Nine conference championships in a row. Only three points dropped at home all season. A +37 goal differential at home. Player’s Shield winners by a 12 point margin.

And it didn’t matter one bit.

RIFC rolled into Louisville for the second time this season to take home a W (and hopefully some lovely bourbon). While the first match at Lynn Family Stadium could have been seen as a bit lucky with the amount of chances Louisville squandered compared to how clinical RIFC were, this one was a wire to wire victory for the Tide.

One big gripe I’m having with this match is the lack of credit that RIFC are getting. People are talking about Louisville not showing up or how poorly they played. Guess who caused that!? It was a truly phenomenal performance from the team but one that we shouldn’t be shocked to see with the form that they’ve been in.

I wouldn’t be doing my newsletter writing obligation if I didn’t make sure to shoutout everyone who did the 15+ hour journey to get to this match. Kevin and Matt represented the Tide Talk crew in Louisville but the performance from La Banda, The Defiance and everyone who made the trip had me in awe. I couldn’t be more proud to be a fellow fan of this team.

And finally, thank you to everyone who did whatever journey you took to get to Providence Brewing and take this in with us. We had an amazing time as always and the atmosphere was “lit” as the kids would say.

To the Content:

One of our traveling heroes, Matt Hands, does a great job as always breaking this match down. But I’ll be honest, the section on the trip and this team is my first ever MUST READ in this newsletter history

Timmy was doing so well in his player ratings until I got to REDACTED then it all fell apart. His Tide Talk Wordpress login is on THIN ICE

Andrew and I sat down to, for the third week in a row, gush about JJ Williams and the heroic defending from this team

Be on the lookout (probably tomorrow) for all of our pre-match content ahead of the EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS

Up the Tide!

Ryan & the Tide Talk team