A Week of Firsts

Sorry for the lack of posting last week, but I had my first test of the semester and spent a lot of time studying for that. Now that I’ve entered the realm of upper division classes, I’m having to make some adjustments to my study habits. I’ll address that issue in Wednesday’s entry though. My wife was pretty sick last week, too. I spent one of my days off last week driving her to the doctor’s office and then to the pharmacy.
For now, I would like to talk about the week that was in FIU sports. The volleyball team continues to spike the competition. Sorry, I couldn’t resist the cheesy pun. They started conference play this past weekend and won both their matches, making them 2-0 in conference play, 12-3 overall. The men’s soccer team notched their first victory of the season on Sunday. In the 66th minute, defenseman Corey Kendall tallied his 2nd career goal for the Golden Panthers. I had to mention that since I had a Spanish II class with Corey over the summer. Despite playing some tightly contested matches, the lady’s soccer squad continues to search for their first win of the season. They also opened conference play this past weekend, falling 2-1 to Middle Tennessee and tying Western Kentucky 1-1.
Finally, the football team went up to Toledo and grounded the Rockets (I just can’t stop). The offense finally seemed to get it going, although it doesn’t hurt when you start four drives inside the opponents 30 yard line. T.Y. Hilton continues to spark the team. Besides Toledo turnovers, T.Y.’s returns on special teams were the reason the offense benefited from excellent field position most of the night. Not only was the offensive line able to open up holes for A’mod Ned (one touchdown) and Julian Reams (three TDs), but they gave Paul McCall the time in the pocket he has so desperately needed all season. He took advantage of it too, completing passes of 22 and 27 yards to Eric Kirchenberg and Greg Ellingson, respectively. He also threw a 37 yard touchdown pass to, who else, T.Y. Hilton. Hopefully this quiets the QB controversy rumblings.
The defense continues to shine. Not only did they force four turnovers, one interception and three fumble recoveries, but they held a team that put 54 points on 25th ranked Fresno State the week before to 16 points. The four forced turnovers gave the team a +2 turnover ration on the season. Of all the football stats that are kept, I consider that to be one of the important ones. You don’t find a lot of 1-3 teams that have a positive turnover ratio, which tells me that this team is better than its record indicates.
The Golden Panthers now begin conference play on a roll. When I did my football preview at the beginning of the season, I said that FIU might be able to steal a win at Toledo or North Texas. Now that they’ve won at Toledo, I don’t think that it is out of the realm of possibility that they win again this week. How nice would it be to have the Golden Panthers come home riding a two game winning streak?