Captains and Players,
I'm excited to announce the formation of a new youth league in the New Jersey and Philadelphia area. In order to strengthen the region's representation on a national scale (at the summer Youth Club Championships) and provide more opportunities for players and teams to play and recruit in the fall, this league is open to anyone born in 1989 or later. Any league participant is eligible to represent the region in either the Open, Girls, or Mixed divisions at the 2008 YCC's, provided they are born after May 31st, 1989. Also, the league is open to several categories of players and teams, combining aspects of both preselected and hat/draft leagues. Depending on interest, we are trying to develop both a Division I and Division II, as well as a Girls league. Registration will be open to any of the following:
Full Teams: Any group of 12 or more players may register in the league as a full team. This team will not pick up other registered players, and is a way for high school teams or groups of friends to play together in the fall. Roster additions will be permitted until late in the season, in order to accommodate any new recruits a team may be able to muster. In rare cases, if teams of 10 or 11 can guarantee attendance, they may petition to enter as full teams.
Partial Teams: Groups of 5 to 11 players that want to play together but can't field a full team. Or parts of high school teams that are splitting in order to get people more experience. Partial teams will combine with other partial teams, packages, and individuals in order to form teams large enough to compete.
Packages: 2 to 4 players who want to play together. Packages will be added to the rosters of partial teams, or combined in order to form teams of their own. These can be a couple of friends, the nucleus of a high school team, etc.
Individuals: Players signing up on their own. This is ideal for someone who has never played organized youth ultimate before and wants to get a taste of it before starting their own high school team, or someone out of high school who is still young enough to play, and so on. All girls must register as individuals.
Currently, we are trying to get each team to play two games per weekend, both on the same day. Depending on the number of teams and field availability, this may change. Right now our possible field locations are Edgely in Philadelphia, MCUDL in Trenton, and Washington Road in Princeton. Our tentative fall schedule starts play on September 22nd and ends with a league championship on November 10th and 11th. This will be (pending acceptance of our application) a UPA-sanctioned league.
If you are interested or able to play, please send me an email at thompsor@stanford.edu with your name and how many people you think you or your team will be able to send. More information will be released in the next two weeks.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Youth Club Championships
This past weekend, in Blaine, Minnesota, the UPA put on the Youth Club Championships for the third time. For the second time, New Jersey had a bid, and for the first time, we accepted and assembled a team. In 2005, we had a mixed bid but low interest, and here in 2007 we created a team with some of the best talent in the state. Unfortunately, a lot of good players could not or would not participate, and we set out with two practices and a tournament under our belt for the eight Columbia and nine other players that we took to Blaine. Under the direction of Columbia coach Anthony Nunez (CHS '98) and Rutgers coach Emilio Panasci (CHS '00), we were determined to break seed and knew that if we played to our potential, we could win the tournament.
Our flight was out of Newark at 1:00 on Friday, so we assembled around 11 at the airport and checked in and got to the gate. We had about 45 minutes before boarding started, so I put Stanford vs. Carleton from Nationals on my laptop (thanks UVTV!) and everyone gathered around. Sherwood absolutely did play out of his mind in this game, and he looks good in the ripper for the interview after the game. After a little more UVTV, we boarded and I broke out my Pride and Prejudice. I rode my combination of reading and sleeping all the way into Minneapolis, and we disembarked, got our bags, and proceeded to the two giant rental vans. It was about a half hour drive to the hotel, which was AMAZING.
This was honestly one of the best hotels and definitely the most fun that I've ever stayed in. While the motel at nationals was ridiculous amounts of fun, that was down to the people and the Kohls parking lot. This hotel made its own fun. There was an indoor water park. How ridiculous is that? I guess they took a cue from the Mall of America, and we thank them for it. Three water slides began indoors and then circled around outside of the hotel. There was a lazy river. And a giant bucket of water that tipped over every 15 minutes or so. It was wonderful. And maybe even better than the water park was the "Beach House Bar and Grill," the hotel's restaurant. With happy hour from 4-7 (meaning half-off appetizers), dinner was affordable AND delicious.
We had a team meeting at 8:30 where we talked about our expectations and rules for the weekend, as well received our kickass jerseys - a green Punisher skull overlayed on a green outline of the state of New Jersey. Even the lettering was badass. We hung around for a while until our 10:30 bedtime, and got ready to wake up at 6:30 the next morning. We wanted to be at the fields by 7:30 in time for a long warmup and plenty of time to cleat up and tape.
When we arrived, we were immediately struck by the lush green fields and immense facility. After practicing and playing on the rock-hand and dusty fields in Princeton, playing on actual grass and soft ground was going to be a real treat. We noticed the wind as soon as we got there too - that did not bode well for us, as it probably meant zone. For some reason, Columbia (and by extension, NJ's YCC team) does not do well against zone. True, we never practiced it, but we'd played against it at Nucci's Cup and done well. But there was no wind then, and no pressure.
New England came out excited, as their hard D and turnover-prone offense showed. The first two points were both long and filled with drops on our side and throwaways on New England's. On the third point we got ourselves under control, and we scored our first O point in three tries when I calmly hit Zander in the endzone to make it 1-2. Our D team came out strong and fired up as we tried to tie the game, but inability to convert on D-team offense hurt us. Once again, we managed to create turnovers, but eventually New England was able to break us down and score. The next point, Jesse threw a loopy forehand to me on what was basically an upline cut in a 2v2 situation, but the disc hung and I fought through fouls by two players to layout between them and catch the disc toeing the back endzone line. I got up excited and angry, punched the disc away in celebration, and roused our sidelines.
Unfortunately, this is when New England threw their zone. It went quickly from a 3-2 game to an 8-3 game, as they began to pull away. Until this point, we had been stopping their offense with our straight-up marks and fronting defense, and our offense had started to judge the wind and stop dropping the disc. However, their zone took us by surprise and stupid decisions led to our downfall. At halftime we talked about breaking the zone and came out a lot stronger. We started trading again, and even got in some breaks. Nobody on their team stood out besides Alex Kapinos, and Zander and I took turns containing him while other players prevented hucks to him. He was the only player we faced all tournament that I felt was impossible to shut down on defense - he could only be contained, unlike every other player we played against. He proved his worth even on defense, when he caught his own point block for a Callahan, stopping our run and putting them on top 10-6. It was the second Callahan we threw in that game, and it really took the wind out of our sails.
Still, we managed to break their zone several times in the second half, and on defense we could still force them to turn it over. It was a disappointing loss, because had the conditions been better or their zone had been taken out the equation, I had no doubt that we would have been able to beat them. But unfortunately, their zone proved too much for us to handle, and in the windy conditions our overhead throws struggled or weren't even attempted. Some of the bright spots included the defense of Jake Rainwater, whose long arms and surprising speed created a lot of D's, and Alex Kinsey's smooth handling in the zone. We moved on, tired, to Derek Gottlieb-coached Denver, the 3rd seed whose first game had been an easy romp over Madison.
We started this game lackluster and uninterested, once again going down 2-0 and 5-2. Fortunately, Denver's offense was predicated on hucks to their tall, athletic receivers, but once we managed to clamp down on the marks, the hucks stopped and our quicker defenders were able to stifle the in-cuts downfield. After trading to 7-5, we scored 4 straight to take half, then go up 9-7. Then it was our turn to collapse, as Zander threw his second Callahan of the day, their deep pulls continued to pin us back, and nervous throws and a lack of cuts sent them on their own 4-0 run to go up 11-9. But calm and collected, we stormed back with yet another 4-0 run, inspired by strong downfield defense that frustrated handlers into forcing hucks against our marks that all ended up either far beyond the arms of the receivers, or in our defenders' grasp.
Receiving at 13-12, Josh hucked to me and I almost killed myself with a futile layout into Will Deaver and a golf cart, but I slowed up and saw that the disc was well out the back of the endzone. We got the disc back quickly enough, I picked up, and saw Zander curling around the breakside towards the openside back corner of the endzone. I threw the backhand, hoping that the winds that pushed Josh's huck out the back wouldn't do the same to my throw, and Zander reeled in the throw 50 yards away in the back corner of the endzone in front of two defenders, with a couple feet to spare. The last two points were turnover free, and we closed out the game 15-13 for the upset win.
Denver was a team that relied a lot on their handlers and big receivers going away from the disc. We were able to limit the damage their handlers could do with give and gos and upfield resets, while taking away the deep options with our marks and shutting down in-cuts with our legs. Standout players on Denver were handlers #8 and #12, along with #10 who was their go-to guy downfield. He came up huge on a lot of early grabs, although we thankfully managed to limit his damage later on. We did have two ridiculous plays of our own - Jesse hucked backhand around a forehand forcing mark, throwing a bullet to the breakside of the endzone, which Stephen tracked down, utterly roasting his defender. And earlier, Jake Rainwater annihilated his defender on a jump ball just outside the endzone, for his first real sky of the weekend. We called the play "Make it Rain."
Our final pool play game was against 0-2 Madison, who had just come off of a 15-7 loss to New England. We started strong for once, and we took half 8-5, finishing the game 15-9. Madison, like Denver, loved to huck. But unlike Denver, they had a massive disconnect between their handlers and receivers. Their handlers would huck whenever they got the disc, regardless of whether or not the cuts were there, and the receivers were usually well-covered and indecisive cutters. Except for one receiver, #14, they never had anyone on the receiving end of the countless hucks they tried to unleash on our straight-up marks. The game passed pretty uneventfully, as we worked the disc on the breakside easily on offense, and on defense we didn't have to work for turns, they gifted them to us.
That left us 2-1, in second place in our pool, awaiting the winner of the Minnesota-Cincinnati game from Pool A. We had a bye now, and I chose to go over to the Atlanta-Philly mixed game, a preview of the finals. It was an exciting and back-and-forth game, but hard cap put a damper on Philly as they fell 12-9 to a strong Atlanta team. But drops looked like Philly's main problem, and if they could cut those out then they would be even with Atlanta. Eddie Peters had some great D's on Ollie, and the teams looked pretty close.
Afterwards was "dinner at the fields," which turned out to be nothing more than salad, cheese, and two half-slices of pizza while watching a slideshow. After we ate our free food, our team just got up and left; there was no reason to be in there. Interestingly enough, I was the only shirtless person in the room. We quickly returned to the hotel, where we showered and waterparked. The hot tub felt amazing, as did the lazy river. Fun times, and we headed back to the hotel restaurant for a late-night meal, since the dinner we'd been provided was not sufficient. Soup and salad at the hotel bar and grill was delicious. I wish we had one of these places everywhere we went. Wow. In bed by 11, we had to get up at 6:15 because our games started at 8:30 the next morning.
When we made our way down to the hotel lobby, we had a table set up with bagels, croissants, bananas, etc. for us to munch on as we waited for everyone to come down. The day before, when some people went to Mall of America I asked for them to pick me up some long green socks to match our uniforms. Well, there was a much-anticipated presenting of the socks, and it turns out that I got fuzzy green frog socks. The foot was basically a frog sticking its tongue out. Cute, comfortable, and completely unexpected. I wore them and played great. They even had little grips on the bottom!
Our quarterfinal matchup was against Minnesota, a team that had been shellacked by Seattle and Pittsburgh the day before. We came out strong and started to do the same. Our man defense and offense took us up 5-2 before long. There was a hell point that we won mainly as a result of our defense forcing turnovers closer and closer to their endzone, since they absolutely could not work the disc on our defense. Fred Tsai and Jake Rainwater got D after D, and Freddy even scored two of our first 4 goals. Ben Feldman was consistently D'ed up by Zander, and if not, he would throw the disc away right afterwards. After my huck was just out of reach of three of our players, I got a layout D right outside the endzone. It was my first baited layout D in a while - I hadn't quite gotten the hang of it in college, and most of my tournament so far was focused on completely denying my man the disc. A few points later we scored twice, as our first goal, a huck from Freddy to Bo was called back on a travel. Right afterwards, Josh hucked to Jake, but Brian Li spoiled the party as he skied both Jake and Jake's defender and put us up 5-2. Minnesota went into a huck and set zone D right after receiving the pull. Our D line was caught by surprise and turned it over quickly, but we worked it on their man defense again to go up 6-3.
This was the turning point in the game, when Minnesota threw their four-man cup and absolutely shut us down. We started moving the disc well enough, but silly drops and turnovers brought it quickly to 6-5. With the heavy crosswind, they trapped us on the sideline where any hammers or overheads were directly into the wind, and we couldn't cope. Our handler give and gos weren't gaining us any yards, and the downfield poppers and wings were not getting us anything. At 6-5 we turned it over after working the entire field, and again at 6-6. At 6-7, we started moving the disc better, but all it took was one throw to put us on defense and them just outside our endzone. After a D, one of their players laid out to get the second-effort in the back of the endzone, for them to take half.
Coming out in the second half was more of the same - although there were turnovers both at our own endzone and theirs, we could never punch it in, no matter how many times we stopped them from scoring. At 8-6 we dropped a hammer in the endzone. Up 9-6 Minnesota called a timeout, and during the timeout we discovered that hard cap would go on in 5 minutes. Throughout the whole game they'd been taking a lot of time between points, which resulted in me yelling "90 seconds" to them a whole lot and then my team yelling at me to stop being an asshole. But when it came down to it, I was right and they were wrong. After Minnesota took forever on the timeout, they scored and we received at 10-6. Our strategy was reminiscent of wildwood - go for the two-pointer, aka big huck. My throw to Zander was just out of his reach, but our man defense forced a turnover close to their goalline and we scored quickly. Hard cap could only have been minutes away. We pulled, went down, got the D, and hard cap went on. Demoralized, we turned it over, before playing good defense again and I threw the game-ending goal to Zander for us to lose 10-8.
It was a real heartbreaker. With our man defense and man offense, we outscored Minnesota 7-2 in that game. Unfortunately, we could only score once on their zone defense. That was the difference. The crosswinds stopped the majority of our crossfield hammers and overhead throws, leaving us with swings and quick handler motion that they could stop as they flooded the middle of the field. I really, really wanted to play in the semifinals against Seattle. This game was especially brutal because when we finally did break their zone, we scored again but didn't have time to complete our comeback. It's games like these where I wish we had observers or timekeepers or something to keep timeouts short and limit the time between points to 90 seconds. I have no doubt that we could have had 15-20 minutes or 4 or 5 more points in that game.
That led us into another game against Madison, 15-1 losers against Seattle. We started off strong, going up a couple of breaks, but our defense was extremely lackluster. Our marks were terrible, and we gave up too many hucks to open receivers. Despite being up 12-8, we found ourselves receiving on universe point, which we scored without any turnovers. The Madison team played as we expected them to, basically the same as they did when we beat them 15-9. But we did not come out sharp at all, and we almost paid for it. I don't remember much from that game, besides our terrible marks and equally terrible decisions on offense. I think this was the game where I basically threw a blade to Freddy, who made an amazing catch about ten yards out of the endzone. As soon as he caught it, I walked off of the field and hid behind a trashcan. He threw to Zander for the goal, and my defender was puzzled, I'm sure. We faced Denver again next, who wanted to play a shortened game. We agreed to play to 9.
This game was never in any question. We came out harder and actually focused, and Denver played like we did in the last game. They turned the disc over a lot and made poor decisions, while we played hard defense and played reasonably good offense. I had a few turnovers in this game before Nunez reminded me to play simple, and I started to move the disc faster and smarter. We had one point where all seven of us on the field touched the disc that was probably our smoothest offensive point of the tournament. We closed out this game 9-4, and it was an amicable, good-spirited game that gave us plenty of time to decide what we wanted to do after we finished.
Half of us decided to stay and watch the finals, which unfortunately were happening at the same time. I started out watching the open finals, but after a few boring points typical of a finals game, I decided to head over to watch the mixed and girls finals. I did manage to catch Alex Kapinos being an absolute beast, but New England was still losing. On the girls side, Seattle jumped out to a quick 6-2 lead. I'm convinced that if Oregon had started sooner, they would have been able to win the game. As it was, they closed to within 9-7 but no further, as they ended up losing 14-10. Seattle tore through Oregon's zone early on, and I wonder if that was the ultimate difference.
The mixed final was where the action was. As I got there, Philly took a 6-4 lead that continued to 7-5. For one of the goals, Aman took Grant deep and skied him for the goal - that was a familiar sight for the Philly and NJ players, but not the Paideia sidelines! Then Noah pulled a fast, bladey backhand that one of the Atlanta girls dropped. Afterwards, we found out that we both called a drop if Atlanta had a girl catch it. Noah told Grant that he was going to break him for the goal, then proceeded to throw the around backhand to Justin Principi to take half 8-5. But Atlanta was a changed team after the half, as they methodically worked the disc down the field and opened the game up with hard defense and big hucks.
It didn't hurt that Philly started trying to huck to their girls - I counted three overthrown or misread hucks to girls that looked perfect on the release, as well as one huck from a girl that tailed out of bounds. Atlanta took advantage, at tied at 9-9, Mark Dundala tried to lead Noah into space on a dump throw that got picked up in the wind, and Grant skied Noah for the Callahan for Atlanta to go up 10-9. After the previously mentioned girl huck that tailed out of bounds, Atlanta went up 11-9 before Philly could stop the bleeding. They almost got a break when Scotty came off his man to get a poach D on a girl, but the disc floated more than he anticipated and he could only lightly tip the disc, not enough to get it away from George, who was waiting patiently behind him. Atlanta, 11-9.
During that point, incidentally, I saw/heard some of the nastiest and really uncalled for comments by some Paideia parents. When Noah made a clean bid on Michael Terry (nearly getting the D), his momentum caused him to roll on the ground afterwards, coming up on Terry's ankle/achilles from behind. Mike Terry crumpled to the ground and had to take an injury after this accidental and freak injury. But the Paideia parents accused Noah of trying to injure him, saying that he'd been making reckless and unspirited bids all game, which was just a ridiculous claim. First of all, Michael Terry had taken injury subs earlier in the game after no contact with Philly players, meaning he was nowhere near 100%, and also, Noah's bid was completely clean, as were all of his during that game. It wasn't a no-chance bid where he landed in his knees from behind, it was a legitimate bid where he bumped him from behind after rolling on the ground. Rob Olson and I got loud and obstinate defending Noah at that point.
After the goal, Philly finally managed to punch it in, after working the disc cleanly and calmly down the field. But they couldn't manage to break Atlanta, no matter how hard they tried. By this point, Atlanta was playing George, Grant, Ollie, and Allen Jarvis, trying to prevent the break as much as possible. In fact, Atlanta's next three goals were all thrown to girls - Sophie, Paula, and Lane for the win. Lane's goal was a really nice layout grab at the front cone of the endzone to end the game - if she hadn't made that catch, the game would have almost certainly gone to universe point. All in all, it was a great game that I loved to watch as a fan, not just because I knew 75% of the players on both teams.
We saw Ben Swerdlow pick up yet another individual spirit award, and somehow New England got the team spirit award with a perfect 5. Stephen and I wanted Ben to give them a 3 or 4 after our game, but Ben gave them a 5 anyway, robbing Cincinnati of their deserved glory. Oh well. I'm just wondering what Pittsburgh did to have a 3.5, even lower than our 3.83. Back at the hotel, we enjoyed a dinner made up almost entirely of half-price appetizers. We were sitting nearby the Philly guys and had some nice conversation and banter - they're really my favorite team/area, probably because we play the game the same way - take no prisoners defense and hard, gritty play.
Later, when we tried to get back to the restaurant for half-price desserts, we found out that the kitchen was closed (oh no!), so we walked to Wendy's after some SEPDA kids to get some Frostys. After yet another walking through the drive through adventure, we had our delicious treats. Back at the hotel, I spent about an hour or 90 minutes hanging out with SEPDA and a few North Hills kids (who never actually did come inside the room) before heading to bed before our 5 am departure. Thankfully I packed before bed, unlike Brian Walter, who held the whole team up in the morning. But it didn't matter, as we got to the gate right as the plane started boarding - perfect timing!
My next post will be more of a reflection than a summary of YCC's, and if I'm feeling ambitious I might even write about what it feels like to play in my last-ever juniors tournament. *sigh*
Our flight was out of Newark at 1:00 on Friday, so we assembled around 11 at the airport and checked in and got to the gate. We had about 45 minutes before boarding started, so I put Stanford vs. Carleton from Nationals on my laptop (thanks UVTV!) and everyone gathered around. Sherwood absolutely did play out of his mind in this game, and he looks good in the ripper for the interview after the game. After a little more UVTV, we boarded and I broke out my Pride and Prejudice. I rode my combination of reading and sleeping all the way into Minneapolis, and we disembarked, got our bags, and proceeded to the two giant rental vans. It was about a half hour drive to the hotel, which was AMAZING.
This was honestly one of the best hotels and definitely the most fun that I've ever stayed in. While the motel at nationals was ridiculous amounts of fun, that was down to the people and the Kohls parking lot. This hotel made its own fun. There was an indoor water park. How ridiculous is that? I guess they took a cue from the Mall of America, and we thank them for it. Three water slides began indoors and then circled around outside of the hotel. There was a lazy river. And a giant bucket of water that tipped over every 15 minutes or so. It was wonderful. And maybe even better than the water park was the "Beach House Bar and Grill," the hotel's restaurant. With happy hour from 4-7 (meaning half-off appetizers), dinner was affordable AND delicious.
We had a team meeting at 8:30 where we talked about our expectations and rules for the weekend, as well received our kickass jerseys - a green Punisher skull overlayed on a green outline of the state of New Jersey. Even the lettering was badass. We hung around for a while until our 10:30 bedtime, and got ready to wake up at 6:30 the next morning. We wanted to be at the fields by 7:30 in time for a long warmup and plenty of time to cleat up and tape.
When we arrived, we were immediately struck by the lush green fields and immense facility. After practicing and playing on the rock-hand and dusty fields in Princeton, playing on actual grass and soft ground was going to be a real treat. We noticed the wind as soon as we got there too - that did not bode well for us, as it probably meant zone. For some reason, Columbia (and by extension, NJ's YCC team) does not do well against zone. True, we never practiced it, but we'd played against it at Nucci's Cup and done well. But there was no wind then, and no pressure.
New England came out excited, as their hard D and turnover-prone offense showed. The first two points were both long and filled with drops on our side and throwaways on New England's. On the third point we got ourselves under control, and we scored our first O point in three tries when I calmly hit Zander in the endzone to make it 1-2. Our D team came out strong and fired up as we tried to tie the game, but inability to convert on D-team offense hurt us. Once again, we managed to create turnovers, but eventually New England was able to break us down and score. The next point, Jesse threw a loopy forehand to me on what was basically an upline cut in a 2v2 situation, but the disc hung and I fought through fouls by two players to layout between them and catch the disc toeing the back endzone line. I got up excited and angry, punched the disc away in celebration, and roused our sidelines.
Unfortunately, this is when New England threw their zone. It went quickly from a 3-2 game to an 8-3 game, as they began to pull away. Until this point, we had been stopping their offense with our straight-up marks and fronting defense, and our offense had started to judge the wind and stop dropping the disc. However, their zone took us by surprise and stupid decisions led to our downfall. At halftime we talked about breaking the zone and came out a lot stronger. We started trading again, and even got in some breaks. Nobody on their team stood out besides Alex Kapinos, and Zander and I took turns containing him while other players prevented hucks to him. He was the only player we faced all tournament that I felt was impossible to shut down on defense - he could only be contained, unlike every other player we played against. He proved his worth even on defense, when he caught his own point block for a Callahan, stopping our run and putting them on top 10-6. It was the second Callahan we threw in that game, and it really took the wind out of our sails.
Still, we managed to break their zone several times in the second half, and on defense we could still force them to turn it over. It was a disappointing loss, because had the conditions been better or their zone had been taken out the equation, I had no doubt that we would have been able to beat them. But unfortunately, their zone proved too much for us to handle, and in the windy conditions our overhead throws struggled or weren't even attempted. Some of the bright spots included the defense of Jake Rainwater, whose long arms and surprising speed created a lot of D's, and Alex Kinsey's smooth handling in the zone. We moved on, tired, to Derek Gottlieb-coached Denver, the 3rd seed whose first game had been an easy romp over Madison.
We started this game lackluster and uninterested, once again going down 2-0 and 5-2. Fortunately, Denver's offense was predicated on hucks to their tall, athletic receivers, but once we managed to clamp down on the marks, the hucks stopped and our quicker defenders were able to stifle the in-cuts downfield. After trading to 7-5, we scored 4 straight to take half, then go up 9-7. Then it was our turn to collapse, as Zander threw his second Callahan of the day, their deep pulls continued to pin us back, and nervous throws and a lack of cuts sent them on their own 4-0 run to go up 11-9. But calm and collected, we stormed back with yet another 4-0 run, inspired by strong downfield defense that frustrated handlers into forcing hucks against our marks that all ended up either far beyond the arms of the receivers, or in our defenders' grasp.
Receiving at 13-12, Josh hucked to me and I almost killed myself with a futile layout into Will Deaver and a golf cart, but I slowed up and saw that the disc was well out the back of the endzone. We got the disc back quickly enough, I picked up, and saw Zander curling around the breakside towards the openside back corner of the endzone. I threw the backhand, hoping that the winds that pushed Josh's huck out the back wouldn't do the same to my throw, and Zander reeled in the throw 50 yards away in the back corner of the endzone in front of two defenders, with a couple feet to spare. The last two points were turnover free, and we closed out the game 15-13 for the upset win.
Denver was a team that relied a lot on their handlers and big receivers going away from the disc. We were able to limit the damage their handlers could do with give and gos and upfield resets, while taking away the deep options with our marks and shutting down in-cuts with our legs. Standout players on Denver were handlers #8 and #12, along with #10 who was their go-to guy downfield. He came up huge on a lot of early grabs, although we thankfully managed to limit his damage later on. We did have two ridiculous plays of our own - Jesse hucked backhand around a forehand forcing mark, throwing a bullet to the breakside of the endzone, which Stephen tracked down, utterly roasting his defender. And earlier, Jake Rainwater annihilated his defender on a jump ball just outside the endzone, for his first real sky of the weekend. We called the play "Make it Rain."
Our final pool play game was against 0-2 Madison, who had just come off of a 15-7 loss to New England. We started strong for once, and we took half 8-5, finishing the game 15-9. Madison, like Denver, loved to huck. But unlike Denver, they had a massive disconnect between their handlers and receivers. Their handlers would huck whenever they got the disc, regardless of whether or not the cuts were there, and the receivers were usually well-covered and indecisive cutters. Except for one receiver, #14, they never had anyone on the receiving end of the countless hucks they tried to unleash on our straight-up marks. The game passed pretty uneventfully, as we worked the disc on the breakside easily on offense, and on defense we didn't have to work for turns, they gifted them to us.
That left us 2-1, in second place in our pool, awaiting the winner of the Minnesota-Cincinnati game from Pool A. We had a bye now, and I chose to go over to the Atlanta-Philly mixed game, a preview of the finals. It was an exciting and back-and-forth game, but hard cap put a damper on Philly as they fell 12-9 to a strong Atlanta team. But drops looked like Philly's main problem, and if they could cut those out then they would be even with Atlanta. Eddie Peters had some great D's on Ollie, and the teams looked pretty close.
Afterwards was "dinner at the fields," which turned out to be nothing more than salad, cheese, and two half-slices of pizza while watching a slideshow. After we ate our free food, our team just got up and left; there was no reason to be in there. Interestingly enough, I was the only shirtless person in the room. We quickly returned to the hotel, where we showered and waterparked. The hot tub felt amazing, as did the lazy river. Fun times, and we headed back to the hotel restaurant for a late-night meal, since the dinner we'd been provided was not sufficient. Soup and salad at the hotel bar and grill was delicious. I wish we had one of these places everywhere we went. Wow. In bed by 11, we had to get up at 6:15 because our games started at 8:30 the next morning.
When we made our way down to the hotel lobby, we had a table set up with bagels, croissants, bananas, etc. for us to munch on as we waited for everyone to come down. The day before, when some people went to Mall of America I asked for them to pick me up some long green socks to match our uniforms. Well, there was a much-anticipated presenting of the socks, and it turns out that I got fuzzy green frog socks. The foot was basically a frog sticking its tongue out. Cute, comfortable, and completely unexpected. I wore them and played great. They even had little grips on the bottom!
Our quarterfinal matchup was against Minnesota, a team that had been shellacked by Seattle and Pittsburgh the day before. We came out strong and started to do the same. Our man defense and offense took us up 5-2 before long. There was a hell point that we won mainly as a result of our defense forcing turnovers closer and closer to their endzone, since they absolutely could not work the disc on our defense. Fred Tsai and Jake Rainwater got D after D, and Freddy even scored two of our first 4 goals. Ben Feldman was consistently D'ed up by Zander, and if not, he would throw the disc away right afterwards. After my huck was just out of reach of three of our players, I got a layout D right outside the endzone. It was my first baited layout D in a while - I hadn't quite gotten the hang of it in college, and most of my tournament so far was focused on completely denying my man the disc. A few points later we scored twice, as our first goal, a huck from Freddy to Bo was called back on a travel. Right afterwards, Josh hucked to Jake, but Brian Li spoiled the party as he skied both Jake and Jake's defender and put us up 5-2. Minnesota went into a huck and set zone D right after receiving the pull. Our D line was caught by surprise and turned it over quickly, but we worked it on their man defense again to go up 6-3.
This was the turning point in the game, when Minnesota threw their four-man cup and absolutely shut us down. We started moving the disc well enough, but silly drops and turnovers brought it quickly to 6-5. With the heavy crosswind, they trapped us on the sideline where any hammers or overheads were directly into the wind, and we couldn't cope. Our handler give and gos weren't gaining us any yards, and the downfield poppers and wings were not getting us anything. At 6-5 we turned it over after working the entire field, and again at 6-6. At 6-7, we started moving the disc better, but all it took was one throw to put us on defense and them just outside our endzone. After a D, one of their players laid out to get the second-effort in the back of the endzone, for them to take half.
Coming out in the second half was more of the same - although there were turnovers both at our own endzone and theirs, we could never punch it in, no matter how many times we stopped them from scoring. At 8-6 we dropped a hammer in the endzone. Up 9-6 Minnesota called a timeout, and during the timeout we discovered that hard cap would go on in 5 minutes. Throughout the whole game they'd been taking a lot of time between points, which resulted in me yelling "90 seconds" to them a whole lot and then my team yelling at me to stop being an asshole. But when it came down to it, I was right and they were wrong. After Minnesota took forever on the timeout, they scored and we received at 10-6. Our strategy was reminiscent of wildwood - go for the two-pointer, aka big huck. My throw to Zander was just out of his reach, but our man defense forced a turnover close to their goalline and we scored quickly. Hard cap could only have been minutes away. We pulled, went down, got the D, and hard cap went on. Demoralized, we turned it over, before playing good defense again and I threw the game-ending goal to Zander for us to lose 10-8.
It was a real heartbreaker. With our man defense and man offense, we outscored Minnesota 7-2 in that game. Unfortunately, we could only score once on their zone defense. That was the difference. The crosswinds stopped the majority of our crossfield hammers and overhead throws, leaving us with swings and quick handler motion that they could stop as they flooded the middle of the field. I really, really wanted to play in the semifinals against Seattle. This game was especially brutal because when we finally did break their zone, we scored again but didn't have time to complete our comeback. It's games like these where I wish we had observers or timekeepers or something to keep timeouts short and limit the time between points to 90 seconds. I have no doubt that we could have had 15-20 minutes or 4 or 5 more points in that game.
That led us into another game against Madison, 15-1 losers against Seattle. We started off strong, going up a couple of breaks, but our defense was extremely lackluster. Our marks were terrible, and we gave up too many hucks to open receivers. Despite being up 12-8, we found ourselves receiving on universe point, which we scored without any turnovers. The Madison team played as we expected them to, basically the same as they did when we beat them 15-9. But we did not come out sharp at all, and we almost paid for it. I don't remember much from that game, besides our terrible marks and equally terrible decisions on offense. I think this was the game where I basically threw a blade to Freddy, who made an amazing catch about ten yards out of the endzone. As soon as he caught it, I walked off of the field and hid behind a trashcan. He threw to Zander for the goal, and my defender was puzzled, I'm sure. We faced Denver again next, who wanted to play a shortened game. We agreed to play to 9.
This game was never in any question. We came out harder and actually focused, and Denver played like we did in the last game. They turned the disc over a lot and made poor decisions, while we played hard defense and played reasonably good offense. I had a few turnovers in this game before Nunez reminded me to play simple, and I started to move the disc faster and smarter. We had one point where all seven of us on the field touched the disc that was probably our smoothest offensive point of the tournament. We closed out this game 9-4, and it was an amicable, good-spirited game that gave us plenty of time to decide what we wanted to do after we finished.
Half of us decided to stay and watch the finals, which unfortunately were happening at the same time. I started out watching the open finals, but after a few boring points typical of a finals game, I decided to head over to watch the mixed and girls finals. I did manage to catch Alex Kapinos being an absolute beast, but New England was still losing. On the girls side, Seattle jumped out to a quick 6-2 lead. I'm convinced that if Oregon had started sooner, they would have been able to win the game. As it was, they closed to within 9-7 but no further, as they ended up losing 14-10. Seattle tore through Oregon's zone early on, and I wonder if that was the ultimate difference.
The mixed final was where the action was. As I got there, Philly took a 6-4 lead that continued to 7-5. For one of the goals, Aman took Grant deep and skied him for the goal - that was a familiar sight for the Philly and NJ players, but not the Paideia sidelines! Then Noah pulled a fast, bladey backhand that one of the Atlanta girls dropped. Afterwards, we found out that we both called a drop if Atlanta had a girl catch it. Noah told Grant that he was going to break him for the goal, then proceeded to throw the around backhand to Justin Principi to take half 8-5. But Atlanta was a changed team after the half, as they methodically worked the disc down the field and opened the game up with hard defense and big hucks.
It didn't hurt that Philly started trying to huck to their girls - I counted three overthrown or misread hucks to girls that looked perfect on the release, as well as one huck from a girl that tailed out of bounds. Atlanta took advantage, at tied at 9-9, Mark Dundala tried to lead Noah into space on a dump throw that got picked up in the wind, and Grant skied Noah for the Callahan for Atlanta to go up 10-9. After the previously mentioned girl huck that tailed out of bounds, Atlanta went up 11-9 before Philly could stop the bleeding. They almost got a break when Scotty came off his man to get a poach D on a girl, but the disc floated more than he anticipated and he could only lightly tip the disc, not enough to get it away from George, who was waiting patiently behind him. Atlanta, 11-9.
During that point, incidentally, I saw/heard some of the nastiest and really uncalled for comments by some Paideia parents. When Noah made a clean bid on Michael Terry (nearly getting the D), his momentum caused him to roll on the ground afterwards, coming up on Terry's ankle/achilles from behind. Mike Terry crumpled to the ground and had to take an injury after this accidental and freak injury. But the Paideia parents accused Noah of trying to injure him, saying that he'd been making reckless and unspirited bids all game, which was just a ridiculous claim. First of all, Michael Terry had taken injury subs earlier in the game after no contact with Philly players, meaning he was nowhere near 100%, and also, Noah's bid was completely clean, as were all of his during that game. It wasn't a no-chance bid where he landed in his knees from behind, it was a legitimate bid where he bumped him from behind after rolling on the ground. Rob Olson and I got loud and obstinate defending Noah at that point.
After the goal, Philly finally managed to punch it in, after working the disc cleanly and calmly down the field. But they couldn't manage to break Atlanta, no matter how hard they tried. By this point, Atlanta was playing George, Grant, Ollie, and Allen Jarvis, trying to prevent the break as much as possible. In fact, Atlanta's next three goals were all thrown to girls - Sophie, Paula, and Lane for the win. Lane's goal was a really nice layout grab at the front cone of the endzone to end the game - if she hadn't made that catch, the game would have almost certainly gone to universe point. All in all, it was a great game that I loved to watch as a fan, not just because I knew 75% of the players on both teams.
We saw Ben Swerdlow pick up yet another individual spirit award, and somehow New England got the team spirit award with a perfect 5. Stephen and I wanted Ben to give them a 3 or 4 after our game, but Ben gave them a 5 anyway, robbing Cincinnati of their deserved glory. Oh well. I'm just wondering what Pittsburgh did to have a 3.5, even lower than our 3.83. Back at the hotel, we enjoyed a dinner made up almost entirely of half-price appetizers. We were sitting nearby the Philly guys and had some nice conversation and banter - they're really my favorite team/area, probably because we play the game the same way - take no prisoners defense and hard, gritty play.
Later, when we tried to get back to the restaurant for half-price desserts, we found out that the kitchen was closed (oh no!), so we walked to Wendy's after some SEPDA kids to get some Frostys. After yet another walking through the drive through adventure, we had our delicious treats. Back at the hotel, I spent about an hour or 90 minutes hanging out with SEPDA and a few North Hills kids (who never actually did come inside the room) before heading to bed before our 5 am departure. Thankfully I packed before bed, unlike Brian Walter, who held the whole team up in the morning. But it didn't matter, as we got to the gate right as the plane started boarding - perfect timing!
My next post will be more of a reflection than a summary of YCC's, and if I'm feeling ambitious I might even write about what it feels like to play in my last-ever juniors tournament. *sigh*
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Nucci's Cup
Nucci's Cup was a 10-team tournament hosted by Roots of Rhythm at the Mercer County Ultimate Disc League (MCUDL) fields this past weekend. Teams in attendance ranged from Boston Invite surprise New Noise and WUCC Masters silver medalists OLDSAG to our NJ YCC team and the last-minute fill-ins Pennsbury Peyote 07-08 (after Gunslingers dropped). But, as is typical for a midseason club tournament, results were inconsistent and teams were still finding out what they were made of and how they would stack up in the series. There were two masters teams from the Mid Atlantic region, four mid-level open teams from the Mid Atlantic, two open teams from the Northeast, our YCC team, and Pennsbury. New Noise came in as the obvious favorite, having come within a single point of unseating Pike in Boston and dismantling HOV (the 3-seed) 15-3 after avenging a 12-13 loss.
Our day started with a game against OLDSAG, and most players on the team had never played against a Masters team. They're surprisingly fast and good in the air, and they move the disc extremely well on the break side. But with that being said, we struggled a lot in this game because it was our first game together as a team, not because we were overmatched. We traded with them when they played man defense, but their switch to zone, while not unexpected, caught us off-guard. It was our first exposure to zone as a team, and different experiences and strategies clashed as we had far too many silly drops and turnovers. But we worked on it, and by the end of the game we had forced them back into a man defense and reduced turnovers again. Unfortunately, the D line was only able to get one break on OLDSAG, as a lack of team cohesion betrayed us on that side of the disc as well. We ended the game down 15-9, but with the realization that we could beat this team given another couple days of practice or tournament play.
We followed up with a bye, and then a nice long Stanford warmup to get the muscles loose before our game against HOV. We came into this game strong as well, and I felt great. I threw the first two assists, and then again we fell victim to turnovers. A lot of these were just miscommunications between where throwers wanted cutters to cut and where they were actually cutting. We called a timeout down 5-2 and then picked it up again, trading out to half 8-5. The second half was very encouraging from a defensive perspective, as we finally started to get more D's. We still had problems working the disc as a D team, but as the game went on we started to convert a few breaks. The offense was also flowing well - we had several points where nobody held the disc for longer than 4 seconds. I had two completed hucks off of upline dump cuts that helped energize me and the team - after the first one I jumped up in the air, had a few fist pumps, and yelled "BAM! BAM! BAM!" Number 33 on HOV congratulated me after the throw and after each time I broke him that game - it was kind of weird but nice of him. Also, they had a guy who did not throw backhands. Scoobers and forehands only. It was kind of funny, but also frustrating when the mark didn't catch on. Unfortunately, our comeback was stifled by hard cap, and we were in the unenviable position of scoring the last point and still losing, 14-11.
We then faced DC Funk, a DC Masters team that was not as fast or athletic as OLDSAG, and we came out confident after our performance against HOV and proceeded to roast both them and their zone. Our D line was coming off of several breaks against HOV and used that momentum to help us go up 8-5 at the half. And to our credit, we were actually getting D's and forcing turnovers, not just waiting for the old people to drop the disc. We finished the game out capped, 13-9, after several injury timeouts for our tired and cramping players. It was over 95 degrees by this point, sweltering heat and we kept running low on gatorade and water. I think that I personally went through a gallon and a half of water during the game, and maybe half as much gatorade. One guy on their team even came over and handed us powerbar gel shots and electrolyte pills to help prevent cramping. Even Masters teams can be friendly!
Our last game of the day was against Roots of Rhythm, which was basically a Pennsbury alumni team with a few other players tacked on. Some of our team had experience playing (and beating) Pennsbury last year, and the game started off well for us. I felt confident and strong again, and I was getting open at will as a downfield cutter. But somewhere towards the middle of the first half, I just had a meltdown. I started throwing more and more lefty throws and push passes, held onto the disc too long, and even turfed a routine swing. That was right after I was about to be stalled and threw (and was fouled on) an IO lefty backhand that was caught for what would have been a callahan. I was a mess, and not until the last five or so points did I manage to pick my game up. The rest of the team was not much better, at least on offense. The D team did manage to continue to rack up D's and convert at a solid rate. We lost this game 13-7, and I was disgusted with myself and how I played. I was definitely feeling the effects of the heat, and I even cramped up on the field and refused to take an injury sub until one of our other players kept yelling at me to "come off if you're hurt!"
So after day one we were 1-3, with flashes of brilliance and smooth flow, and erratic play still lurking in the background. The D team was steadily improving, though, but still had to do a better job converting. We left the fields at 8 pm, and had to be back in 12 hours to warm up for our 9 am prequarters game against Pennsbury, the only the team in the tournament younger than us.
We started the game a little late, but we'd been at the fields warming up for long enough to be ready and pumped to play. We jumped out to an early lead, but then we took our foot off the gas. We found ourselves only up 6-5, and after working the disc the length of the field, we turned it over on the goal line, only to get the goal after a Callahan - our second of the game and my first ever in tournament play. Needless to say, I was excited, especially after just failing to catch my layout D in the endzone against DC Funk the day before. My exuberant punch spike was purely celebratory. I promise. We took half 8-6, then traded to 10-8 before we really turned it on. We started to get our offensive flow and our deep game going, and we went on a 5-1 run to close out the game 15-9. Next year's Pennsbury team will still be good, but I don't think they'll repeat as state or Easterns champions. They have their formidable deep game but a lot of inexperienced players. But they will have been strengthened by playing in this tournament against good club teams.
Our last game of the weekend was our quarterfinal matchup against #1 seed New Noise (sorry to ruin the suspense) and BUDA YCC coach Micah Flynn. Before the game, the players huddled together without the coaches to set goals for the game - on defense, take away their good huck looks and easy dumps, and on offense, move the disc quickly and get the handlers involved. New Noise came out firing, but we forced them into a turnover on the first point. We couldn't convert, however, and they came back with a huge hammer break us open and take the first point. Then they came down in a zone, and we worked the disc until a drop set us back, and then they scored on a hammer. We worked the zone better next time, and my own hammer into the wind was pulled down in the endzone as we clawed one back. But then New Noise kept pressing us, and we kept making silly mistakes. Down 5-2, we called a timeout and Zander addressed the team. "Stop respecting them!" was the message, and we came out firing.
We stopped holding onto the disc so long, moved the disc quickly, and started to shred their zone. They tried to stop us with man defense, but we broke the mark well and opened up the game with hucks and quick flow. And on defense, we forced more and more turnovers, including some layout D's and sky D's on hucks into the endzone. In the end, we fell 15-10, but we managed to get several breaks on them, force them out of their zone defense, and move the disc extremely well towards the end of the game. Things are looking up for YCC's - losing 15-10 and 14-11 to the two finalists is respectable, and I have no doubt that both games were winnable had we been playing together longer than two practices and a tournament. Plus, we were missing players both Saturday and Sunday, due to injury and work, and having them back for YCC's will have a big impact.
9:00 am. Field 3. We'll be there.
Our day started with a game against OLDSAG, and most players on the team had never played against a Masters team. They're surprisingly fast and good in the air, and they move the disc extremely well on the break side. But with that being said, we struggled a lot in this game because it was our first game together as a team, not because we were overmatched. We traded with them when they played man defense, but their switch to zone, while not unexpected, caught us off-guard. It was our first exposure to zone as a team, and different experiences and strategies clashed as we had far too many silly drops and turnovers. But we worked on it, and by the end of the game we had forced them back into a man defense and reduced turnovers again. Unfortunately, the D line was only able to get one break on OLDSAG, as a lack of team cohesion betrayed us on that side of the disc as well. We ended the game down 15-9, but with the realization that we could beat this team given another couple days of practice or tournament play.
We followed up with a bye, and then a nice long Stanford warmup to get the muscles loose before our game against HOV. We came into this game strong as well, and I felt great. I threw the first two assists, and then again we fell victim to turnovers. A lot of these were just miscommunications between where throwers wanted cutters to cut and where they were actually cutting. We called a timeout down 5-2 and then picked it up again, trading out to half 8-5. The second half was very encouraging from a defensive perspective, as we finally started to get more D's. We still had problems working the disc as a D team, but as the game went on we started to convert a few breaks. The offense was also flowing well - we had several points where nobody held the disc for longer than 4 seconds. I had two completed hucks off of upline dump cuts that helped energize me and the team - after the first one I jumped up in the air, had a few fist pumps, and yelled "BAM! BAM! BAM!" Number 33 on HOV congratulated me after the throw and after each time I broke him that game - it was kind of weird but nice of him. Also, they had a guy who did not throw backhands. Scoobers and forehands only. It was kind of funny, but also frustrating when the mark didn't catch on. Unfortunately, our comeback was stifled by hard cap, and we were in the unenviable position of scoring the last point and still losing, 14-11.
We then faced DC Funk, a DC Masters team that was not as fast or athletic as OLDSAG, and we came out confident after our performance against HOV and proceeded to roast both them and their zone. Our D line was coming off of several breaks against HOV and used that momentum to help us go up 8-5 at the half. And to our credit, we were actually getting D's and forcing turnovers, not just waiting for the old people to drop the disc. We finished the game out capped, 13-9, after several injury timeouts for our tired and cramping players. It was over 95 degrees by this point, sweltering heat and we kept running low on gatorade and water. I think that I personally went through a gallon and a half of water during the game, and maybe half as much gatorade. One guy on their team even came over and handed us powerbar gel shots and electrolyte pills to help prevent cramping. Even Masters teams can be friendly!
Our last game of the day was against Roots of Rhythm, which was basically a Pennsbury alumni team with a few other players tacked on. Some of our team had experience playing (and beating) Pennsbury last year, and the game started off well for us. I felt confident and strong again, and I was getting open at will as a downfield cutter. But somewhere towards the middle of the first half, I just had a meltdown. I started throwing more and more lefty throws and push passes, held onto the disc too long, and even turfed a routine swing. That was right after I was about to be stalled and threw (and was fouled on) an IO lefty backhand that was caught for what would have been a callahan. I was a mess, and not until the last five or so points did I manage to pick my game up. The rest of the team was not much better, at least on offense. The D team did manage to continue to rack up D's and convert at a solid rate. We lost this game 13-7, and I was disgusted with myself and how I played. I was definitely feeling the effects of the heat, and I even cramped up on the field and refused to take an injury sub until one of our other players kept yelling at me to "come off if you're hurt!"
So after day one we were 1-3, with flashes of brilliance and smooth flow, and erratic play still lurking in the background. The D team was steadily improving, though, but still had to do a better job converting. We left the fields at 8 pm, and had to be back in 12 hours to warm up for our 9 am prequarters game against Pennsbury, the only the team in the tournament younger than us.
We started the game a little late, but we'd been at the fields warming up for long enough to be ready and pumped to play. We jumped out to an early lead, but then we took our foot off the gas. We found ourselves only up 6-5, and after working the disc the length of the field, we turned it over on the goal line, only to get the goal after a Callahan - our second of the game and my first ever in tournament play. Needless to say, I was excited, especially after just failing to catch my layout D in the endzone against DC Funk the day before. My exuberant punch spike was purely celebratory. I promise. We took half 8-6, then traded to 10-8 before we really turned it on. We started to get our offensive flow and our deep game going, and we went on a 5-1 run to close out the game 15-9. Next year's Pennsbury team will still be good, but I don't think they'll repeat as state or Easterns champions. They have their formidable deep game but a lot of inexperienced players. But they will have been strengthened by playing in this tournament against good club teams.
Our last game of the weekend was our quarterfinal matchup against #1 seed New Noise (sorry to ruin the suspense) and BUDA YCC coach Micah Flynn. Before the game, the players huddled together without the coaches to set goals for the game - on defense, take away their good huck looks and easy dumps, and on offense, move the disc quickly and get the handlers involved. New Noise came out firing, but we forced them into a turnover on the first point. We couldn't convert, however, and they came back with a huge hammer break us open and take the first point. Then they came down in a zone, and we worked the disc until a drop set us back, and then they scored on a hammer. We worked the zone better next time, and my own hammer into the wind was pulled down in the endzone as we clawed one back. But then New Noise kept pressing us, and we kept making silly mistakes. Down 5-2, we called a timeout and Zander addressed the team. "Stop respecting them!" was the message, and we came out firing.
We stopped holding onto the disc so long, moved the disc quickly, and started to shred their zone. They tried to stop us with man defense, but we broke the mark well and opened up the game with hucks and quick flow. And on defense, we forced more and more turnovers, including some layout D's and sky D's on hucks into the endzone. In the end, we fell 15-10, but we managed to get several breaks on them, force them out of their zone defense, and move the disc extremely well towards the end of the game. Things are looking up for YCC's - losing 15-10 and 14-11 to the two finalists is respectable, and I have no doubt that both games were winnable had we been playing together longer than two practices and a tournament. Plus, we were missing players both Saturday and Sunday, due to injury and work, and having them back for YCC's will have a big impact.
9:00 am. Field 3. We'll be there.
Friday, August 3, 2007
"Wildwood Night/Day 2" OR "We hate guidos"
After a much-needed and really delicious boardwalk dinner, most of our team decided to return to the hotel, forsaking the beer garden and beach party. Partly because half the team was underage, and partly because, well, our team doesn't exactly get along with other teams that well. Especially Evan. "I used to think that all CHS players were jerks, but then I found out it was just him." So we kept to ourselves at the hotel for the beginning of the night, planning a late-night raid on the boardwalk and the Bolero.The night started off slowly, but quickly rose to a crescendo as more and more epic games of beer pong were staged on the room's only table, culminating in a ridiculous 10 cups to 2 comeback after guaranteeing victory. After the miraculous win, one glorious victor called the White Castle Hotline to share his accomplishment, while a mortified loser hid himself in the closet in shame. "How does it feel to know that I just won the GREATEST beer pong game of ALL time!?" the legendary Golden Stick Wiffleball league future Cy Young candidate shouted into the phone at the bewildered and bored White Castle Girl. "What?" "I just won the GREATEST game of beer pong EVER!" he repeated. "Do you have a comment about burgers?" she asked, both annoyed and amused. Puzzled for a second, he regains his composure and ends the conversation, "Yeah! I was eating burgers while doing it. While winning the greatest GAME of all TIME!"
Meanwhile, with this in the background, I'm watching the replay of the Tour de France time trial that I'd seen earlier in the day. They were highlighting the ride of Vladimir Karpets, who was about two kilometers from the finish. I said, to no one in particular, "1:04:40," which I remembered was his time. Our esteemed captain, Ed Frowley, heard me and squinted at the TV before saying in return "1:04:47 - wanna bet a shot on it?" I laughed and said yes, then laughed again as Karpets came in at exactly 1:04:40 and Ed was astonished. Jake saw what was going on, and realized that I'd seen it earlier in the afternoon, and when I went to the bathroom he asked me for confirmation on the final time of Yaroslav Popovych and did Ed in double.
I didn't see Ed for the rest of the night after that, until I came back to the hotel to sleep around 1:30. It turns out that Jake and I had just contributed to the night of his life, during which he had apparently bought many rounds for people at the Bolero bar, and then proceeded to make out with Frank from Slow White, who we had seen puking on the side of the field during his first game only 12 hours before (left). "I made out with Frank, and I liked it!" Ed could be heard telling everyone the next day. Bravo Ed, bravo.But the night's revelry would not end there. Evan, everyone's favorite houseguest, decided to christen the room by pissing in the suite's kitchen sink, through a plastic dishrack. There's photo evidence of that too, but let's leave that on facebook. I'll consider it part of Evan's revenge on Wildwood after losing his wallet somewhere on the beach during his Friday night frolicking/mayhem. At this point we all realized that true fun was to be found on the boardwalk, and in Jake and Zander's case, trashy beach girls. Woohoo! The two of them bonded over their singular goal: "We're going to rump tonight!"
It was always going to be a case of Zander breaking the ice and Jake coming in to make or break the deal. There were plenty of young and willing pairs of girls wandering the boardwalk - Zander's first approach was to a pair of Irish lasses meandering down the boardwalk, casting furtive glances at people they passed. His wonderfully original and surprisingly effective pickup line was simple: "Are you walking? Walking for boys?" They were indeed walking for boys, and he struck up a conversation, and Jake soon joined in. But as soon as they started, they quickly pulled the plug. Apparently they still had standards, and there were plenty of fillies in this stable.
Their next target was two girls sitting on a bench, just talking, but also eying people coming down the boardwalk. They were amenable to Zander, and once again Jake swooped in, regaling
them with tales of something, unfortunately not wiffleball. After some convincing (it didn't take much), they walked back together to our hotel room. When they arrived, they found Evan, ostensibly still clothed, along with Stephen and Jonah (see top picture). Jonah immediately zeroed in on the girls and made belligerent conversation through his missing front tooth and cheeky boyish grin. He dubbed the girls Caitlin and Laura, after girls from Columbia that he thought the two pickups resembled. They chatted for a little while, before Stephen and Jonah left, soon to meet up with me, and Evan ... well, who knows. Zander and Jake moved in on the girls, and Zander's consistent encouraging line was simply, "Don't be a sourpuss! (photo)"I met up with Stephen and Jonah outside of the Bolero, the tournament hotel, party spot, and their hotel for the weekend. While out there I ran into a staggering Zach Wyatt, and we tried to talk a little bit about Hawaii, but it was all lost in the haze. Who else was out there? Ben Sprung, a college national champion with Brown, said hi to his little brother and the rest of us, and I think we even ran into Jon Lin right after he was unceremoniously kicked out of our lovely hotel. Apparently he was banging on cars in the parking lot and got into an altercation with the manager. Typically mild-mannered Jon began insulting the manager, guessing that he never went to college (and was proved right!) and yelling at him that he made two times, three times, five times, even a *thousand* times more money than the hotel manager! That was the last straw for the manager, who loved everyone else but told us in no uncertain terms that "that Oriental kid is not welcome in my hotel! I want him out!"
After a quick jaunt inside the Bolero, I went to wander the boardwalk with Stephen and Jonah. We picked up a delicious funnel cake and then immediately saw "Caitlin" and "Laura" on the boardwalk with two random guidos. Jonah yells out "Caitlin!" and runs over, the first question that spills out of his mouth is, "How far did you get with Zander???" Calm and smooth, as though we were her best girlfriends, she answered him with, "Well, we were making out and he took my top off, but then he broke my button and I left." Very impressive, Jonah. We talked to them a little longer, and even learned that their real names were Sammie (sp?) and Erin. The two guidos with them looked kind of shocked and didn't say a word during the whole conversation. We even found out that the girls were from Maryland, and in the crazy small world we live in, it turns out that Erin goes to the same school that my best friend Kelly went to and knows her little brother! Also, they were 16, which is fine for Zander but cradle-robbing for Jake.
This is enough excitement for the night for me, and I end up in bed around 1:30 or 2, sound asleep until I'm rudely awakened by Benny and Ed around 8:40. I look around and see that the entire hotel room is trashed. It looks absolutely awful. There are cans and bottles everywhere, furniture and bags and clothes strewn across the rooms, and our styrofoam cooler sprung a leak, so two couch cushions and a bedspread were sitting in a puddle of water on the floor. As we managed to slowly rouse everyone else, I spent a lot of time trying to at least make the room presentable to the maid. I think it was fairly successful, and Ed and I talked with the manager, who graciously offered us two rooms to shower in after we finished playing. Two! At no extra charge! He also offered to sponsor our Wildwood team for next year, although we'd probably have to kick Jon Lin off. Ridiculousness!
We finally made it out the fields by 10 in time for our quarters matchup against Loyola (MD) alumni. We had no problem scoring, but we were anemic on defense until the last few points, when we scored seven in a row to take the game 18-11. Too easy! Before our semi I hit the water again, and it was just as refreshing and wonderful. This time I wore my ankle brace in, which was weird but felt fine. After about 20 or 30 minutes in there, I headed out and found most of our team watching and heckling with other CHS alumni on different teams (hi Nunez, hi Kieffer). The two CHS alumni faced off in the semifinals of HS Easterns, with Kieffer-coached Pennsbury knocking off Nunez-coached Columbia on Pennsbury's way to winning it all. Congratulations Darwin! (are you happy now? are you?)
It's also about this time that I found out that Will Watts was brutally attacked by either four black guys or four guidos or three puerto ricans (the story keeps changing, Bilbo!). No matter who did, the circumstances are clear - Muzzleby was stumbling home to the hotel at night in the middle of the street, when a car slows in front of him and someone yells, "Get the fuck out of the road!" Wicks does not take kindly to this, and responds in kind. "Fuck you," he says softly. "I'M HERE!" Needless to say, this does not go over well. One guy jumps out and pulls a knife on Bill Botts, and another guy punches him in the nose and stomach. Bleeding and alone, Wicketts somehow manages to make it back to the hotel where Benny takes care of him.
It was with this night behind him that Billiam won us the right to receive in our semifinal after he soundly defeated the other team's punk shotgun challenger in about 2 seconds to 6. Too easy! Goodnighted. Unfortunately, the rest of our game did not go quite as well. We played them close almost the entire time, until the very end when we once again got faulty time reports from the sideline and decided to go for the two-pointers. We failed, and what was a three and four point game degenerated into a terrible, terrible joke. The other team scored on a leapfrog, we had 40-yard dump passes, I threw a lefty scoober, and the game was just awful, awful ultimate, even by beach standards. The last point was endzone line to endzone line, and ended with me plopping a scoober into Jake's arms from 30 yard, splitting two defenders. Immediately after, both Amandas stormed off in anger and disappointment, as once again Evan managed to split apart the team and alienate every girl who ever talked to him. But only for a while. Because they can't stay away. They just CAN'T.
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