1997 NORTHEAST CLUB REGIONALS

The Men's National Championship has been won by a NE team eight straight years. The Women have appeared in eight of the last ten finals. Can they do it again?

Pools for Men's Play were as follows, in order: Pool A: DoG, Red Hook, Small Pox, Aftershock (the Rochester team finally got tired of the name Fuschia Shock) and Burlington. Pool B: WSL All-Stars, Simon Says (Ottawa), Texas, Orange (Toronto) and Amherst. Pool C: Roq (Snapple), Garbage, Mephisto (Montreal), Suspicious Package and Williams. Pool D: Cornell, Red Tide, El Nino, Dos Manos and UMass.

DoG swept their pool, playing lazy at times and allowing teams 5 and 6 points before striding into their groove to close out games they knew they were going to win. WSL All-Stars used their New York intensity to clobber most of the competition in their pool, while Roq had little difficulty cruising through their games, efficiently cleaning up Garbage in the 3 vs. 6 matchup. The D pool experienced some fun though.

Cornell has traditionally been a spoiler at Regionals and has often benefitted from the region's numbers by gathering the third spot to Nationals. Red Tide brought some talent from New York and Boston to Portland in an effort to make a run for the money this year.

The game started with traded points and soon everyone on the sidelines knew it was going down to the wire. An hour later, after a few frosty beers settled my hunger, the game was tied at 11's. Then patiently to 13-12, then Red Tide player Kevin Massey throws the disc away, after a timeout, on the goal line. Cornell picks up the disc with a chance to go up two, when suddenly Massey makes a quick break on the first pass and slaps it away. Red Tide puts it in to tie at 13's, then uses the momentum to force a turnover and send an endzone disc Massey's way, which he snatches for the lead 14-13. One more Cornell turnover was all Red Tide needed, they got it, and closed out the day 4-0, gaining the #4 seed for Sunday's elimination bracket.

Lady Godiva was all business, finishing the day with nary a scare. In the first bracket, Yale beat Throwing Muses 13-8 and then lost to Godiva. Ambush took apart GLU 13-3 and escaped a tough Harmony team 13-10 before facing Godiva in the first semifinal. In the second bracket, #2 seed Stella watched the Valley Girls-Tullulah game, won by Valley Girls, and then beat them to move into the second semifinal. Cornell defeated Portland's Undertow 13-5 and #3 seed Twister shut down Amherst 13-1. This set up a match of last year's National qualifiers that turned surprising when Twister convincingly defeated the Wild Roses by a 12-5 margin, propelling the Boston team into the second semifinal against Ottawa's Stella.

Ambush thought that they could give Lady Godiva a run. But try as they might, the one month-old New York team could only muster 4 points as the Godiva veterans emerged triumphant from their short round of Saturday play. The other semifinal proved to be quite exciting.

Twister was anxious to give Nationals another go, and this game could have done it. They came out strong to take a 7-3 lead. But Stella got into their groove and soon the tables were turned. Only down by a few at half, the Ottawa women turned on the jets and pulled out a tough one to win a well-earned game 13-12 and advance to the finals against Godiva. Amazing.

INTERLUDE

There was no party that I knew of, though that didn't prevent me from playing a hearty round of Cribbage Saturday night. I guess the Canadians have been making inroads in more places than Ultimate, eh?

I would also like to congratulate Ken Dobyns on running both Metro Sectionals and Northeast Regionals without a flaw, single-handidly. There were no arguments, no questions about the rules or caps, the games were on time and the fields lined, the seeding proved accurate and no one whined about anything. Of course, I'm not too sure anyone would be stupid enough to do so. All in all it was a very well-run tournament.

SUNDAY

The weather was perfect for Ultimate both days. Crispy cool, yet sunny at times. It felt like you could run forever. Or at least put down more beers and watch the next game, like me. The Men's pools were whittled down to 8 while the 4 women's teams still in the loser's bracket would fight it out to face the loser of the Godiva-Stella match.

First round, Men's play, was consistent with only one upset. The position that Red Tide earned on Saturday was erased by the tough boys from New York's Garbage. The players on that team don't like to lose to Maine that often. Their intense defense shot them straight out of the gate and into a shocking 8-2 halftime lead. Too much talent waiting to play on the Garbage sideline kept Portland from coming back and the final tally was 14-6.

DoG played traditionally, allowing a 4-4 tie before turning it up a notch to defeat Simon Says 15-5. WSL All-Stars played the upset #16 seed Aftershock who had managed to beat both Red Hook and Small Pox to move into Sunday play. Unfortunately they ran into the home folks and lost 15-2.

Meanwhile, in a preview of events to come, Roq matched up with Cornell to start the day. It must be noted that Roq's uniforms were especially dandy and should be encouraged in all ranks of Ultimate. However, in typical Ultimate sponsorship malaise, they had to pay for them — although they did get half-off. Spiffy sleeve-striped grey and slate-blue shirts with matching black shorts — all provided by the snowboarding clothing company Quiksilver. To reward the good folks at Quiksilver, the team, which already abandoned the cheesy name Snapple and taken up Rock, adjusted the spelling to accomodate the half-sponsors.

Roq runs an open offense with horizontal rather than vertical stacking. This has been alternately referred to as the Stanford Women's offense and "that Swedish crap." Whatever it was, it worked well against Cornell. Opening up a 4-1 lead, the boys from Rhode Island and beyond kept it together against the persistent Buds. Cornell had a chance at 7-10, but two silly turnovers and a patient Roq offense made the score 12-7. The final score was 15-8.

Four teams remained undefeated for the day, with each now invloved in a "game to go" — providing the region garners a third Naitonals spot. DoG faced Garbage and Roq faced members of a team they had upset last year to gain Nationals — the WSL All-Stars.

Garbage played DoG tough, even taking a 4-3 lead before falling behind 8-5 at half. From there the men in yellow outpaced the scrappy Garbage team, scoring 3 points for every 1 Garbage put-in. The final was 14-7.

WSL All-Stars were ready for Roq, and any set offense runs into trouble with the fiery man-to-man defense New York is famous for. WSL pulled away after two key plays by Brett "Sticky" Evans. At 3-2, Evans made a flying block in the short corner to stiff what looked to be a sure goal. WSL capitalised and put in two more for a 5-3 lead. Again Evans came up big when he stuck a questionable huck in the endzone between 3 defenders to deflate the Roq team and take a 6-3 lead. WSL took half 8-4 by roaching Roq's zone and received the pull to start the second half. They scored that one and coasted to a 15-9 final.

The women faced a long road to make the qualifying round. Ambush started the day against the Wild Roses, and although noticeaby weaker, you can never count out a Cornell team. The wind picked up and the points stretched out, but Ambush maintained a 2-point margin before taking half 8-5. From there the New Yorkers' talent was too much and they closed the long game, capped at 13-8.

Twister faced the team from Vermont — Harmony — who played well all weekend. They were not, however, strong enough to compete with the Boston women and Twister advanced to the next round.

Thus Twister and Ambush squared off with the winner getting a shot at Nationals and the loser going home. The teams are intimate with each other as each features former players from the other team. New York has not been able to beat Twister in the last few years, but Ambush was planning on sacking the Boston women this time around.

In a game featuring the zone Ambush managed to use patented forehand hucks to take a commanding lead over Twister at half, 8-4. Twister might have seen the light at the end of the tunnel after Ambush scored the first one of the second half. The intensity dropped and Ambush picked up the victory 15-7 en route to Stella.

Meanwhile, Garbage and Roq were sent down to the loser's bracket, awaiting the winner of the Cornell-Aftershock game and the Red Tide-Simon Says match. Cornell won with little difficulty and Red Tide advanced 15-11.

Garbage's run of good connections finally fell short against the well-oiled Cornell machine. Try as they might, the Buds were simply too consistent and played effectively against the strong man-to-man. They took an 8-4 halftime lead and held on to eliminate the New Yorkers 15-10.

Roq faced Red Tide after getting smothered by WSL. They weren't particularly happy about the loss and took it out on Portland. Opening up a 10-3 lead, they closed at 15-7 to rematch Cornell in the last available "game to go".

Maybe the South will quit clamoring over Collegiate sensation Brian Harriford when they witness Roq's Fortunat Mueller in Sarasota. I think both players are excellent, but they play different games. Harriford is tall and has the quick leaps that can damage a team deep, while "Forch" is short and muscular and plays like a 10-year veteran. His throws and fakes are perfect, his cuts intense and his demeanor unflappable — and he's only a sophomore at Brown University.

Partly because of his youth and even-keeled attitude, Mueller is one of the spiritual leaders of this young Roq team captained by Mike Jones and led by Dan Cogan. They are trying to keep the team together for the futue, but first they have to get by the Buds one more time.

Death or Glory and WSL All-Stars had already concluded the day. The All-Stars ran out of intensity-fuel. When things don't really matter, as the finals game at Regionals never does in this region, they can get distracted. DoG scored the first two quickly, which was the first time yet they opened up strong. The All-Stars didn't play particularly well, and you must play nearly perfect to defeat Boston. Half was 8-5, DoG. Boston closed out behind the play of their big men: Paul Graff, Bob Lobell and the bespectacled fellow in the MIT sweatshirt. The final was 15-8, though it is worth noting that Boston defeated NYNY many times in the final game at Regionals only to watch the New Yorkers win the whole enchilada the following month, and Cojones did the same two years ago but watched as Boston won its second title.

Meanwhile, the women's crucial battle for 2nd and 3rd place was going on between Stella and Ambush. The women did not know if they would receive a third bid to Nationals. The winner of this game was guaranteed a trip to Florida, while the loser recieved one week of nailbiting as punishment.

The teams were well-matched, but Stella's 10 women were all very talented and played tight together. The game started off well for New York as they took a 3-0 lead. But Stella had already experienced that sensation. They rushed back to tie at 6's. Stella's consistent throws enabled them to take half 8-6. The Ottawa women played very well in capturing the next two points at 10-6 before Ambush came at them again, closing to 10-8. Stella stayed calm and put away the Ambush women 15-9 to claim 2nd place.

There was some apprehension after the game. Stella may be the first team from Canada to qualify for Nationals, and in the process took a potential spot from a U.S. team. The region was offically given the third spot this week, thus qualifying Ambush, but had another region received the slot there may have been concern.

The Canadian issue will no doubt come under scrutiny this season, as rumors of the battle for the Northwest have reached the far coast. A former player from that region didn't think that it was a problem, opining that whatever was good for competition was good for the sport, even if it meant a team like Furious George could oust one of the three National-caliber teams in that region. However, a Montreal player commented, "I don't know if I would have voted for it [the referendum]" He pointed out that US teams can't play in Canadian Nationals, held in August.

It will come down to the route Ultimate chooses in the future. In most major sports there is a North American league comprised of teams from Canada and the US. However, this system is based primarily on professional teams, and we aren't to see any money anytime soon. So perhaps a strict U.S. Nationals does make sense. Either way, we should give Ultimate a nice gloss and call "Nationals" the "North American Championships" if we continue to include Canada.

Well, the sky darkened and the clouds starting spitting when the last game of the weekend started. But that didn't matter for Roq and Cornell who only had eyes for sunny Sarasota.

After toasting Ultimate with a round of smoking guns, I sidled up to the sidelines to catch the score, 4-3 Roq. Points were traded to 5-4 when Roq player John Patterson picked up a Cornell turnover and immediately sailed a perfect hammer for the two-point lead. Cornell fired back a couple, but Roq played patiently and scored when they should have, taking half 8-6.

At 10-8 Roq, Forch picked up a turnover on the Cornell goalline and cranked an ill-advised 70 yard backhand into a crosswind that sailed improbably into the hands of the targeted teammate, who flipped it in for the score that surely extinguished the Buds. Cornell kept it close though, and traded points to 13-10. But Roq's sidelines kept up the chant of "boring is good" to push the team onward to patient scores, and they finally won 15-11 for third place at NE Regionals.

Good luck to all.

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