Week 2: Ancona Dolphins

     Things were looking pretty bleak going into week 2. We were pretty beat up, both mentally and physically, after an emotional game against Bergamo and Ancona was supposed to be another solid team. They had two stud linebackers, one who played at Notre Dame and the other a 2-time All-Big Ten selection out of Wisconsin, who spent some time with the New York Jets. On offense they had a speedy QB who had played his college ball up in Canada, and the two linebackers filling out the backfield. All week our QB, "Downtown" Danny Brown, had been nursing some sore ribs and after a visit to Dr. Pasta (no joke that's his real name....and yes he's a real doctor) he learned that two of them were cracked and so he wouldn't be able to suit up on Sunday. Seeing as we have no back-up QB that caused some serious problems. Fortunately Andrew, our head coach, had been acting as fill in during pre-season before we arrived, and with one American out he would be eligible to play in the game. Although Andrew had literally zero game experience at QB at any level of football, he's a good athlete and the Italian guys really rallied around him. Nothing like having the head coach right in the middle of the huddle to light a fire under your ass. 

     Our game plan was pretty simple, play good D and pound the ball on Offense. The emphasis was on first downs as each time we moved the chains we could eat up more clock and keep their offense on the sideline. Things couldn't have started better as we stuffed their first two attempts at running the ball forcing them into a 3rd and long on their first possession. They motioned to trips with one of the Americans and tried to run a flood pattern with the two inside guys running double outs. I buzzed out to the curl and the QB floated a duck right into my hands. I took off with it down the right sideline with their QB and runningback trying to cut me off. I saw they were pursuing hard so I cut it back. The runningback tried to put on the breaks but the QB slammed into him from behind and I had nothing but green grass all the way to the endzone. Just what we needed to take the pressure off our newly formed offense. We continued to stifle their offense for the rest of the first half as our own began to come into form. Late in the second quarter we had driven down inside their territory but the drive was stalling out after a short gain and then an offsides penalty. We had been running the ball a lot and two American linebackers were flowing fast to the ball so we called a reverse to Corey and it worked like a charm. I took the pitch to the left side and immediately there was a whole sea of green jerseys racing to cut me off. Corey took one false step at the corner to freeze him then came around behind me as I flipped the ball to him. Danny through a nice block to seal the Notre Dame linebacker who was blitzing from the backside but had bit on the toss. Corey took the ball at full speed and nobody caught him as he turned the corner and headed for the pylon. Up 14-0 at half and we never looked back. The final was 28-6. The defense played lights out coming up with another turnover and a key fourth down stop in the second half. Andrew was huge both running the ball and throwing just enough to keep them off balance. The atmosphere wasn't quite the same as when Grisham was in town but a win's a win no matter how many people are in the stands. The beers stared flowing as soon as the final whistle sounded and in locker room the entire team busted into our traditional victory song, "Heyyyyyyyy-hey baby....OOOH-AHHH, I wanna knooooo-o-o-o-o-ow if you'll be my girl!" Even though Ancona turned out to be pretty bad, it was a huge win for us and hopefully give us some confidence going into next week's match with the Bolzano Giants. 

In other news, we attended the infamous Vinitaly wine festival this past week in Verona. It's one of the biggest wine expos in Europe and features wineries from all over the world. We did our best to sample them all but I now realize why the experts don't actually drink it. We stuck out like a sore thumb surrounded by the supposed "experts". While they were sniffing, swishing, and spitting, we were slugging and chugging. We may not have learned too much but we definitely had a good time...so far Italy has not disappointed.