Now we can gather to watch women's pro sports

At the time, it seemed a little embarrassing to have a 12-year-old running our soccer practice.

When one of my best friends, Brooke Adams, talked me into playing on a women's soccer team about 14 years ago, it didn't take us long to realize that while we didn't lack enthusiasm, we were a little short on skill. Most of us, because of age, hadn't had the chance to play organized soccer.

So we called on her then 12-year-old daughter Liz Bogus for some lessons.

Yes we were desperate, but as it turned out, we had a pretty outstanding teacher. Who knew the kid would turn out to be a professional soccer player?

Certainly not me — or even Brooke — because we thought it was a real accomplishment that women the world considered washed up could still play recreation league soccer.

"There was no such thing, never had been, so no," said Brooke about whether she ever thought her 12-year-old daughter would make a living playing soccer. The good thing about being young is that one is often blissfully unaware of the limitations the world is waiting to put on you. So while we didn't consider it, Bogus did.

Brooke and I gathered with a group of friends at Fiddler's Elbow Saturday to watch Bogus and her team, the Boston Breakers, take on the St. Louis Athletica.

Watching the Women's Professional Soccer on screens that are normally reserved for the NBA and MLB is a little surreal for middle-aged moms like us.

It was during a conversation about how great it was to have the WPS that Brooke and I decided it would be fun to do something else formerly reserved for men — head to a restaurant or sports bar and watch the game as a group on a big screen. For some of the women, it was the first time they'd gathered as a group to watch a sporting event.

And finding a place that wanted a bunch of women (and a few husbands) watching women play the Beautiful Game on their big screens wasn't the easiest task to accomplish.

Brooke called the usual sports hang-outs — Iggy's, Skybox and the Green Pig — all of which declined to dedicate a television to the WPS' featured game at 4 p.m. on a NBA playoff Sunday.

One fellow even laughed when Brooke asked.

In fact, he went on to tell Brooke that "those televisions are reserved for the NHL and the NBA."

Well, excuse us!

Fiddler's Elbow actually put the game on three screens so it could be seen by everyone at the table. I sat on the restaurant side with my daughters and our waitress put it on the big screen for us.

So there we were watching one of our own play professional sports on national television.

That, in and of itself, was enough to get us cheering and clapping. Utah has another home-grown player in the WPS, Alta alumna and BYU graduate, Katie Larkin, who plays for the Atlanta Beat.