Stormwatch912

Look how excited Taylor Swift was to meet me. It's been a cruel summer for Tormenta, but they have to shake it off if they ever want to get back together with the playoffs. We know all too well that Tormenta has been down bad at points this season. There's still time to make a playoff push, so you need to calm down so we can begin again and be fearless as as we exile ourselves from out of the playoffs and reach the postseason in style , leaving those on the outside seeing red . Ok, I got all the Taylor Swift stuff out of my system and I was able to fill the blank space on the page with a good paragraph of her song titles. Today was a fairytale for Swifties as she got engaged. (Well, she and Travis Kelce announced it on Tuesday.) Look what you made me do , Taylor. I'm chasing trends in a blog about third division soccer. It'll be a fortnight before I forgive myself and I'm sure it will result in bad blood among my readers. It's probably karma for me n...

Photo Credit: Tormenta FC The previous item you were reading online ran longer than anticipated, so we join this edition of Stormwatch912 already in progress. ...and with that we wrap up our reviews of the 3-3 draw with Westchester and the 3-2 win against Richmond, bringing us to this weekend's matchup with Chattanooga. Currently Tormenta is in 11th place with 20 points through 20 games, just two points outside of the playoff picture. Omaha (21 points in 19 games) and Portland (21 points in 17 games) sit ahead of them, with Forward Madison at 19 points through 19 games* right behind Tormenta. In other words, the hunt for the playoff spot is tight. Saturday's match is against the Chattanooga Red Wolves who sit atop the table right now** with 37 points and just two losses in their 19 games so far. Just looking at the stats, it seems Chattanooga has unlocked the key to soccer. The score a lot of goals (31 so far, good for second in the league) while they also don't give up man...

Photo Credit: Tormenta FC Interim Head Coach Mark McKeever (center) celebrates following a goal in Westchester. At some point we have to get back to talking about the games on the field. That's what we're all fans of and that excitement is what draws us in and causes us to be fans in the first place. Seeing incredible athletic feats on the field is why we show up to games. But today is not that day. Soon, I promise, but today we're talking about Tormenta's interim manager Mark McKeever. I think it was a surprise to everyone when former manager Ian Cameron (yep, still weird writing that), stepped down and in the same announcement we all found out  Mark McKeever would take over the helm at Tormenta. I think I audibly said "What?!?" in my office when I got to that point of the release. Mark McKeever? The One Knox guy? Wasn't there something that went on with him in Knoxville?  Oh? Ohhhh. Right, that. There were allegations of physical and verbal abuse during ...

Photo Credit: Luke Martin Ian Cameron at Tormenta practice in June I don't know where to begin, so I'm going to begin with a story that I've likely written about before. It was probably 2023 but maybe late in 2022 and I'm on the field at Tormenta Stadium interviewing Ian Cameron after a game. The details of the game aren't important, which is good because I don't remember them anyway. We're maybe a minute or two into the conversation when his daughter, who was likely three or four at the time, runs up to give her dad a hug, not caring that he's in the middle of an interview as no kid that age should care about that. All she knew is that daddy was done with the game and she wanted to run up and give him a hug. Cameron pauses the interview, talks with his daughter for a few seconds and then sends her off to kick soccer balls on the field while we continue our interview. As she runs off in that awkward way that little kids who are still figuring out the mec...

Photo Credit: Tormenta FC I'm happy that USL League One is getting some coverage on CBS Sportsnetwork and it's even better when Tormenta gets to play on there like they did Wednesday night. Any time you can get some national coverage for third division soccer, you've got to be excited. But despite subscribing to far too many steaming services, CBS SportsNetwork is not a channel I have access to, thus making covering the Tormenta/Naples game slightly more difficult. But we're not going to let a little thing like not being able to watch prevent me from writing a recap of the game. You all know me better than that. I had big plans of trying to cover the game from both team's BlueSky accounts and try to write it based only on that. Unfortunately for me, Naples still doesn't appear to be on BlueSky and Tormenta uses it intermittently so there was a decent chance I'd end up with nothing. Also unfortunately, both Tormenta and Naples are still on Twitter and post re...

Photo Credit: Tormenta FC No, I'm not going to rewrite House of Pain's Jump Around to recap a game where Austin Pack scored a goal.  I thought about it. I thought really hard about it. But I don't want to go to that well too often.   Well that was a heck of a game to miss. But just because I didn't watch and only saw the highlights isn't going to stop us from writing a (probably) abbreviated post about a thrilling 2-2 draw between Tormenta and Greenville Saturday night.   While I was out to dinner with my wife, my oldest took his first ever drive by himself after getting his driver's license to Tormenta Stadium for the game. I asked him what time he was leaving because, well, I'm anxious about him being out on his own. He asked what time the players ran on to the field for warm ups and because I've read the media notes that get sent out, I knew it was 6:47. "You want to make sure you're there in time for Mason to wave at you, don't you?...

Photo Credit: Tormenta FC South Georgia and Greenville will renew their rivalry Saturday night at Tormenta Stadium as the Triumph come calling to Statesboro. Do you renew rivalries? It's not really like Netflix where you renew your subscription each month. I guess if it was something like college football and teams changed conferences and stopped playing each other for years and then either found themselves in the same conference or just scheduled non-conference games against each other, that would constitute renewing a rivalry.  But Greenville and South Georgia play each other every year. Multiple times a year. And they play each other three times this season. Last year I saw enough of Greenville to last a lifetime. I still wish Lyam MacKinnon a lifetime of personal and professional joy as long as that professional joy does not entail returning to Tormenta Stadium as an opponent. Anyway, regardless of if the two teams are renewing their rivalry, rekindling their rivalry, just con...