Avalanche's first league game was against the South San Jose Surge, a U17 team. The game plan was to start strong and not give the momentum to the opponent. Avalanche did exactly that, scoring three times in the first ten minutes. Katy scored the first goal only two minutes into the game. Running from her right wide midfield position, she placed a hard driven low ball out of reach from the keeper from 20 yards out. "She's scored a lot of goals for us with that shot," said Ed. "She knows how to knock one in from the right side from a fairly long distance." The second goal came only three minutes later at the fifth minute, when Chelsea scored a 15 yarder from the right side. "We're getting a lot of shots and goals from our midfielders," said Ed. "That's important, because we've been playing a formation with two forwards, and so when we attack, we usually need another midfielder to join the offense. As long as we make sure we have players backing up defensively behind the attacking midfielder, that's fine. The players backing up will help stop a counter-attack if the other team wins the ball." In the ninth minute, Avalanche scored off a free kick. Once again, Emma took her usual free kick, placing a high ball from about 30 yards out toward the goal. Kathy jumped for the header, barely missing it, but the ball continued to travel into the far corner of the net for Avalanche's third goal. "We're getting pretty good at scoring off our free kicks. Since there will probably be more fouls in Class 1 and more free kick opportunities, this just means more scoring chances for us," said Ed.

Christy had very few touches in goal in the first half, as the Avalanche back flat four defense of Jessica, Laura, Emma and Julia protected the goal well. Laura filled in well for a missing Jessie (sick) as a center back. While the first half was clearly in Avalanche's control, the second half was not as solid. Surge was able to spend a lot of time in Avalanche's half of the field, and had many opportunities to score. Avalanche had some trouble keeping possession of the ball, and couldn't dictate play. "We want to work on improving that," said Ed. "Once we have a lead, we'll need to learn how to maintain control and not let a team back into the match. Irena noted that the game was similar to our game vs Marin at the Napa tournament but reversed. Napa had a big lead and should have comfortably sailed to a win, but they nearly gave it away to Avalanche when we scored two goals in the second half. We can keep control by making sure we own the ball, making smart passes!that won't be intercepted, and not giving up control of the ball on long shots or passes that have a low chance of succeeding. We also had a bit of difficulty with the long 45 minute halves. It is a test of endurance, and a good team needs to be fit to play the whole 45 minutes." Nevertheless, Avalanche was able to withstand the Surge attack and came away with a 3-0 win.