And you thought the World Cup was it for high-level soccer. No, indeed not. The Albuquerque Asylum FC (I have no idea why they thought Asylum* was a good name) will play the Sacramento Knights this Saturday evening in Albuquerque for the Western Division championship of the National Premier Soccer League (NPSL). The winner advances to the national championship.
The NPSL is an 18 team league — eight franchises are in California (from Chico to San Diego), but other locations include Las Vegas, Phoenix, Denver, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Minneota, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Princeton and, obviously, Albuquerque. The rosters include current and former college players, some I’m told as old as, gasp, 30.
NewMexiKen knows a few of the players and has attended three or four matches including last Saturday’s semi-final 1-0 win over San Diego Fusion. It was a hard-played, aggressive, exciting contest before 4,000 equally aggressive fans.
This week’s championship took on a new cast during the week when the Sacramento team asked that the match be rescheduled to Sacramento, as they were, they said, the better team and they didn’t want to play at Albuquerque’s altitude. Fortunately, the league stood by its schedule. Come on up Sacramento. Bring oxygen.
Saturday, 7:30 at Menaul School, tickets $5. Come early, it was packed last week.
* Asylum = A place offering protection and safety; a shelter.
As it turned out, the Sacramento team was the better of the two, holding on to win Saturday night 3-2. Sacramento substituted with a plan, it appeared, and clearly overcame the altitude.