So we went down to Ridgecrest last weekend to celebrate Larry Josephson’s 75th birthday.  Erica and Niall put on a great party.  Lost of people from his church came, too, and Erica had two quizzes for the party guests – one for events that happened in 1937, and another quiz on how well the guests knew Larry.  I missed every single question on the 1937 quiz, but did get every question right on the Larry quiz…

Anyway, click on the photo to see the gallery of pics…

So Rosamond high is the most competitive match for Bishop High this year.  They played Thursday night, and it was a pretty exciting match.  Joey even got to start, and he provided an assist for Elijah Alexander for the first goal.

The Broncos were ahead the entire match, but unfortunately, a late goal in the final minute of the match saw them tie, 3-3.  So far, the Broncos are 1-0-2 in High Desert League play. They play Desert High from Edwards Air Force Base on Tuesday.

The Lady Broncos also played Rosamond, but had a much easier time of it.  They won 7-0.  Click on any of the photos to see the full gallery of pics.

Gracie has been playing for Round Valley school’s co-ed basketball team this winter, and she got the chance to get significant game time when they played another small school, Lee Vining Elementary.  The Round Valley Bobcats managed a win, but it was a very close game, and even went into overtime!  Click on the photo to get to the full gallery of pics.

Just thought I’d post a short clip on Joey’s play.  He’s number 16.  He makes a really nicely weighted pass to Chris Gonzales during last night’s game against California City.  As a freshman, it’s great that he gets to play on varsity at all, and I’m glad I got to catch a few good moments during his play.

The Bishop Broncos boys varsity played their first High Desert League match against California City High School on Tuesday, Jan 10th, 2012.  They dominated possession in the first half, and managed to keep a clean sheet to win the match 2-0.  The youtube video I’ve posted took place in the closing minutes of the match.  Tani Santana took the corner kick, which was headed in by senior Alberto Olvera.  You’ll notice that the Cal City defender also manages to handle the ball at the end, but it didn’t prevent the goal!  Go Broncos!

So Christmas extended for several days this year.  First, we had our wonderful Christmas eve service on Friday, and Gracie opened one of her gifts afterward.  I’m sure that’s one of the loooongest services ever for her..haha!

Then, we had Christmas morning.  My mom was able to drive up from Barstow to share our Christmas morning, so that was really nice.  She always brings up some homemade inarizushi (tofu-wrapped rice rolls, with shrimp filling), which are Karen’s favorite.  We had turkey for Christmas, and I tried a new stuffing, which was a turkey/sausage/apple recipe, and it turned out really well.

Then, we had Larry and his friend Dorothy come visit, along with Erica, Niall, and Liam, and Karen’s sister Maria.  We had honey-glazed ham, and I even made the glaze.  It turned out super-moist and very tasty.  Two cups of honey, a stick and a half of butter, and corn syrup.  So yummy, though.

Grandpa Larry shared a great Christmas story with the family, and I’ll link it later, after I’ve uploaded it to YouTube.  The kids then opened more presents, and we played a board game called Zero, which we hadn’t played before.  It was a really great family Christmas at home.

Hope all of yours were equally great.

So now that Joey is playing for the varsity squad at Bishop Union High School, I’ve created a new folder in the photo gallery for all of the matches.  You can access them in several ways.  You can click on the SquishPics link on the right, click on any photo on the front page, or just click HERE to see the pics.

Enjoy!

This post is quite late.  The Quartz Hill Shootout tournament took place on the weekend of May 21st-22nd, 2011.

The Bishop U14 boys faced strong competition in Lancaster, but managed another tournament championship, defeating Tri Comm 2-0, Valencia 1-0, Quartz Hill 4-0 and playing Canyon Country to a 0-0 draw.  They took first place with the most points in their group, having no losses.  Bishop U14 boys fielded a very strong defense, allowing no goals to be scored against them all weekend.  Bishop players had to dig deep to maintain their form after striker Joey Griego broke his collarbone late in the first game against Tri Comm.  But Bishop came back strong despite having only one substitute for the rest of the weekend, and their victory was well deserved.  Coach Greg Alexander said, “I’m so proud of our boys. They had to fight through several injuries.  They had numerous bruises, cuts, strains, and had to play through some very physical teams to win this championship.  The’ve done a great job, and I think we’ve prepared them well for high school soccer.  They have earned this championship with all of their hard work over the years.”

It was a pretty quiet, but nice Easter for us in the Griego household.  We went down to Ridgecest yesterday to spend some time with Karen’s family.  Had a really nice meal, although Karen and Gracie didn’t get to go horseback riding because it was too windy.

We went to the early service this morning, and it was very nice.  The weather was beautiful, and the  egg hunt and butterfly release was fun.  We just went to McDonald’s for a short lunch, then home to relax.  Grilled up some steaks, and we had a nice dinner.  Karen and Gracie went off to see the movie Rio this evening, and now I’m just relaxing on the couch…not a bad Easter Sunday.

Click on the photo for the gallery of pics from church, and later at home…

Over the weekend of  April 16-17, we went to Carson City to attend the Comstock Shootout soccer tournament.  Joey’s team has never done particularly well at this tournament over the years, and unfortunately, this year was no different.  Although they won three out of their four matches, there was no way to progress to a semi-final or final match out of their group.  The disappointing part is that the schedulers of this tournament never put Bishop in the opposite group from the strongest team.  This means that to progress out of the group, Bishop teams must defeat the toughest team either in their first or second match.

While this isn’t *that* big a deal, it does mean that the final match is almost always a blowout, regardless of who the opponent is, since the teams in the other group are weaker.  This has happened for the past four years at Comstock in Joey’s divisions.  Maybe it’s just dumb luck, or maybe the Carson City sponsors don’t want Carson City teams in the harder group, so they can advance to the semi-finals or finals (only to get blown out anyway, of course).  Just makes me wonder what their scheduling philosophy really is…

So, Joey’s first match was against Mount Diablo, from the bay area.  They won this match relatively easily, defeating them 5-0.  Joey scored in this match, and Bishop moved to their second match, against the toughest team in the division, the Davis Mojo.

The Davis Mojo game was excellent.  We expected it to be essentially our final.  If we didn’t win it, then we would not be able to progress out of our group on points, even if we beat the other teams.  We knew this going in.  The first goal, unfortunately, was from a really great free kick by their number 8 – their only real scoring threat.  He struck it hard and low, and beat Daniel Martinez, the Bishop keeper, in the near corner.  The second goal came quickly after that on a defensive mistake.  While Daniel came out valiantly on a one-on-one with their striker, number 8 finished coolly, and it was 2-0 at halftime.

Bishop then came out extremely strong.  They dominated possession the entire second half.  There were at least eight shots on goal, but Bishop just could *not* seem to get the finishing touch to put them away.  About ten minutes into the second half, Joey perfectly anticipated a back-pass to the Davis keeper from a Davis defenseman, and stole it just inches away from their keeper, who had come out hard. After muscling through the hard challenge, Joey kept his feet and managed to dribble into the net for Bishop’s first and only goal of the match.  A furious barrage of shots came from Bishop for the rest of the match, but to their credit, Davis’ defense held, and the match ended 2-1.

Our third and last match was against Pleasant Hill, who we knew Davis had defeated earlier by a score of 4-0.  As expected, Bishop dominated the match.  Bishop held the ball and controlled the entire match, with at least five different Bishop players scoring.  Bishop eventually had to stop scoring against a demoralized Pleasant Hill team, with the final score of 8-1.

Bishop’s only chance would have been a Davis Mojo loss to Mount Diablo.  Mount Diablo actually took the lead in their match against Davis 1-0, but Davis’ striker #8 put two goals in the 2nd half to finish off the game and assure their place in the final, beating Mount Diablo 2-1.

Because Davis was from the stronger group (with Bishop), their championship match was against the winner of the opposite group (whose teams were much weaker), the championship match wasn’t very exciting.  Davis Mojo defeated MDSA United in a 4-0 blowout.  One of these days, the Comstock Shootout schedulers will figure out it’s more exciting to watch a competitive final than make one group weaker just so their Carson team can advance.  For the past three years, the final matches have all been blowouts due to this scheduling habit of theirs.  Sigh.

Still, we did get at least one competitive match against the Davis Mojo, and that Davis team was well coached.  The Davis parents were also really great – cheering their side on, and applauding the Bishop boys, too.  Maybe next year we’ll actually get a good final if they put the two strongest teams in opposite groups.  We’ll see.

So, the Bishop boys will train for the next few weeks for the Quartz Hill Shootout tournament in Lancaster, and then their season will be over.  Joey will start high school in the fall, so we’ll move into high school soccer this winter.

Click on the photo to see the whole gallery of pics from the tournament.

Cheers,

Joe Griego