It was a chilly Saturday morning at Southwest High School and soccer spectators huddled under their umbrellas as brief showers came and went.  Clad in either black and orange or purple and silver, they cheered on the freshman boys’ team at Super Soccer Saturday. Unfortunately for the athletes, the weather did not improve too much throughout the day.

“The weather was really bad, it was raining and it was pretty cold too,” wrote JV player Jo Alterini in an email. “My hands felt like they were going to fall off at the beginning of the game…We ended up putting our bags in a tipped over trash can so it would keep our stuff dry.”

However, the weather wasn’t the only thing that made Super Soccer Saturday so charged. The other reason isn’t new.

South and Southwest high schools have a well-known, intense rivalry (not just in soccer), with both sides just as fierce in competition. “The second I got onto a team I started to dislike Southwest,” said Alterini.

Unfortunately for Alterini and her teammates, South lost four out of six games and tied once, with Southwest winning the majority of the games. “My team was disappointed in our loss and I know I wish I could have played better, but it was still fun for most people,” she wrote.

While South did not win as many games as it would’ve liked, morale is still high for the future as the fall season continues.