USA Ultimate

Open Division South Regionals Recap

Saturday

After all was said and done with the seedings and schedule for the 2011 USAU South Open Division Regionals, the only thing left to do was to play the games. Everyone was sort of crossing their fingers for parity among the pools. But because seeding the teams outside of Chain Lightning and Doublewide was nigh impossible, calamity was sure to ensue. And, sure enough, it only took one round for a team to notch an upset with Uproar coming out on top against Tanasi on double-game point. Elsewhere in Round 1, HIP gave Six Pack a scare over in Pool A, but Six Pack worked to come out on top. Everything else went according to seed.

The 2 v. 3 seeds took the field during round two and once again produced close, exciting games that would set the tone for the weekend. Brah was the story of the round making Plex fight for every inch of field and nearly pulling off a victory. Omen had everyone biting their nails during their game against Uproar. Omen barely came out on top and that game set up a pivotal match-up between Tanasi and Omen for the final round.

As the last round before teams were taken out of championship contention, round three was undoubtedly nerve-wracking for some teams. Remarkably, there was only one other upset in pool play on Saturday when Freaks Uv Nature beat Space City Eclipse in a barn burner, 15-13. Despite getting a scare from Brah in the previous round, Plex turned it around to challenge Ironmen for the top spot in Pool D coming up just short. Six Pack and Space City Ignite, recognizing the massive hurdle against them by playing Doublewide and Chain and already clinching a berth in the cross over games took it easy against their skilled opponents and the top two seeds held to win pools A and B. In Pool C, everything was still up for grabs. If Omen beat Tanasi, they would win the pool, Uproar would take 2nd and Tanasi third.  Tanasi took care of business against Omen to take the pool and drop Omen down to the third place.

In the crossover round, the action would be provided by the teams in the 2 v. 3 games. Six Pack took on Omen, Space City Ignite took on Brah, El Diablo dueled with Uproar and Plex battled with Freaks Uv Nature.  With the season on the line, all the games were close despite what the score reporter says.  None of the winners ran away with their games and Freaks Uv Nature almost got their second upset of the day to make quarters but just came up short versus Plex.  El Diablo had the unfortunate circumstance to run into a very talented Uproar team as a result of the point differential settlement in Pool C and Space City Ignite was too much for Brah to handle.

Sunday

In the morning, despite the 8 am start time, teams were awake and ready to go.  Since a berth in the semifinals would make the road to Nationals a lot easier, a quarterfinals win would be a crucial step to making the show. On top of that, no team from the South has gone on to make Nationals after losing in the quarters. Would this be the year to buck the trend?

Chain didn’t have much trouble with Six Pack and Doublewide took care of business against Space City Ignite. Uproar continued on with their stellar weekend, earning a victory over Ironmen.  Tanasi held seed against Plex. This meant Six Pack, Plex, Ironmen and Space City Ignite were heading to the backdoor bracket and two of them were going home after the next round.

Championship bracket semi-finals went about as expected, with Doublewide housing Uproar 14-2 and Chain winning at the cap against Tanasi 13-8. Down in the 3rd place bracket, Six Pack and Plex traded back and forth until Six Pack generated a few breaks to take an 8-6 lead at half.  Space City was also up on Iron Men when the horn sounded, signaling hard cap and the end of the round, just as the second half was beginning for all of the games. The end of the round definitely caught teams off guard and neither team that was down at half had much of a chance to fight back. Six Pack defeated Plex 9-7 and Space City Ignite took out Iron Men 11-7. Six squads were still in contention. Tanasi, Uproar, Six Pack and Space City Ignite were left to vie for that last bid to nationals while Chain and Doublewide dueled for regional supremacy in a match-up that has produced some exciting finishes in the past.

The game of the round probably goes to Six Pack v Uproar. Neither team was up by more than a point the entire game and there were nine lead changes between the teams.  Uproar took half up 8-7 and up a break but Six Pack scored two on defense right out of half to get back on serve, 9-8.  Uproar countered with a break of their own at 9’s and led 11-10, game to 13.  Six Pack got their break back and had two chances at victory, almost converting on defense but Uproar got the point to set up a universe situation at 12’s.  Six Pack received and had the disc 20 yards from the end zone but a pass was too short for the receiver.  Stephen Poulos picked up the disc and bombed a flick to the end zone to a streaking receiver.  Even with two Pack defenders on his heels the throw was far enough out in front and Uproar came away with the victory, 13-12. Tanasi took care of Space City Ignite on the other side of the backdoor bracket in a shortened game, defeating the Houston team 13-10.

Chain quashed the chances of Doublewide repeating as regional champions with a convincing 15-11 victory.  According to Jonathan "Frito" Monforti, Chain made the most of all-star performances from Peter Dempsey on the D line and Grant Lindsley on the O line. Dempsey skied multiple DW players to solidify a break early in the game, then got a huge block on Jerrod Wolfe later in the game. Lindsley was "unguardable," and was, according to spectators, the game’s leading fantasy scorer. Chain tried to neutralize the Brodie factor using Michael Arenson who "deserves a shoutout for his stellar play." They switched up the match-ups on him and Kurt Gibson—though Jolian Dahl was also on him a lot— to try to keep them guessing. Frito says it was great competition and "even though both teams had already qualified for Nationals, it felt good to…have a tough game to finish off Regionals." It is also worth noting that Chain pulled off the victory without brothers Joel and Frank Wooten as well as Sam Chatterton-Kirchmeier. 

Thus, the only game left was Tanasi versus (a clearly underestimated) Uproar with a spot at Nationals on the line. The last time a Florida team made Nationals was Vicious Cycle in 2006.  Tanasi, despite their significant roster turnover from last year, still had recent Nationals experience on their side and that can be a confidence booster.  Uproar got an early break but Tanasi stayed patient and didn’t let it affect their game, taking half 8-5.  Although it would have been nice to see the game played out to 15 instead of only to cap, the teams stuck to the original schedule and the cap came on at 10-8.  Uproar scored, game to 12 with Tanasi receiving.  Tanasi sent out their starting O line and scored. Then they broke to win and advance, 12-9 over Uproar. 

Overall, this was a fantastic weekend of ultimate and while some believe that Tanasi doesn’t belong in the same company as the rest of the Nationals qualifiers, they absolutely deserved their bid, beating out a strong field of teams as the region grows stronger and deeper every year.  Chain and Doublewide cemented themselves as the cream of the crop in the region and will be in contention for overall victory as the best team in North America down in Sarasota.