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2002-2003 Offseason

2003 March 27 - The Freedom defeat the Charge, 1-0

The Freedom repeated the score of last year's semifinal, squeaking out a 1-0 victory against the Philadelphia Charge in an exhibition game at Trinity College. Laura Schott, fighting for a developmental player slot, provided the single goal. She was assisted by Meredith Beard, who split the Charge defense before passing off to Schott on the left flank. Schott just got the ball past Charge goalkeeper Melissa Moore and inside the far post.

The Freedom's starting formation looked like this:

The Freedom had the better of the play in the first half, with the ball spending much of the time in the Charge end. However, despite good ball movement, possession, and speed of play, they were seldom able to get past the disciplined Charge defense and put the ball on goal.

The Charge were in their usual 4-5-1 formation, with Pichon as the one. (The Charge were not wearing numbered uniforms, which made it difficult to identify players, so I can't provide details on the formation.) The primary strategy appeared to be to knock the ball long to Pichon and hope she could run onto it. This was not a great success, and most of the Charge's best chances came from Freedom turnovers in the midfield. In the scariest moment for the Freedom, Pichon and Skylar battled for the ball at around the 18, with Skylar turning a strong run by Pichon into a weak back pass that nevertheless required a diving kick save (more like a nudge save, actually) from Siri to knock it just barely out-of-bounds.

Kelly Smith looked fully recovered and put on some nifty moves, including a total deke-out of Skylar at one point in dangerous territory close to the goal. But the other defenders closed in, and Smith was unable to get off a good shot.

Second-half substitutions for the Freedom were tryout goalkeeper Erin Regan in for Siri, Lori Lindsey for Golebiowski, and Monica Gerardo for Jacqui Little. This also brought Mia Hamm up as a forward from her first-half midfield position.

The Charge made several substitutions of their own at the half, but due to the lack of numbers the only obvious one was Arrington for Pichon.

The play went much more the Charge way in the second half, with the Charge adopting a more methodical style of play, though they still sometimes resorted to the "knock the ball long and hope our forward can run onto it" approach, which with Arrington might actually work. Let me tell you, this girl is scary fast. On one of the long ball plays, she blew by both Carrie Moore and Jen Grubb and came in one-on-one with the Freedom goalkeeper, who barely managed to knock her shot wide. She also missed a few shots later on, as did some of her teammates, which was all that kept the game scoreless.

At minute 60, Meredith Beard came on for Mia and Casey Zimny came on for Lindsay Stoecker, who also seemed to be fully recovered. This seemed to increase the energy level for the Freedom, and the game was more even after this point. Abby knocked a shot off the right post at minute 65, and Arrington returned the favor at the other end at minute 67.

Laura Schott came on for Abby Wambach around minute 70 and almost immediately scored the winning goal. The Freedom held on against an increasingly frantic Charge attack and stood fast for the win.

Overall, both teams looked good, and definitely we have a lot to look forward to in the level of play for WUSA season 3. The speed of play has improved tremendously, particularly for the Freedom, and there seems to be ever greater confidence among the players. Still, the attack seems to need to gel a bit, as evidenced by the low score and lack of shots on goal.

The Charge looked dangerous but not overwhelmingly so, but perhaps they need to gel a bit as well. I think they also need to consider getting away from their 4-5-1 formation, which is too easy to defense if you have the appropriate players (e.g., Carrie Moore). And if Krikorian doesn't at least try having both the speedsters Arrington and Pichon on the field at the same time, he should have his "Coach of the Year" trophy taken away from him.

• Washington Freedom coverage
• More photos

2003 March 11 - Carrie's second and final (for now, at least) player diary.

Veterans Grubb, Barr, and Moore with newcomers Baiku and Schott face the Cavaliers as the UVA bench looks on. 2003 March 15 - The Freedom defeat the University of Virginia, 5-1, helped by a solid outing from Carrie. Freedom website coverage. The Freedom showed increasing confidence and organization as they defeated the University of Virginia women's soccer team, 5-1, at RFK. Draft picks Darci Borski and Laura Schott provided three goals in the final period to seal the victory. Borski scored twice, though the first goal was a putaway on a shot by tryout player Baidu that would have gone in anyway. The game was played in three, thirty-minute periods, with significant substitutions by the Freedom between each period. Despite the changes, the Freedom improved noticeably as the game wore on and thoroughly dominated the third period, as demonstrated by the three goals. The starting lineup was as follows: Goalkeeper: Gao Hong Defenders: Casey Zimny, Carrie Moore, Jen Grubb, Emmy Barr Midfielders: Lindsay Stoecker, Lori Lindsey, Monica Gerardo, Kelly Golebiowski Forwards: Abby Wambach, Meredith Beard Regulars not present included Mia Hamm and Siri Mullinix (in Portugal for the Algarve Cup), the Little twins (at a family wedding), Steffi Jones and Sandra Minnert (still with their German club team), and Bai Jie (Chinese national team duty). Substitutes during the game included Borski, Schott, Baidu, Fennell, MacFarlane, Noftsinger, and several recently arrived players who were never identified. The only player who definitely played the entire game was, unsurprisingly, Jen Grubb. Carrie played a solid game and looked extremely fast and healthy throughout, though she played only the first two periods. There was one briefly scary moment in the first period when Carrie sent a pass back to Gao Hong that seemed aimed more for the goalmouth than Gao, though the veteran goalkeeper intercepted it easily. During the second period, the Freedom went to a three-back lineup, allowing Carrie to play flank defender for a time. She was not involved in the sole UVA goal, which came from the opposite side of the field from where she was playing.

2003 March 11 - Carrie's first-ever player diary.

2003 February 19 - Carrie participates in an online chat about the movie Bend It Like Beckham, alongside director and co-writer Gurinder Chadha.

2002 September 26 - The Freedom website has an article about Carrie and Jen Grubb at the All-Star Game.

2002 September 21 - Carrie plays the second half in the inaugural WUSA All-Star Game Carrie chips a pass between Maren Meinert and Brandi Chastain Photo copyright 2002 and courtesy of Alison Andrews Carrie tries to get the ball past Kate Sobrero as the North bench looks on Photo copyright 2002 and courtesy of Alison Andrews As I expected, Carrie came in at halftime of the 2002 WUSA All-Star Game and stayed in for the rest of the game, helping the South to shut out the North during that interval. For most of the time, she was the left flank defender, accompanied on the back line by teammate Jen Grubb, and Courage players Nel Fettig and Danielle Slaton. Teammate Abby Wambach was named MVP of the game for scoring two goals and an assist.

2002 September 14 - Carrie stands out in an exhibition in Boston to honor Michelle Akers

Winning and losing wasn't the point, which was just as well since the Freedom lost, 1-0, to the Breakers, in a game honoring Michelle Akers, probably the greatest women's soccer player in history. Akers played in the first half and was feted at halftime. Meanwhile, our girl Carrie earned raves from bigsoccer.com fans who attended:

Carrie Moore was unbelievable last night... cleaning up and solid..and covering everywhere...... very solid outing for her.
- PoetSong

Yeah, I know I only made a brief "white-on-rice" comment regarding Moore, but yeah, she sure made her presence known last night! I did more than one "yesssssss!" regarding the things she did.
-magiclamp

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