USA Ultimate

Women's Division Mid-Atlantic Regionals Recap

Congratulations to:

• DC Scandal for defending their 2010 title and winning the 2011 Mid-Atlantic Women's Regional. 
  
• Phoenix of North Carolina for taking the 2nd bid and earning their second trip to Nationals as second year team. 
  
• An additional nod to Green Means Go, the overall 3rd seed, who after losing to Phoenix in the semis, fought up from the bottom to play in the second game to go
  
• Swarthmore Warmothers, the only college team in the field, for playing out all their games and taking advantage of the bid they earned at Founders Sectioanals. 
  
• Finally, a belated thank you to Brandywine Polo Club of Toughkenamon, Pa; PADA, and RC Kim Kreitner for finding a site for the Mid-Atlantic Mixed and Women's Divisions to play after Poolesville was rained out. 

Nine teams attended Regionals this year; down two teams from last year's tournament.  Though a new site was found after the polo fields in Poolesville were decided off limits, the weather continued to not cooperate for the bulk of the weekend.  9am Saturday had the markings of an ideal Frisbee day as teams were warming up,  but by game time the weather slowly began to sour for the rest of the day [and weekend].  However, this turn didn't cause either pool to stray from seed, with the exception of Lady Death Strike falling to Swarthmore 7-8 [game to 11].  The top two teams in each pool outscored their opponents 44-4 and 45-8 to finish the day.  On paper, the only apparent close game of the day seemed to be between Philly's Green Means Go and North Carolina's Sweet T in the B pool's second round of action.  GMG won 15-11 leaving Sweet T and 0-2 before a last round blow out of Veto; leaving them 1-2 on the day and looking to play up from the bottom on Sunday.  They, along with Phoenix farm team Ember, would win their first play in games while the top four teams fought it out in the semis.

One semifinal pitted overall one seed vs. standing three seed Green Means Go.  These teams saw each other months ago at WCC in Charlotte, where Phoenix had the only break of the game to win 9-7.  In the semis here, after a quick 2-4 lead, GMG saw Phoenix roll 4 before scoring their 5th and final point of the game.  Phoenix 15-5.  In the other semi-final, Scandal defeated Hot Metal from Pittsburgh 15-9, though the game went all the way to the hard cap horn at 10:15am. 

As Scandal and Phoenix waited to play at 12:30pm, GMG made quick work of Ember, and Sweet T barely got away from Hot Metal 10-9 to set up a rematch from the day before's pool play.  This game was played as the same time as the finals with GMG winning 15-11.

By 5-3 Scandal in the finals, Phoenix had already suffered one dropped pull and 2 offsides penalties, followed by a spike warning at 6-7.  Down two at half, Phoenix quickly got one break back to narrow the score 7-8; the next point was followed by one of Scandal's 5 one possession O points, which opened the door for their D to get two more quick breaks and extend their lead to 11-7.  After yet another break to move the score to 13-8, and at 1:43 pm with about 30 minutes left to play before the Hard Cap, Phoenix called time out to steady and rally their team for one last push.  They would outscore Scandal 4-2 the rest of the way, but a chance to break two and narrow the score 11-13 was barely missed after a quick Scandal turn in the Phoenix red zone.  Scandal then took their 2nd chance 70 yards to move their lead further to 14-10.  After rolling two and cutting the lead to 12-14 and looking at triple game point, Phoenix called their last time of the game in perhaps an effort to freeze up Scandal.  However, they would save their fifth and final one possession O point to end the game and repeat as Mid-Atlantic Regional Champions: 15-12 Scandal!

In the game that decided the final bid to Club Nationals, Phoenix quickly licked their wounds and took an 8-2 lead on Green Means Go, despite a handful of inebriated and mouthy GMG supporters.  Final score Phoenix 15-6. 

The separation between Scandal and Phoenix to the rest of the teams in the region is pretty immense; but it's only a short matter of time before Green Means Go and Hot Metal, etc start feverishly competing for the 1st and 2nd spots in the region.