Playing the sport of power soccer has been an integral part of my life for many years. I always enjoyed competing in the sport and I get a lot out of competing with my teammates and other teams.  I started playing as a little kid and I continued through two decades. Power soccer is a sport played by people in power wheelchairs. The game is played on a basketball court with four players playing on the field on each team. A player from each team is a designated goalie and usually stays in the goalie box leaving the other three teammates to attempt to try to score a goal on the other side of the field. It is a fast paced game and is exciting to watch and play. 

On the weekend of March 6th and 7th of this year my team, the BORP Bay Earthquakes played in the United States Power Soccer Association Western Regional at San Jose State University.  Since we were a division one team we had to face stiff competition to place well in the tournament. We were under pressure to qualify for our national tournament, which is going to be in Indianapolis, Indiana in mid-June. Only the top three teams from the two divisions qualify for nationals and my team has always been fortunate enough to compete in the national tournament. 

For this year’s regional tournament my team was fortunate enough to win our first three games without having a goal scored on us. We were confident going into the championship game with our rivals the San Jose Steamrollers that we were going to win the whole thing. However, after our unfortunate defeat two to nil, we settled for taking second place in the tournament. I still wanted the first place trophy though, but at least we qualified for nationals.  And although my DynaVox wasn’t in the game with me, I was able to use it after the fact to tell everyone about how exciting this tournament was.