Boston Invitational: SATURDAY
Saturday morning in Boston. Weather was perfect… light crisp air, a bit of cloud cover in an otherwise warm and calm New England morning. As PoNY began to tie the laces, and warm up the throws, the other team took the field, and oddly enough, our bracket of competition looked much like Saturday at Cazenovia—- but PoNY never complains.Pride 15, Pike 8: First up, we played Pike from Philly/Jersey. These guys have had their work cut out for them since day one of the season; with lots of new faces, this young team recognized early its need for new focus and new discipline. They took their many lumps from elite teams at early tournaments in May, and lost to the PoNY in June, 3-13. However, they’ve been on an upward spiral all season long and planned to make a statement at the Boston Invite. They came out with a fast-paced offense, dumping and swinging early to center the disc and began looking immediately to throw the long-ball. Our defense was caught off our heels several times over, unable to make the adjustment in the first half. The Pride’s offense had been working on its chemistry all week long, and was dicing up the field with breakmark throws and speedy cutting, but we were still giving up the disc on occasion, particularly on horizontal cuts across the center of the field. Most notably, if J-Dono (for Pike) wasn’t scoring against us, he was laying out D’s on us, forcing our offensive line to play D and get the disc back. The Pride was lucky to take half at 8-6. We re-grouped at the half, and came out making adjustments. We clamped down on D, increased our sideline chatter, reminded guys to defend the huck, threw out some junk/transition defenses to stifle Pike’s set plays, and the turnovers were soon to follow—giving us the right confidence to work diligently to convert turnovers into scores for the rest of the tournament. The defense was generating enough scores that the offensive line only played three points all second half! PoNY wound up beating Pike Saturday morning, delivering Pike its largest margin of loss for the tourney, 15-8.
Pride 13, Mephisto 8: Secondly, we faced Mephisto, a very solid Canadian team from Montreal. The Pride’s normal tactic of eavesdropping on the opponents’ pre-game huddle was stifled, as this breed of opponent to our amazement recreationally enjoys speaking French! Quickly we were reminded that we faced Mephisto one month prior in Syracuse, and took them down (with quite the fight) 15 to 9. Remember, we came into this game after a strong second half against Pike, and you better believe we we’re determined NOT to give up easy points. Call me a generalist, but many teams north of the US border tend to be long in the air and physical on the mark, forcing us to play a smarter game, requiring us to move the ball to open space and to win points with our legs not our throws. Mephisto managed to rattle our long game with great defensive pursuits that earned turnovers, especially when we tried to throw away throws down the line, and when we threw deep hucks that were not thrown with enough power and/or not thrown to enough space for the receiver. These are our own “early season” mistakes and our focus leading up to the Championship series will be ironing them out—that is, learning to play with each other, using different kinds of on-field communication techniques, and making adjustments when our top priorities are not working. The Pride struggled to take half 8-6, with our mental game too loose and with Mephisto providing a strong contest. The first half was long, and the Pride was able to play a lot of guys, whereas Mephisto’s roster seemed a bit smaller in the second half, and guys were getting tired. Tightening up where we could, PoNY comfortably closed out the game under time constraints (softcap), 13-8.
Pride 11, Boston 15: Ahh… Boston. Not sure what they’re calling their team these days, but if there’s a team we get psyched to play at every opportunity, it’s that one team from the capitol city of Massachusetts. Over the past many years, and to our chagrin, they’ve managed to piece together a very strong showing to represent the Northeast Region in the National Arena, and they seem to be on the very same track this year as defenders of the NE regional title. And as they share a home with the Red Sox, the Patriots, the Celtics and the Boston College football program, they have become our city’s most pronounced rival. Already with their perfect winning record for the 2008 Ultimate Frisbee season, they will serve as a reflection of our team’s mental development, and we will have to play the long-lost Manning brother on the track and at the practice pitch until this season of consternation becomes a moment of final judgment; this is a game of attrition, my dear lads, and we in NYC expect our progression to be an asymptotic trajectory, where our finest game is the game played next. We matched well against Boston the month prior in Syracuse, losing to them once 13-11, and a second time the next day 15-11. Keeping the marathon vision at the forefronts of our minds, this third battle felt good. We took a very rudimentary approach on offense: showing only our vertical stack look. We wanted to see one-on-one match-ups. We wanted to see how Boston covers space, and which way their Defense is likely to shade us (in or out or wide or middle). We hit them with the same punch every offensive point, and tempted individual match-ups to have to respond. Our cutters were too fast, or too tall, or too patient to be stopped in the first half and the offense marched to halftime without giving up a single turnover. Meanwhile, on Defense, we stuck it to them—putting special pressure on their dumps, and trying to tempt Boston into making uncomfortable, low-percentage throws. As we had hoped, we generated turn after turn. Most notable was the five-foot high, flying, over-the-shoulder, going away, lay-out D by Mr. White Chocolate!! The crown went ballistic!! Boston sensed a ferocity in us that not even we knew what to do with… and in the first half, this was evident each time our D-line marched with the disc to score. Simply put, we couldn’t convert turnovers into scores. Yes, we were missing a few keys receivers on our defensive team, which put a lot of pressure on our throwers to play outside themselves, but the truth be told, we looked panicked. A handful of guys couldn’t keep their turnover ratios down, others couldn’t center the disc in flow, others had miserable luck with execution errors, and when the going was moderately good, we were still stuffing the disc down the open sideline for only short gains and moreover, our sidelined teammates were on our heels instead of on our toes. All of which is out of character for the Pride. Half was on serve, 8-7, Boston. We came out in the second half looking for improvement, and when the O-team went down a break to make it 11-9, we were shocked with ourselves. There was residue in our minds from the 2006 & 2007 seasons where perhaps we didn’t expect to play 9 perfect offensive points against the champions of the region. And then there was disappointment. With the coming of the 2008 era, New York ultimate had arrived without question to the elite level, and we expect to win games, we expect to generate turns against any & every team—why weren’t we converting these scores? And as we called timeout to decide what kind of team were going to become in this defining moment, our pledge to overcome took too long to materialize, and Boston rattled off two more breaks to end the game 11-15.
BOSTON INVITIATIONAL: SUNDAY
Pride 13, Truck Stop 10: After swimming and playing Shoe-ball (the official precursor to American Baseball as we now know it) in the park all Saturday afternoon, we arrived Sunday morning refreshed. We had not played Truck Stop yet this season, but they were a quarterfinalist team at Nationals the year before, and we expected this game to be a good fight. This was our quarterfinals draw at the Boston Invite, and any good team knows that you cannot look ahead of any team en route to finals. Our offense came out in our vertical side-stack, and we were able to rattle off a couple of early 5-pass plays for scores. When things got jammed, we reverted back to fundamentals, and were able to improve our ability to move the disc laterally, opening up different cutting lanes, and throw choices. The defense was doing its job, generating turns, and putting pressure on Washington DC team. I think we took halftime, yet again, 8-6. The second half seemed a bit more of a trade fest—the Pride would battle for a break or two, and then DC would get it back. But PoNY remained in control, and closed the game out at softcap, 13-10. I think Truck Stop was low on numbers Sunday morning, and with all confidence, we expect them to be back and with a vengeance.
Pride 11, GOAT 12: This game was semifinals! On the other side of the bracket, Great Britain Ultimate played Boston and only two teams were headed to finals after these last two games. Back to my Canadian hypothesis, these guys were long in the air, and physical on the mark. At times, the game felt more like hockey, with both sides getting more heated than we would have liked. GOAT, which stands for “Greater Ottawa and Toronto” ultimate club, came out firing on all cylinders. They were a semifinalist last year at UPA Championships in Sarasota, FL, and squeaked away a massive victory over PoNY in the game to go at NE Regionals, at double-game point. This year, they will be contesting as strongly for their right to return to the big show. But we aren’t going to make it easy for them. The first half between us was two teams trying to feel out the other. We anticipated well their deep huck game, and we’re able to put marks on their big throwers to shut down any easy looks. Our down field defensive presence was magnified by lots of sideline talk, and guys looking to make switch calls when able. We found ways to convert a couple breaks early in the half, and rode that marginal lead for most of the game. I remember Joe and BVH coming down with some monster grabs, and Krishna getting a massive layout D on someone. There were a couple early squabbles in the game between the two teams, and though I don’t remember the score at halftime, the second half was riddled with aggression. Time was running short, and the sun was out forcing half our team’s native Northeasterners to sprint to their bottles of sunscreen between points. The hardcap blew, and the score was 11-9, game to 12, with our defense pulling the disc. Our team was feeling the triumphant morale of the game from the sideline, watching as our D-line pulled the disc to sprint down the field with the chance to take our team to Finals. We forced a GOAT turnover, but with our own massive huck throwaway soon to follow, we couldn’t convert it the possession. 11-10. Next, PoNY received the disc on offense, marched it in flow to the red-zone. One of our players had the disc, stranded on the sideline, not seeing the cutters that he wanted. The stall got higher while the disc idled, trapped to the left side of the field. Not enough patience was given to the dump handler to get open, and the Pride forced a cross field hammer out of desperation which was D’ed. GOAT marched down the field and scored to tie the game, 11-11. There was one point left to be played, with the Pride receiving the disc. We made a few changes in the line, hoping that the issue was personnel, and stuffed a few defensive players on the line just in case. The point dragged on. Two turnovers, two injuries, and two substitutions later, GOAT scored the goal to win it. PoNY was admittedly rattled, and like our last Boston game, a part of us might have been caught between shock & disappointment, allowing our great position in the game to slip from our fingers. So this was a case where we tightened up our natural flow and decision making, and gave up several of chances to win the game. Games like these make the Pride better, and hungrier. Period.
Pride 0, Great Britain Ultimate 0: Everyone wanted this match-up, to settle the 3rd place finish, and get some more elite level experience. But alas, the Boston tourney directors had no available field space for us until much later in the afternoon. With Finals playing, and with British players needed to head to the airport to catch trans-atlantic flights, the game was left as a theoretical exercise for the imagination.