Showing posts with label field hockey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label field hockey. Show all posts

Sunday, November 18, 2012

#2 Princeton Tigers storm back to defeat #1 North Carolina 3-2 in Norfolk and capture their first NCAA Field Hockey Championship

Wow! 
Just watched the #2 Princeton Tigers storm back to defeat #1 North Carolina 3-2, and capture their first NCAA Field Hockey Championship in a match that was both frenetic and an example of a beautiful game when played with so many high-caliber players who actually do all the small details consistently. (Yes, just like watching Glenelg High School!)

With a new state-of-the-art turf field, Bedford Field, a wonderful head coach in Kristen Holmes-Winn, someone who played at a very high level herself, and perfectly positioned geographically to get well-grounded and elite recruits from both the Mid-Atlantic and Tri-State area, Princeton is, literally, a dynasty in the making... just like Northwestern in Women's Lacrosse under head coach Kelly Amonte Hiller.who have won 7 of the last 8 NCAA titles.

http://www.goprincetontigers.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_LANG=C&ATCLID=205749560&DB_OEM_ID=10600

Meanwhile locally, in the year 2012, the University of Miami has neither a varsity Field Hockey team or a Women's Lacrosse team, despite getting lots of students from areas of the country where those sports are very popular at both the youth and high school level -the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast.
Why?

That makes as much sense as Miami NOT having a Men's Golf team.

Top-ranked North Carolina faces #2 Princeton Sunday in its quest for their 7th NCAA Field Hockey title, but you can't watch it on TV. Despite all the lip service given by U.S. cable sports channels -and advertisers- to taking Women's sports more seriously, unless you're in Norfolk, VA at 1 p.m., you'll have to watch via NCAA.com



So many cable sports channels offer third and fourth-rate programming opposite LIVE NFL telecasts, but despite it being an Olympic sport, one that the U.S. did very well at in London this summer, and defeating Argentina earlier in the year, apparently there's no time or space for the NCAA Field Hockey title match between Princeton and North Carolina on any of the following network of families that have about 15-20 channels among them on my DirecTV sports tier package: ESPN, Fox Sportsnet, CBS Sports Network and NBC Sports Network.

ESPN can show you a zillion NCAA Softball tourney games in the summer featuring a handful of teams teams you've already seen -or think you've already seen because that tourney seems to be 24/7 for 3-4 days, with each team seemingly equipped with one lanky left-handed pitcher and one very large right-handed pitcher- but they can't seem to find a space for two hours for the D1 title match of an Olympic sport, something that softball is decidedly not? Yes.
http://www.ncaa.com/sports/fieldhockey/d1

To me, it's not unlike the fact that U.S. gymnastics fans gets such crummy coverage of the NCAA Mens and Womens Gymnastics Championships, as last year Alabama won their second-straight  Women's title, and Illinois won the Men's title -ignored.
For years CBS Sports has not only shown the championships on a delayed basis, but weeks after-the-fact.

Which is why despite all the lip service given by those networks and advertisers to taking women sports more seriously, unless you're going to be in Norfolk, VA on Sunday afternoon, the only way you can see the Tigers-Tar Heels match is at:NCAA.com 

Video of semifinals, UNC over UVA and Princeton over Maryland is here:
http://www.ncaa.com/video?ncaa_mid=vod:fieldhockey#!playlists/sports/fieldhockey/d1



http://www.goprincetontigers.com/mediaPortal/player.dbml?id=1096704
More highlights of Princeton over Maryland.

Watch the title match LIVE here at 1:00 p.m. Eastern: 


New York Times 
The Quad blog
Unfamiliar Foes in the Field Hockey Final
By Clare Lochary
November 17, 2012, 10:00 PM
Princeton Coach Kristen Holmes-Winn told her field hockey players that passion, not pedigree, would be the deciding factor in the Tigers’ N.C.A.A. semifinal game against Maryland, the two-time defending national champion, on Friday, and she proved correct.
Read the rest of the post at: 

Friday, October 28, 2011

Breaking News: USA Field Hockey earns spot at 2012 London Olympics with 4-2 upset win over #1 Argentina in Finals at Pan Am Games in Guadalajara

Breaking News: USA Field Hockey earns spot at 2012 London Olympics with a 4-2 upset win over #1 Argentina in Finals at Pan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico.

I found out via the UVA Field Hockey Twitter account shortly after 8 p.m. tonight while watching Game Seven of the World Series:

Virginia Hockey
Congrats to @USAFieldHockey who just punched a ticket to London with a 4-2 win over world No. 1 Argentina! Well done Paige & Michelle!
(I tried to take a screen shot of it but it was too faint to post here.)


Paige Selenski (Virginia), Shannon Taylor (Syracuse), Katie O'Donnell (Maryland) and Michelle Vittese (Virginia) scored for the underdog American squad.


Rachel Dawson's blog from Pan Am Games:


More soon on the upcoming Field Hockey conference tourneys which start next week, inc. the always tough ACC tourney in College Park that members of my FH-loving family may be attending at some point.

2011 ACC Field Hockey Championship at College Park, Maryland.
Thursday Nov. 3rd & Sunday Nov. 6th



Friday, July 16, 2010

Hoosier in a Hurry: IU Hoosier Field Hockey star Mutsa Mutembwa, Rhodes Scholar selection, is bound for Oxford

The BigTenNetwork's Kara Lentz profiles Indiana Hoosier Field Hockey star Mutsa Mutembwa, a math and economics double-major and now a Rhodes Scholar, leaving Harare, Zimbabwe and Bloomington behind for her two years of study in Oxford. The daughter of Amman and Priscilla, she plans to become a financial economist and return to her native country to help solve Zimbabwe's profoundly tragic struggle with hyperinflation.

http://www.bigtennetwork.com/videos/indiana-hoosiers.asp?bcpid=41652681001&bclid=1612710067&bctid=101554555001



For more on Head Coach Amy Robertson's IU Field Hockey team, including roster and 2010-11 schedule, see http://iuhoosiers.cstv.com/sports/w-fieldh/sched/ind-w-fieldh-sched.html


See an early profile of
Mutsa here: http://iuhoosiers.cstv.com/sports/w-fieldh/spec-rel/100807aaa.html


See more news on
Indiana University athletes and teams at http://iuhoosiers.cstv.com/index-main.html and http://www.bigtennetwork.com/schools/indiana/

http://www.bigtennetwork.com/

Monday, January 4, 2010

A terrific Swedish TV program we could use more of over here: "Jag ska bli stjärna"; The state of Girls sports in South Florida and the abysmal media coverage it receives; Zara Larsson

Below, Zara Larsson singing A Moment Like This.from Sweden's TV4 daily morning show "After Ten," from Nov. 26th, 2009.

Zara
is the eleven-year old winner of last year's
nationally televised Talang 2008 contest, and is one of the handful of very talented kids profiled on TV4's very compelling Tuesday night
documentary series,
Jag ska bli stjärna, (I'll be a star). 






You can see the most recent episode, 5 of 6, about 44 minutes long, by clicking below, as long as you do so before Tuesday afternoon our time, since a new episode airs tomorrow night in Sweden, and will be uploaded to their website some time
thereafter.

http://www.tv4play.se/aktualitet/jag_ska_bli_stjarna

Here, in a clip from last Tuesday's episode, Zara sings the Swedish national anthem at
a race track, and naturally, everyone's a critic!

Meanwhile, back home, Laila Bagge helps Zara get prepared to record a demo CD
and sets the wheels in motion for Zara to go to Hollywood.

But not before preparing here to answer basic questions, en engelsk, like, "Who are your musical influences?"



I think it'd be great to see a show as savvy, serious and well-produced as this made in the U.S., but you just know that given the current entertainment climate, rather than make a smart,
knowing
documentary series, they'd intentionally add a lot of unlikable kids into the mix instead, just to add some spice and melodrama.

That's the current casting method at reality
shows like Fox-TV's American Idol and MTV's
Real World, and a little often, lately,
with CBS-TV's Survivor.

(I've watched just about every single episode of Survivor since the show first aired, but after watching this past season's premiere in September, my gut-sense was that the cast seemed a little TOO predictable and orchestrated. Nej tak!)


Me, I like to watch the inherent sociology of
what happens to people are suddenly thrown together and forced to deal with strangers, with whom they suddenly will have to depend upon to an extent.

That's one of the principal reasons why CBS-TV's
The Amazing Race is so great. 

That show is one I never miss, precisely because it's hard to orchestrate things well enough in advance to get teams to act a certain way.

Frankly, that's why out of all the myriad reality
shows, a celebrity season of it would prove quite interesting and appealing ratings-wise, as long as you have teams that mix smart and
resourceful
people from different milieus competing against each other: academia, High-Tech, fashion, sports, Film, TV, high culture, et al.


That would be very compelling TV with the right people in place.

One of the things that I personally find so appealing
and compelling about Jag ska bli stjärna is that you literally have no inkling of what's going to happen to the kids and their parents before it actually does.
The "real" of reality TV!


Thus, it seems fresher and more genuine than
anything like the pre-programmed reality shows
here in the U.S., where the show runners seem unwilling to trust the intelligence of viewers
to figure things out on
their own.

I have a great sense of humor but I suspect that's
one of the many reasons why I've NEVER watched a moment of Fox-TV's American Idol, except for the spill-over at the top of the hour when I flip over to watch House.

To me, it seems pre-programmed 
to a fair-thee-well to get a particular narrative and construct.

I want competitions to be about what the subject
at hand is -not people trying to become famous for 'Fifteen Minutes'- and want the final results to correspond to something
involving talent, ability
or effort.

I guess I'm just Old School that way.
But then I've been a Turner Classic Movies fan from Day One, too.


Olivia Welin från Höllviken GIF.

.

Thirteen-year old soccer player Olivia Welin and her family and teammates, who were
filmed since last January, remind me a lot, in a positive way, of a lot of the families with
daughters I saw for many years in
my sister's part of western Howard County, Maryland,
and how they focus some of the their time and energies on their daughters playing sports,
especially field hockey, lacrosse
and soccer.


The parents are VERY committed, especially the mothers, as is the case with Olivia'smother on the show, as well as my sister, who is a coach for field hockey and soccer,
just like my brother-in-law in Maryland is.

All of my three nieces played field hockey 
and two have already started in the Maryland State High School Championship game for their team, with one now playing in college.
They all played soccer, too, of course, and one -the youngest- does field hockey, soccer and lacrosse over the course of a year.
I'll be writing on the topic of Girls sports in more
detail in the future, but to me, comparing how they're organized in the greater Northern Virginia/ DC/Baltimore area, is that Girls sports are MUCH better-supported, valued and attended up there compared to the rampant apathy
of South Florida.


I have my suspicions on why that's the case, but it starts with the mothers down here, too, who, sadly, far too often, live in self-absorbed condo cocoons, and who clearly aren't willing to spend
the time and energy with their daughters they should.

That time means occasionally having to be a referee or a coach or raising
money for trips if it's a Travel Squad.

And do I even have to mention how atrocious South Florida's sports media is in covering Girl's high school or Women's college sports in a serious and non-condescending way?

With all the technological resources they have now, they've stood still and are running-in-place.
It's really, really embarrassing.

Meanwhile, elsewhere, the world has evolved while South Florida's sleepwalking media watches the grass grow...
http://www.expressen.se/sport/sanktan


The media coverage was MUCH better in the late 1970's, especially at the Herald, which I know from personal experience because of...
Well, I'll explain more in the future, but suffice to say for now that it has to do with North Miami Beach High School Girls Gymnastics and Hialeah Miami Lakes High School girls Soccer.

One more important point, without getting into lots
of minute detail.
In watching the previous shows as I have, you can see after watching Olivia Welin's
self-evident talent, ability and dedication to listening to her coach and getting better, why Sweden, not England or some other well-known South American soccer countries -besides Brazil- are among the top Women's National Soccer teams in the world, EVERY YEAR.
Like the Dutch in field hockey!

That's why all the elite NCAA field hockey programs have Dutch players: UVA, Maryland, Wake Forest...

Below, Olivia's first day as a referee



Olivia has some difficult decisions to make



See also:
http://www.tv4.se/jag-ska-bli-stj%C3%A4rna/artiklar/olivia-welin-4fbf872404bf72519400275c

More about Olivia:
http://www.tv4.se/jag-ska-bli-stj%C3%A4rna/artiklar/l%C3%A4s-hela-chatten-om-fotboll-med-olivia-4fbf8bd104bf725194002f91

http://www.expressen.se/Sport/sanktan/skane/1.1799454/jag-ska-bli-stjarna

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Exciting match expected today when Terps play Tar Heels for NCAA D1 Field Hockey title

At Noon on Sunday I'm watching the NCAA
D1 Field Hockey championship
match on
CBSC -CBS College Sports, DirecTV 613-
between undefeated, # 1 and defending champion
Maryland
and #3 19-2 North Carolina in what
looks to be a really exciting match from Winston-Salem.

http://www.ncaa.com/sports/w-fieldh/ncaa-w-fieldh-body.html

http://www.ncaa.com/brackets/2009/ncaa_bracket_DI_field_hockey.html

http://www.ncaa.com/sports/w-fieldh/champpage/w-fieldh-div1-index.html

http://wakeforestsports.cstv.com/sports/w-fieldh/spec-rel/09-wake-fieldh-final-four.html


In my opinion, the handful of matches televised
this past season on The BigTen Network were
much better than in the past, though
Michigan
State
naturally got the lion's share of the games,
befitting their national reputation
and consistent
Top 15 ranking.


Last year's
Big Ten tourney in Bloomington
was played under some cold,
wet and windy
conditions on the field just off
of 17th Street
between Fee Lane and N. Jordan.

The weather sometimes seemed to affect play,
which is always a possibility in early November
in Bloomington.

This year's tourney up in East Lansing,
thankfully, seemed blessed with much nicer
weather that allowed all the teams to flash
their skills.

I was very pleased to see
IU make it to
the
finals against the Spartans on Nov. 8th,
and to be able to watch the match from
beginning to end.

Though they ultimately lost 3-2 to an
excellent
Spartan squad, whom I knew
fairly well from watching
their earlier matches
on TV over the past few months,

the closeness of the match and the
gritty spirit
and character the Hoosiers
displayed in
hanging-tough with a top
national team on the
road, clearly
demonstrated to all who are paying
close attention
to the sport, that IU's
growing positive national
reputation
is well-deserved.


Kudos to
Hoosier Head Coach
Amy Robertson
and her assistants
for getting the most out of the
team
and making it to the NCAA Sweet 16
this year, before losing to a tough
Wake Forest squad, which is always
well-coached and full
of very talented
international players.

http://iuhoosiers.cstv.com/sports/w-fieldh/ind-w-fieldh-body.html



Efforts like those will only increase the
positive
word-of-mouth about the
Hoosier's FH program's upward direction
and increase the flow of
high-quality
recruits from field hockey hot-spots

on the East Coast and in the Midwest
to
Bloomington.

Not that it wouldn't be great to get
some silly-talented girls from
The Netherlands or Great Britain,
though!

http://www.knhb.nl/


Thru fortuitous timing, that same day,

I was also able to watch the ACC
tourney
final and watch the Terps
stage an amazing
comeback in
overtime against a scrappy and
ultimately
somewhat heart-broken
#2
UVA squad at Charlottesville,
one of my favorite places.
http://www.virginiasports.com/SportSelect.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=17800&SPID=10593&SPSID=92022

The talented
Cavaliers regrouped
and
later eliminated Michigan State
from the NCAA tourney 3-2 and
made it to the Final Four where they
lost 3-2 on Friday to UNC .
http://www.ncaa.com/splash/2009fhockeysplash.htmldefault.aspx?id=188

The sheer talent and ability of the
Terps in that game demonstrated
once again that no matter
what the
score is, no matter how well you're
playing, you can NEVER EVER
take your
foot off the accelerator
when you play
Maryland.

They will not quit, no matter how
close to the end
of the match it gets.
They are relentless!

The Terps tradition of winning NCAA
titles and playing tough matches even
when they are not at their best, is a
valuable lesson that ought to be more
widely-known and appreciated than it
currently is.

http://www.umterps.com/sports/w-fieldh/archive/090809aab.html
http://www.umterps.com/sports/w-fieldh/md-w-fieldh-body-main.html
http://www.umterps.com/view.gal?id=58544

I like them to win 4-2 over a talented
Tar Heels squad.
http://tarheelblue.cstv.com/sports/w-fieldh/unc-w-fieldh-body.html

Friday, November 7, 2008

Running Tallies on Ross vs. Lewy for 2nd HB Commission Seat

Friday 1:40 p.m.

Watching the Big Ten Field Hockey semifinal game between Iowa and Michigan State from Bloomington on The Big Ten Network as I write this. http://www.bigtennetwork.com/
Great game!

As a result of their defeat of Penn State in the first semifinal, the winner here faces Ohio State in championship game on Sunday at Noon, televised live on BTN.

One of my nieces is playing Saturday morning in the Maryland H.S. Field Hockey State Championship game, so I'm taping the game for her and her younger sister to watch next week.
-------------------------------------------------------------
As of 11 am Dotty Ross is leading Alexander Lewy by 32 votes.

I got a call from Michael Butler around noon and he reminded me that the Broward BOE does have publicly accessible running tallies at Broward Elections's various URLs.

You might want to check it every few hours, even though the whole thing willlead to a formal recount next week.

And check out his latest entry at www.changehallandale.com

See parent site http://www.browardsoe.org/

See tally box http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/FL/Broward/8512/13382/en/md.html?cid=0144

See precint-by-precint breakdown http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/FL/Broward/8512/13382/en/md_data.html?cid=0144&
_________________________________________
www.sun-sentinel.com/community/news/hallandale/sfl-flbhallandale1107sbnov07,0,1923804.story
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
No winner yet for Hallandale Beach commission seat
By Ihosvani Rodriguez
November 7, 2008

Who won the second commission spot?

The answer depends on when you ask.

Tuesday night, newcomer Alexander Lewy won by 23 votes.

On Thursday, veteran Commissioner Dorothy Ross took a 24-vote lead.

The top vote-getter was clear from the start: Commissioner Anthony Sanders. But calling the second spot is turning into a slow-motion drama.

Election officials still have thousands of provisional and absentee ballots to count, elections spokeswoman Evelyn Hale said.

A winner may not be declared until next week, likely followed by a manual recount.

Hearing he was ahead by one vote, Lewy rushed to the ballot-counting center Thursday, only to watch his lead evaporate.

"This chair is actually kind of comfortable," he said.
_____________________________________________
I saw the Channel 10 truck in the city hall parking lot on my way into last night's Unsafe Structures Board meeting right before 6 PM, which turned out to be not quite what I imagined it'd be, with lots of wasted time.

http://www.local10.com/politics/17926517/detail.html
Hallandale Beach Commission Race Very Close
Recount Imminent For Hallandale Beach City Commission Race

POSTED: 6:31 pm EST November 6, 2008
UPDATED: 6:45 pm EST November 6, 2008
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. --

At the beginning of Thursday, only one vote separated two candidates for the Hallandale Beach City Commission.

Commissioner Dotty Ross was torn.

She was clearing out her office in City Hall because it appeared that she lost the commission seat she has held since 1995.

The problem is that election workers are still counting absentee ballots. The new numbers on Thursday showed Ross trailing her opponent, Alexander Lewy, by just one vote.

"Can you imagine one vote? One vote?" she said.

According to the Broward County Supervisor of Elections' Office, Lewy had 2,721 votes for the at-large commission seat, and Ross had 2,720.

"There's no point in analyzing something that may or may not happen. Now as it gets closer, I will," Ross said. "I'm starting to get antsy a little."

At the very least, Ross' race will have to be recounted because the margin of victory likely will be within 0.5 percent of the total ballots cast.

Canvassing board member Judge Robert Lee said it is not the first close race he's seen.

"We've had several small cities over the past at least 10 years where we've actually come within three or four votes," Lee said.

"It is rare, but unfortunately for us, it's not unusual."

If she wins, Ross said her newly cleaned office will be a reminder that every vote counts. "This is proof positive that it does," Ross said.

Late Thursday, the supervisor of elections updated the numbers, and this time Ross held a 23-vote advantage over Lewy, with some 5,000 votes still to be counted.

If the race ends up in a tie, the city charter says the winner will be "decided by lot," which is something like the toss of a coin, Local 10's Roger Lohse reported.