Varsity 2011 Match reports
WOW
Missing some of our regulars to various continents, the women's team was looking a little sparse until some fantastic non-regulars and college players stepped up and joined us for Varsity. The massive squad of 9 met for the first time on Sunday morning and were quickly brought together by the awesomeness of Steph's tie-dye shorts. We set the goal of the indoors game to learn each others' names and to have fun (and score some points along the way). We managed all three, although were lacking slightly in the third. Cambridge had some speed and height on us, which worked in their favor. We played some iso that helped us gain some space and movement, but once we got to the endzone, we had trouble coming down with the disc - something Cambridge didn't struggle with. I don't recall the final scoreline, but I know we had that very important one point. We came out of the game mindful of several things to work on, and optimistic we could at least improve our score by 100% in the outdoor match.
Having mastered our own names, we looked to the outdoors match to continue to have a good time and to give Cambridge more of a game. Cambridge came out strong and scored several points quite swiftly, but we took two points before the half (that's 100% improvement, people!). We really managed to put on the pressure on defense and caused Cambridge to turn the disc over regularly. They had to work for every point and we slowed them down while also scoring more of our own points on offense. Final score was somewhere in the range of 5-11 (±1 on each side). A good time was had by all (I think!) and we clearly improved over the course of the day, and throughout the outdoors match.
Great play by everyone - particularly Solid and patient handling all the way through from Steph Cat's iso play and constant cutting and catching outdoors Awesome cuts and tireless running from Emma and Bristi Great d's and immediate apologies from Georgia Amanda's great break-side cuts and endzone catches Gennet's grabs and patience in finding the dump Bucky's endzone grab with pressure.
Thanks to everyone for playing, and I hope that our newly inducted players come back for more ultimate this spring and next year!
OW2
Indoors: OW2 started the first game of the day as some players were still turning up to the sports hall, but with the aid of a few members of WOW got off to a bright start. We took an early lead, moving the disc around nicely any putting lots of pressure of Cambridge when they had the disc. The score was close all the way through the game, with Cambridge stringing together some nice passes. Some unfortunate drops and panic throws near the end zone resulted in the scores levelling up at 6-6 with about 5 minutes to go. Cambridge managed to take the next point to leave us a point down with 2 minutes to play. However we never gave up, fighting hard to level the game again, but Cambridge successfully managed to run down the clock, and with no cap the game was done with the scores at 7-6 to Cambridge. Nevertheless it was a good performance from a group of players which hadn't played together much before, and hadn't had much experience playing indoors.
Outdoors: OW2 got the outdoor games going feeling fresh after lunch, but we were soon behind by a large margin due to a lot of break throws by Cambridge. The offensive play from OW was looking pretty good, but every turnover was punished by some precise passing and quick movement from Cambridge. With the man-to-man defence not working, we switched to the more zone-like 'Fat Man' setup, which immediately paid dividends. Cambridge struggled to find a way to play through the defence and OW started to get more turnovers in good positions. We managed to get a few more points on the board but with only two subs, we were starting to tire. With Cambridge able to change their entire line every point they eventually started to find ways to get through our defence again, moving the disc around quickly and not allowing us to catch up. This was probably to deciding factor in the game with OW unable to keep up with the pace of Cambridge's play by the end. The final score was 17-3 to Cambridge. Everyone who played put all their effort in so the scoreline was hard to take. Special mention goes to Nick Eng, who was voted MVP by the Cambridge team thanks to his unrelenting pace and athleticism along with some outrageous fakes.
OW
Having had some issues with transport we arrived at the indoor venue on Sunday morning. Having watched the second team and the women have close loses we took to the pitch. We had several points of fluid offense that boded well for the outdoor game but some errors on defense let us down early on. We managed to keep pace with the smaller Cambridge squad and the game went down to the wire, it finished 8-7 in Cambrige's favour after we failed to convert with the disc in the last 10 seconds.
Following some lunch time mack line and the 2nd's and women's games we begun or match with the aim of repeating last years success. We started by taking the first few points quickly with smooth offense and tight defense but Cambridge recovered and the game became very close. We went into half time up by one point (9-8) and starting the second half on defense. We proceeded to take the next point to go up by 2. The time ran out at 10-9 and we scored that point to make it 11-9 game to 13. We then traded up to 12-10. Our offense had been struggling late in the stall count in the second half and the final point saw a big huck go up deep into space, gaining posession about 10 yards out of the endzone we called a timeout to set up a play. Moving the disc between the handlers we got the disc to the middle of the pitch with a neat stack in the endzone. The game ended with a hammer to the break side to a cut from Sam Poulson who calmly caught the disc for the win. OW1 victorious for the second year in a row over Cambridge, a feat not achieved since 2004 according to team chronicler Niel Bowerman.
OW1 was: Sam Vile, Philip Garner, Dan Wainwright, Nate Harper, Ben Carroll, Isaac Black, Sam Paulson, Neil Davis, Sheldon Edwards, Jake Gofman, Niel Bowerman and Hugo Grimmett.