January 28, 1995 -- Shutouts are quite common in outdoor soccer -- maybe too common. They are very rare in indoor soccer.
Therefore, a shutout by the Blizzard in a game in Buffalo was big news. A crowd of 6,287 in Memorial Auditorium held its breath until the final buzzer when the Blizzard had finished a 23-0 romp over the Dayton Dynamo.
Tony Meola did the honors for the Blizzard. There had been 27 shutouts in the National Professional Soccer League until that point, and this one had more points scored by the winner than any of them. What's more, it came on a day when posters of Meola were handed out to fans, with the caption, "Keeping. It's all about getting it done."
Meola told Robert J. Summers of The News after the game, "It [the quote] is something I believe in. My theory has always been that I don't have the greatest technique, but I just find a way to get it done. It doesn't matter for me how I save the ball, as long as I save it."
The save of the game came with less than four minutes left when he got a hand on a shot by Chris Pfau. The shutout was a nice response to a loss the night before, a 15-7 loss to Harrisburg.
--- Budd Bailey
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