In October, the Western New York Flash (WNY Flash) became National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) champions.  Now you may not understand the gravity of what I just said… so let me explain.

The WNY Flash is a women’s soccer team based in Rochester, New York.  It is a MINOR LEAGUE  team.   A couple weeks ago, the NWSL held their championships.  The Flash was against the Washington Spirit.  The Washington Spirit had American national players Crystal Dunn and Ali Krieger while the Flash had Sammy Mewis from the U.S. national team and Sabrina D’Angelo from the Canadian National Team.  The first goal was scored by Spirit player Crystal Dunn but the Flash came back when birthday girl, Sammy Mewis, scored a goal.  After that, the game was full of back and forth play until regulation ended and it went to overtime.  During overtime, Crystal Dunn scored in the very beginning but in the 124th minute, one minute before overtime ended, Lynn Williams headed the ball into the goal and they went on to penalty kicks!

Now, if you’ve ever seen penalty kicks take place, you know how stressful they are.  During penalty kicks, each team picks five players to shoot on the other team’s goalie one by one.  Sabrina D’Angelo was the goalkeeper on the Flash side while Kelsey Wys was goalkeeper on the Spirit side.  The first goal was scored by Abby Dahlkemper when the ball hit Wys’s glove and went into the net!  Next, Ali Krieger shot for Spirit but Sabrina D’Angelo deflected the ball out of the goal with the very tip of her glove! The Flash were up 1-0!  The third penalty kick was shot by Jaelene Hinkle and went in after the ball hit hand and found the back of the net.  The fourth penalty kick was shot by Christine Nairn and went in giving the Spirit a sliver of hope.  The fifth penalty kick was shot by Jessica McDonald but the ball sailed high over the goal.  The sixth penalty kick was shot by Katie Stengal and tied the score up 2-2.  The seventh penalty kick was an easy shot by Lynn Williams who tapped the ball into goal making the score 3-2!  Tori Huster then put a shot on goal causing D’Angelo to make a diving save and caught the ball when Wys did the same thing on penalty kick number eight to Sammy Mewis.  The last kick was shot by Diana Matheson with hopes of tying the score up but D’Angelo had other intentions when she blocked the goal and the Flash won!  

Penalty kicks are a goalie’s worst nightmare but Sabrina D’angelo rose to the challenge. She was named the Flash’s most valuable player, too!  I saw this game live.  It’s exciting to go to any soccer game but to be there when this minor league team won a national championship was beyond thrilling.