Soccer, Soccer Everywhere

One of the very cool things about attending school at Lake Forest is the proximity to Chicago. The train is so safe, clean, accessible, cheap, and easy to use that getting from campus to downtown is a fairly regular event for most students.

And there are infinite number of things to do in the country's third-largest city. Of course, this being a soccer blog, I have to mention that one of them is attending soccer games.


Chicago has one of the best soccer-only stadiums in the country in Toyota Park. It is home to The Chicago Fire (MLS) The Chicago Red Stars (WPS) and has hosted more than a few U.S. National Team games. Last spring the Men's and Women's soccer teams took a group trip down there to watch a Fire game. Last fall the Women's team caravan-ed to see the U.S. Women's National Team play Japan. And hopefully, this spring, we will travel to see the Red Stars in their second season of play.

Saturday night though, was all about the Chicago Fire. They were playing in the Eastern Conference Final against Real Salt Lake. The winner would earn the right to play Landon Donovan, David Beckham, and the rest of the L.A. Galaxy in the MLS Cup Final.


Forester Molly "Goggles" Shaw was among the 40 or so Utah natives cheering for Real. The rest of the 21,000+ in the sold out stadium were definitely pulling for the Fire. (Headline photo: the loyal fans of Section 8 roll out banners during the pre-game player introductions. Above: Section 8's flares get a little out of control.)

After a scoreless 90 minutes of regulation and 2 15-minute scoreless overtimes, the game went into a shootout. After the first five PKs both teams had made three. On the 6th kick the Real GK made a save and the Real kicker missed. But the Fire were not so lucky on the 7th. The Real GK made ANOTHER save (his third of the shootout) and then the Real striker buried his PK for the victory.



The home crowd was extremely disappointed but it was a memorable match.

(A blurred shot of Molly Goggles--in green jacket, texting other Real fans after the match. Nice seats Molly!)

So, soccer in Chicago is over until next April. Hope to see you at Toyota Park next year!

[Photo credits to Molly Goggles, who had field-side seats]