Northern Bites members survived the recent semifinals match without having heart attacks, throwing up, or passing out (barely).  The game was a nail-biter against the Nao Devils from Dortmund, a team who we had previously played and beat 2:0.  However, they had made many fixes to their code in the time since, and did not make it quite so easy on us this time.

The first goal scored was against us… by us.  When we are positioned down in the corner by our goal, we usually just continue to kick it out until a “game stuck” is called, but this time we side kicked it in front of our goal, and proceeded to side kick it in.  Thankfully, we made a valiant return and scored a goal in the correct goal within the first half.  The second half remained scoreless, leaving us with a game tied at 1:1, meaning penalty kicks would decide who advanced.  This was an eerie echo of last year – tied in a semifinal against a German team, with penalty kicks to decide.

In penalty kicks, each team has 5 chances to score a goal against the blue goal, with the opponent’s goalie in it, within one minute.  The Devils went first, easily booting it into our goal at a perfect angle.  We were next, and we made it to the ball, and then just stared.  This is when panic mode set in.  Over the next 4 kicks, our goalie managed to save 3 with its wide stance, the Devils managed to get one more in, and our leading lady Trillian got two shots in.  This meant that the penalty kicks were now tied, 2:2.

This means a sudden death shoot out.  Each team now has 2 minutes, and if both teams score, the winner is determined by who scored the goal faster.  The Devils managed to score a goal in 1:06 seconds, after missing the kick twice.  Trillian shuffled towards the ball, shuffled some more…. kicked…… it went in!!  Then we had to check the time it took.  (If the times were within 2 seconds, we would have to go again.)  We looked at our time…. 0:58 seconds!!!  A difference of 7 seconds won us the match!!

Northern Bites and Nao Devils after the match

While a huge relief, it was bittersweet as we have close ties with the Nao Devils, and it was so close.  The next semifinal match between Texas and B-Human is currently being played, and as a soon as a winner is determined, we will be sure to update.