Sectionals Success

Sectional champs for the 9th time in a row! All the results are posted in the Score Reporter and all 5 teams qualified for NW Regionals.

We hosted a fantasy ultimate contest over the one-day tournament. Many entries’ picks were foiled by a few unexpected absences on the field. Drew and Keely were out all day with a nagging quad injury and illness, while Val, Claire and Rohre each missed games due to missing cleats, a foot injury and a knee injury, respectively. As it turns out, Surge racked up the most fantasy points, earning 14 over the course of our four games. No contest entry picked the combination with the most points: Surge (14), Kawai (13), Calise (12), Bermi (9), Kreilkamp (9), Gags (9), and Gwen (9). The contest winner was Danny Karlinsky with his line of Surge, Kawai, Calise, Gwen, Shannon, Nora, and Alyssa. It was a fun contest to run, thanks to everyone who participated!

Our first game against Underground was off to a good start as the score was 3-0 before we had our first turnover. Only one more turnover in the first half, and lots of great D extended the Riot lead to 7-0. In the second half we didn’t connect on all of our deep looks, and Underground snuck two scores in for a final count of 13-2.

Next up was Zephyr from Vancouver. We started out slowly and despite gaining going up 2-0 we called a time-out to emphasize cleaning up our play. Things got better from there and Riot capitalized on a short field to work with after some of the Zephyr unforced errors. Shannon finished out the half 7-0 after getting a block on the first pass of the game and then cutting for the score. After having to drive back to Seattle to pick up her cleats, Val re-joined the team in the second half and went in to promptly throw two goals. We closed out the game 13-0.

After a long bye, we played the Fryz, a youth team from Seattle. Many of the Fryz players have been coached by Riot at some point or other and it was our team goal to give them our best game possible. After scoring the first two points, we gave up a score when our D was unable to generate a turnover. The whole first half we didn’t have a turnover, hitting all of our hucks and taking care of the disc—even if it meant a spectacular lay-out grab by Bermi on a swing pass. Halftime: 7-1. In the second half, the Fryz scored 3 times—twice after working it the length of the field against junk Ds—and the final score was 13-4. It was impressive to see the talent and poise that these young athletes have already. It was also hilarious to play a slackjaw dance-off game with them afterwards where Alyssa’s moves could not be stopped.

We had been awaiting our game against Traffic ever since we lost to them in the semifinals of Colorado Cup. Unlike our previous back-and-forth affairs, this time it was all Riot. Bermi scored the first point on a huck to Val and then made good use of a Calise D for the next score. After a Traffic error, Riot fast breaked the disc and HM unleashed a beautiful inside-out flick huck to Smalls for a 3-0 lead. Traffic answered, but then Riot got two in a row on hucks to Kawai by Alyssa and Bermi. Traffic put in their O point, but Riot responded by going deep to Surge. Two D blocks on the next point gave Riot a half-time lead of 7-2. In the second half, Traffic played their diamond junk D a bit, but the Riot handlers patiently broke it down. Playing great coverage D and being incredibly efficient after any Traffic turnover didn’t give the Canadians many chances to get back in the game, and the final score was 13-5.

This was now our third tournament victory in a row, a feat not repeated since the storied 2005 Riot season. We still have our work cut out for us with a tournament the following weekend across the country at Virginia Fusion, preparing for the true tests in October.

Sectionals Statistics:

• Record: 4-0
• Points for Riot: 52
• Points against: 11
• Defensive blocks: 24
• Throwing percentage: 91%
• Huck percentage: 29/38 (76%)
• D block leaders: Gags (4), Gwen (4), Surge (3), Kawai (3)
• Goals thrown leaders: Bermi (7), HM (6), KK (5)
• Goals caught leaders: Surge (8), Calise (7), Kawai (6)