NW Regionals Recap

Long story short: Riot went 4-0 in pool play on Saturday to punch our ticket to Sarasota with an assured bid to the USA Ultimate Club Championships.  On Sunday we faced Fury in the finals, playing for the #1 seed at Nationals, but we were unable to overcome a 4-9 deficit and lost 13-15.  We then had to play the 2/3 placement game against Traffic where we also went down early and couldn't fight our way back out of the hole, losing 11-14.  After two back-to-back years of winning NW Regionals, only to end our season in the semifinals of Nationals, we are determined to take advantage of the opportunity to have had such a test of our team's skills and character with three weeks left to fine tune our game before going to Florida. Full tournament results posted on the Score Reporter.

More details of the weekend are below, but first enjoy this amazing one-minute clip of hilarity and a few pictures from the sidelines at Regionals, courtesy of our new Patagonia team gear.

Our Saturday games were played in our own little world. Literally. Our field was in the corner of the main Skagit River Park fields, surrounded by youth soccer games with not another ultimate game in sight. Not the typical tournament experience, but fine by us. Unfortunately, KK had to take herself out of the line-up this weekend due to a pinched nerve running through her right shoulder and wrist, but we were as close to full strength as we've been since Labor Day. First up was Slackjaw and we started out hot, stringing together a 7-0 half, lead by three Maddy goals. Wonderful to have her back in Seattle from Atlanta for the weekend! Slackjaw snuck two goals into the second half, and the final was 13-2. Next we saw the Oregon women, Further. On the second point of the game, an unfortunate tangle-up resulted in a serious leg injury for Caitlin who was then out for the rest of the tournament. We are all hoping for her speedy recovery and more than ever hate the sight of crutches on our sideline. Further's handlers were able to generate a few nice deep shots for goals, bringing the game as close as 7-3 right out of half, but Riot refused to give up another goal. The highlight of the game was Nora scoring a Callahan after she had just barely missed toeing the line on an OB huck.

After a bye (and a chance to watch some other games at the tournament), we played Zephyr. With a few of our regular handlers out, Gwen stepped up to fill in and help keep the PT balanced. In this game, Riot was especially efficient with the disc and only had a handful of unforced errors. Another 13-3 game in the books. We had prepared for our last pool play game against Zeitgeist as our game-to-go since winning the pool meant an automatic bid to Nationals. As fate would have it, Zeitgeist had lost to Further on DGP so we had essentially already locked up our spot--a fact the captains did not share with the team going in to the game. Instead we welcomed Drew back onto the field for the first time since Labor Day and got fired up with some pre-game perspiration. Each team earned a break in the first part of the game, leaving the match on serve at 3-2, Riot. Then, a series of great D blocks gave us the disc back for the opportunity to pull ahead 7-2. One of the Ds came with a price as Erin's calf seized up and put her on the injured reserve list for the rest of the tournament. This was the only game that weekend where the weather played a factor as the predicted rain finally showed up. With more weather-related turnovers than we'd like, Surge's defensive effort was especially noticeable as she earned 4 blocks in this game, helping us close out a 13-4 victory. Kreilkamp was down right giddy on the cool down lap with her first bid to Nationals secured! Riot is going to Sarasota!

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. It was time for the finals vs Fury for the fourth time of the year. We started on offense, scored, and then got a break by converting a Fury turnover to go up 2-0. Fury answered and then started playing zone. While we quickly broke through the zone, an unforced dump turnover after they had transitioned to person defense gave Fury the disc and they converted to tie the game. The next three points saw other uncharacteristic Riot turnovers against a variety of different zone D looks followed by defense that came up just inches short on our bids, allowing Fury to push their lead to 5-2. Riot stopped the bleeding after Claire found Nora in the endzone and we had a shot to bring the game within one when our 1-3-3 generated a turnover around mid-field. But we turned it over instead and then gave Fury a short field to work with the subsequent point. Trading out the next two points put us down 4-8 going into half-time. Wiping the slate clean, it was time to turn the game around and our zone O finally hit its stride, scoring against the variety of junks and zones that Fury threw in the second half. Riot started out the half on D, and an early Fury turnover gave us a shot at endzone O, but we failed to execute and Fury was able to strike deep to stretch their lead to a 5 point advantage. Our next D line got another shot at a break, but Surge came just inches short of the huck and suffered a minor concussion on the play, removing her from the rest of the game. We kept fighting and finally converted our next defensive chance. Three points later we earned another break with good deep D and Bermi connected with Gwen to bring the game within two. Three points later it was deja vu as we again converted a Fury turnover with a Bermi to Gwen goal. 11-12! Calise's defense generated a turnover and a chance for Riot to tie the game, but a dump set error foiled our chance. The next point our O line had its first turnover of the second half when a swing pass sailed a bit too high, but Shannon got the disc back with a great skying D. She had to take an injury after getting crushed on the play and Drew subbed in to score the goal to Smalls, 12-13. Unfortunately, our D failed to generate another turnover and we traded out the rest of the game to the final score of 13-15. Congrats to Fury for a well-fought game and regaining the NW Regionals trophy. We look forward to playing again in Sarasota!

Fifteen minutes later, the first pull went up in our next game against Traffic to determine 2nd place. With our injured reserve growing to include Kawai and Calise, we were essentially down to 15 players for the match. Riot had bested Traffic 13-5 at Sectionals a few weeks ago and when the Seattle women jumped out to a 2-0 lead the dangerous thought emerged in some Riot players' minds of another lopsided victory. That idea never occurred to Traffic as they answered with no turns and then squeezed a break out of Riot to tie it up. Riot answered then squandered three shots at getting a defensive break the next point, instead settling to trade scores until 4-4. Then Traffic struck and quickly capitalized on Riot turnovers on the next two points, 4-6. Riot's next O line valiantly fought against Traffic's poachy D, but four turnovers (two in the redzone) was not going to get it done and Traffic scored. The half ended when Riot turned over the second pass of the point and Traffic went into halftime up 8-4. Regrouping out of half, Riot earned one break back the first point and had a chance for another right after that, but a drop allowed Traffic to hold onto its 4 point lead. The two teams then traded O points without any turnovers until 7-10 when Bermi got a block and helped Riot close the gap to two points by finding Kreilkamp in the endzone. Riot had a chance at cutting Traffic's lead to one the next point, but a huck was just barely too far for a bidding Smalls to secure. Two points later Riot made good on a block by Keely, as HM quickly hucked the disc to Maddy streaking past the defense. Val earned a D for Riot and a chance to tie, but we couldn't convert as Traffic's deep D proved too much. The soft cap went on, so when Maddy caught another deep pass at 11-12 it was now a game to 14. Traffic responded without a turnover and then struck deep for the game winning goal after a Riot huck sailed too far. Props to Traffic for making good use of coordinated defensive pressure and quick disc movement to take the 2nd place bid out of the NW for the first time in recent history.

As it turned out, Sunday was a rough day for Seattle ultimate as both Sockeye and Underground barely missed advancing through the backdoor brackets. Congrats to all the Seattle players for well-fought seasons; here's to next year being even better. As the lone Seattle representative at Nationals in any of the four divisions, Riot is determined to put in the work polishing our game to be able to perform at our absolute best in Sarasota. Thanks to everyone who came out to support us on the sidelines this past weekend and wish us luck for the journey ahead!

[Sideline photos by Shannon O'Malley; photos from the finals by Scobel Wiggins]