She Believes

March 10th, 2020 is a Tuesday. I took Grace Anseth to Dallas with our friends ScottyRob and his daughter, Avery.  The plan was to come in Tuesday night, see the US Women’s National team play on Wednesday and get home Thursday by 2.  This seems like a fun plan to see some awesome athletes do their thing.  It got a little more stressful with COVID-19 becoming a more significant issue around the world.

We hit MSP at maybe 10, walked through security and were at our gate in 20 minutes.  During that time we applied roughly 2 pounds of hand sanitizer.

Our flight was uneventful from MSP to DFW.  We took an Uber up to Frisco and checked in without issue.

We checked in at the Marriott at Legacy Town Center. It is a beautiful hotel in this funky neighborhood where you can walk to different shops.

After checking in, I took an elevator ride with Mallory Pugh and Kelly O’Hara.  They were very nice.

ScottyRob and I talked the girls into this food hall about 10 min away at the most.

The girls getting ready for a little pasta.  We ended up getting some orange chicken too, which was killer.

#itis5o’clocksomewhere.

We did stop and take a couple of photos.  The shadow is there on purpose so the girls don’t get their retinas burned out by the setting sun.

These two are pumped to see the US Women’s National team.

After the food hall, we walked the boulevard for a little bit and found a very nice sushi 🍣 restaurant.

This Toro was as good as it gets.

After dinner we headed back to the hotel.  I thought the girls might try to get a couple of autographs but I think they were too nervous.  This did lead me to follow Carli Lloyd  through the lobby telling her that she may be one of the best footballers of all time and asking if she remembers scoring 3 goals within like 16 minutes during the first half of the the 2015 Women’s World Cup.  She smiled pleasantly and nodded acknowledging that I was there but too crazy to stop and talk too.

We went to bed after that. On Wednesday March 11th, 2020, we all got up and met at the Starbucks in the hotel.  Nothing keeps Coronavirus away like a hot chocolate and a chocolate croissant 🥐.  The girls hit the pool for a little bit and then we decided to try TopGolf for lunch.

Doesn’t matter how nice it is sometimes you just need to cruise cyberspace.

We banged balls at TopGolf for about 1 and 1/2 hours. We played some fun games.  We ate a little lunch and we had a few Diet Pepsi’s.

Hit it straight Youngblood. Lord know the dads can’t 

After cleaning up at the hotel we headed to Toyota Stadium for the US vs Japan Game.  We had the opportunity to tour the Soccer Hall of Fame first. 

Outside Toyota stadium.

The Soccer Hall of Fame is amazing and super interactive.  Grace, Avery, ScottyRob and I each created our best US Women’s National team of all time.  I was in the 91st percentile.  I did a US Men’s National team as well.  I was in the 97th percentile.  The strikers are pretty easy with legendary players Clint Dempsey (Come on you Spurs) and Landon Donovan.  We of course had Christian Pulisic in the midfield.

You should definitely check this place out if you get to Frisco, Texas.  After the HOF, we checked out the media spaces at Toyota Stadium.

Grace and Avery working on handling post match questions.

We also had the opportunity to see the US Women’s National team locker room before the match.  We broke things down with the head equipment manager, Jake.  Who goes through boots the fastest?  How do you handle all the gear?  Is anyone particularly superstitious?  It was amazing.  Jake is a little OCD so the jerseys have to be in numerical order.

Here we go.

Legends

Megan in the middle.

These are Carli Lloyd’s boots and shin guards.  This is the most baller thing I have ever seen.


The girls with Jake after the locker room tour.

After the tour we had the opportunity to watch the women head to the locker room.  Grace has the video on her phone.  Most were business-like preparing for the match but Megan Rapinoe gave the girls a little 🤙🏻 and Rose Lavelle gave them a little 👋.

After, we killed a little time till the US Women would take the field for warmups.

I can’t count real high but I can get to 4 World Cups.

We were able to get down on the edge of the field for warm ups.  It wan a beautiful night in Texas and the girls loved every minute of it.

Waiting for the US Women to hit the pitch.

One picture with your dad.

Avery and ScottyRob 

Ali Krieger and Kelly O’Hara

Becky Sauerburnn.  We love her at the Anseth house.  Signed Gracie’s jersey in 2015. 

Kelly O’Hara

Julie Ertz leading the warmup.

After warmups m, we head to our seats.  Amazing seats, you could see the game develop in front of us.  We also had prime time seats for Rapinoe’s sick free kick for the first goal and Christen Press’s ridiculous chip for the second goal.  That chip was so good we needed some salsa.


The girls are 100 percent into this game.

The field.

A little game action.

Once the game was over it was back to the Marriott.  I thought the girls might want to stay up and see if the US Women’s team was going to show but they were tired and went to bed.

Kate Markgraf, the US women’s team manager stopped by the lobby bar for 1 second and was gone.

It was an amazing experience with great friends.  In the morning it was Starbucks, DFW airport, hand sanitizer and home.  Turns out this was the last major sporting event held before everything went sideways.

For me this was a great way to end socializing and begin social isolation.