confident in our chances to pull out a win.  What we didn’t realize was that the field was absolutely terrible.  It is astro turf with a layer of sand over it.  It is usually used for soccer and for some reason they enjoy having the sand on the field.  So, obviously it looked as if we were playing on ice.  It was a huge advantage for Tampere considering they practice on that field.  You could tell that they had become comfortable with the slippery surface.  Our team on the other hand had big problems with it.  We are a small and agile team, this surface totally neutralized that and allowed Tampere to compete with us and actually end up winning the game. 

 

The entire first half was totally dominated by both defenses.  Neither offense could get any sort of drive going.  We had one huge opportunity to score and I blew it.  I noticed that their safeties were very slow at getting over the top of me.  I had man coverage with a deep safety over the top and called for a fade.  I got past the corner pretty easily with an inside move then faded out towards the sideline and away from the safety.  Mikko made an amazing throw and I was running wide open.  The ball landed in my arms as I was crossing the End zone.  It would have been the easiest touchdown of the year for me but I totally dropped the ball.  The entire stadium went nuts, it was really funny to look over at the sideline and see Tampere players Hi-5ing each other and everyone in the stands just going crazy!  I had to start laughing as well just to keep from getting so mad! 

 

The first score was by Tampere late in the 3^rd quarter.  They finally manufactured a solid drive and went 75 yards in 9 plays to take a 7 – 0 lead.  We still couldn’t get anything going, our drives would stall or we would turn the ball over.  They capitalized on our fumble early in the 4^th quarter to take a two touchdown lead with just under 10 minutes to play.  I finally made up for my dropped pass early in the game with a touchdown on a post but it was too little – too late.  They ran the last few minutes off the clock and we had again lost a one score game! Luckily the Helsinki Demons also lost, so we are tied going into the last game of the season.  We play the Demons for the last playoff spot.

 

After the game a few of us stayed in Tampere to hang out.  I knew several of the Saints players and they are great guys so we thought it would be cool to chill with them for the evening.