USA Ultimate

Revolver Wins 2013 National Championship

Every day in Frisco we’ve seen a different sky. For the final, it was bright and sunny with a gusting eastern wind. With full stands awaiting the fist pull of the men’s final, the audience was eager for the game to get underway, so they could see the big plays promised out of the match up between these two giants. Revolver had the notoriety and momentum behind them, with a flawless tournament to this point, but a layout D from Sockeye’s Tim Gehret in the first point gave the audience pause, but a retaliatory D from Revolver captain Ashlin Joye saved the point for the favorite. Opening up the game, Revolver scored off a dish from Beau Kittredge. Kittredge, who in many circles is considered the best receiver in the game, was predominantly on the distribution side of the disc throughout the game. 

The best Sockeye answer for Kittredge was without a doubt Matt Rehder, who before the game looked as if he might have still felt the pains of his enormous layout D in the semifinals match against Ironside, which resulted in him calling an injury sub. Although we didn’t see the big match up in the end zone between Kittredge and Rehder (like we unfortunately didn’t get a big match up out of Kittredge and Jimmy Mickle in the semifinals match), both players were instrumental to their teams on-field successes. What we saw for both teams were big shots into the end zone, looking to capitalize on downwind hucks that were forced into the ground by the erratic gusting wind.   

 

As with each of the semifinals battles, Revolver and Sockeye traded points until Revolver created a gap with back-to-back breaks, putting Sockeye in a small hole at 5-2 Revolver. The next point gave the audience an unexpected and surprising on-field exchange between the two teams—a 13-turnover point before Sockeye finally drove the disc into the end zone. In a game with such concentrated talent, 13 turnovers might be the allotment predicted for the entire game and was a bizarre occurrence for one point. This point, and many throughout the game, were plagued by both forced and unforced errors. Discs were thrown away on dumps, dropped in the open field, D’d by athletic players or forced into the ground by an unpredictable gust of wind. Between points, after the exhausting turnover-laden battle, Revolver was issued its first of three Team Misconduct Fouls for aggressive marking. Sockeye then scored a break point after a nasty layout D from Sam Harkness on an attempted shot through the cup from Revolver. Bringing the score to 5-4, Sockeye showed hopes of staying in the game and possibly surpassing Revolver to take the title. Those hopes were quickly diminished when Revolver took half 8-5.

 

Sockeye showed promise in two strategic capacities: a) the implementation of their four-man cup zone defense, which did generate turnovers (unfortunately without conversion), and b) use of their uncontainable handler weave. 

 

Despite adjustments from Sockeye to salvage a victory, Revolver had too much drive, and the preparation of their season leading up to this point showed through. Stand-out play from Kittredge and Joye were met with dream-shattering points from Revolver freshmen Lucas Dallman and Joel Schlachet, whose layout catch on disc tipped by the Sockeye defender guarding Beau Kttredge in the red zone was one of the most raw and intuitive plays of the game. Turnovers still plagued both teams even late into the game, and the second and third TMFs against Revolver gave Sockeye field position and opportunity after the half, but the scale never tipped in Seattle’s favor. Without a single break point in the second half, Sockeye didn’t create the opportunity needed to put themselves back in contention after the half. At 13-10 with the cap on, a scary moment came when a shot to Kittredge was bobbled looking like a potential drop, but the veteran player snagged the disc and dished it to Josh Wiseman for the score and their third national title.

 

2013 National Champions Revolver will join Sockeye and third-place team Ironside in Lecco, Italy representing the United States of America at the 2014 WFDF World Ultimate Club Championships.