I have to confess that I didn't make it to the end of the game. My daughter graduated from high school (year 12) this weekend, and at the time the ball was bounced, I'd put in a long day of cooking, cleaning and decorating for the party. Graduation parties in the US have become a bit overblown...

I was lying in bed listening to the audio feed from the Internet through the first quarter and even though it was a close game at that point, I just had a feeling that we were going to be OK. Part way into the second quarter, I was just too exhausted to stay awake another moment. Confident in our Tigers, I shut the computer down at my 12:30 am.

Think about that for a moment, if you will. How many years back do we have to go to find a team that filled me with so much confidence that I could flip the switch on a neck-to-neck game, believing that the boys had what it takes to get the win?

I still credit Terry Wallace for this victory. Yes, I know Nathan Brown was a hero, and he certainly does deserve kudos for his goal kicking extravaganza! But there's something special that Wallace has brought to this year's Tigers that they were lacking before. We all know that things can and do go wrong in a game but somehow we seem to be prepared for those things, and when we're caught unaware we're able to make the corrections to fix our shortcomings. It's a BEAUTIFUL thing!!

I still think it's prudent to be humble; to take each game as a serious challenge; not to jump ahead of ourselves thinking we're something special. Let's remember the first game of the season and vow not to let that happen again!

From: Anonymous
Sent: Sunday, May 15, 2005 11:52 PM
It's an important game to have played before taking on Brisbane, West Coast and Melbourne. We weren't at our best and all the hype from the last two weeks wasn't a substitute for some hard work in the final quarter.

Wallace is going to milk every moment of it to preach staying focussed, staying confident and not getting big headed. Better to have a scare before another test of our credentials against more serious opponents.

From: Chris Greenway
Sent: Sunday, May 15, 2005 3:16 AM
Subject: Oh yeah!
Hi Becky,
I'm not sure if you listened to it all or not, but we won.....again! This is so cool! I'm loving it. I'm trying to decide what is better absolutely belting Collingwood from siren to siren or letting them have some hope for the first three quarters and then ripping it away from them in the last quarter. Nothing better than beating Collingwood. It's like that old joke, what's better than beating Collingwood by 100 points? Beating them by a point! Browny is 2nd on the goal kicking table and we're 3rd on the ladder, a win and percentage ahead of Melbourne and behind Geelong only by percentage. Bring on those Lions, I say!

Chris (a happy little Tiger)

From: Alexander Pelic
Sent: Sunday, May 15, 2005 5:00 PM
Subject: The Mighty Richmond
Gday Becky
OH WE'RE FROM TIGERLAND!!!!

I went to the game yesterday and i have a rather sore throught from screaming so much. For the first three quarters i felt that we were playing slightly better than Collingwood yet I didn't feel that we would win. But when Browny kicked the first of the quarter I thought one more and we'll run all over them and we sure did.

Next week we must be on our best game to beat Brisbane at the hellhole (I have seen too many losses there). They must run the old buggers around and just keep going and going. It would do them well to watch a video of how Hawthorn beat them.

The next six weeks will really make us or break us. We have Brisbane (A), West Coast (H), Melbourne, Kangaroos, Sydney (H), and Adelaide (H). We need to win one or two of these games. Best chance to snag a couple are against the Kangaroos and Sydney and hopefully Adelaide. If we win one of these and the four games that we should win in the last eight rounds we will end up with eleven wins which usually is not enough for the finals but this year it looks like that it could sneak us in. We just really need to win the ones we should and one or two in the next month and a half.

Anyway I won't be able to go to many games for a while but I will be listening on the radio.

Hope all is well with you

Pelic