Ontario Women's Regionals 2008

Nation,

The Ontario Women's Regionals take place this weekend. There are five teams, and 4 bids:

1.Lily
2.Lotus
3.PPF
4.Scarlett
5.Stella

Shannon Becker-Boston 2008
Corry Berghout Photos

Here are some previews of the teams:

Stella- Despite a young roster, Stella is poised to take the number one seed at regionals. They are lead by the same girls who made UPA college followers say "Ottawa Who?". New members to the team continue to get outside praise for improvement.

Lotus- Let's be honest here- the Capitals are able to compete at UPA nationals based on strong talent coming from both Toronto and Ottawa. Lotus could very well take the regionals crown. They will also be a favored to be semi finalists at No Borders next weekend.

PPF- 2nd place finish at Jazz last weekend, and had an excellent TUF. I saw them play last weekend and I was very impressed with their athleticism and their love of the big play. They are the first legitimate threat to Stella and Lotus in this province in a long time. If they can keep producing bid d's and get better decisions when near the red zone, they'll scare teams at nationals.

Scarlett- Outside of Carrie Lugg, they lack a lot of big game/throw experience at handler. However, I was really impressed by the improvement this team showed at Jazz last weekend. Lots of athletes.. and willing to grind it out on every point. Major hurdle is getting the offence going, especially off of a turn.

Lily- Not sure where the team was for Jazz last week. They defaulted. It's a fight between Scarlett and Lily for the last bid to nationals, and Lily has the home field advantage.

Best of luck to all teams this weekend!!

Jazzfest 2008 Results

Nation,

Huge thanks to Jazz 2008 tournament director Sonia Scalise and her team for a great tournament this year, as well as the final results and pictures below.

Tournament Itself

• Visiting Montreal in the middle of the actual Jazzfest is fantastic. It's hard to mess it up.
• Field food was great and the free BBQ on Sunday was greatly appreciated. Trying some cold apple cider on a very hot day was refreshing.
• It was hot all weekend, but some very light breezes and plenty of trees for shade were great.
  
• Sadly, our fields were a bit rough on Saturday. Most fields were fine, but our pool had fields that were not quite up to competitive par. Some major holes and a hill just before one of the endzones were the main culprits
• I definitely would recommend the tournament experience to other Canadian teams.
  

Firebird Experience

Saturday

Well, as boldly predicted, we made it to quarters after an excellent Saturday.

Firebird 13 Raynet 6

Not our best game, but a good start against a team from Trois Rivieres. If you ever played on bad teams, you have to appreciate being on a team that doesn't play their best but pulls it out easily.

Firebird 11 Tabasco 10

This was a team full of Montreal vets who have played coed and open. We started off well and lead by a score of 5-1 at one point. I was sat off for an o point and thought nothing off it. Next thing I know, it's tied and we're fighting to try and take the half.

We lose the half, but come back and take a lead which our o line held onto.

I would say that this is one of my better games this season. It's also the game where I knocked a "leg humping: mark to the ground, right on his back. After he called foul, I retorted "Stop humping my leg!!!" He admitted to said humping ("yeah.. I was humping your leg") and got back up and started the stall count at zero. Good laugh, good spirit.

Firebird 13 Zebra Muscles 7

The matchup we were waiting for was tempered by the fact that Zebra had a small bench. It was very hot and we wore them down very quickly.

At this point, no one on our team is standing out, but everyone is doing well.

Crossover:
Les Ringards Famléqiue 12 Firebird 10

This was a pick up team featuring some Montreal talents, some Queens alums, the Dowlers, and none other than the Beast (Scott Stinson). Hard ultimate, but fun to play.

This one was a little surprising. We shortened the bench early and we got into a big hole. Our team really felt the heat and the exhaustion from playing in such temperatures, We go back to the "bench" and they are more effective. They simply keep it simple. We close it to one but the Ringards finish us off at time cap.

On to the quarters, moving up to 5th going into the 2nd day.

Sunday:

BearProof 15 Firebird 6

Talk about letting one get away. They had one medium size dude with amazing jumps and blazing speed. He torched us. They had some Penn state guys who really shut down our long game and solid handler/bail defence.

We very well could have walked away from this game had we went underneath and adjusted, but it never came. I personally felt like I did little to help us win. It was very frustrating.

GLUM 15 Firebird 13

These Ottawa match-ups between us and the old guard of Wax and GLU legends is not usually pleasant. $hit gets said, calls get argued, and no one plays their best.

This was not the case.

Facing a strong GLUM squad (bolstered by PHX d line stalwart Jaime Craig and some ex Firebird/PHX grads), we got off to a rocky start. After giving up a cushion we ended the half going on a run and making it close. We kept inching closer and closer, but we can't make it all the way back. Appreciate GLUM for finishing the game past time and playing a good game with us. They are going to be dangerous come nationals and upas this season.

Worst case scenario- Our valued cutter Adam Binks seperated his "good shoulder" and is likely out for the rest of the year. Few guys have dedicated as much as to the game and struggled through as much injury/illness as Adam in his short career, so I hope he can come back from this.

One last piece of advice- Do not P%ss off Ian Brooks. If he's slacking off and not doing much, that is not a good time to argue a call with him, and set him off.

Overall, a tournament where we won a lot, finished top 6, got lots of playtime, and had some of our lesser known players get a chance to shine. Phil Boisvert, Josh Tai, and Eric Mathieu are but 3 of these examples.

Final Results

Open

1st – Mephisto

2^nd – Stimlus Package

3rd – Bear Proof

4th – MIT Geek Mystique

5th - GLUM

6th - Firebird

7th & 8^th - Les Ringards Famléqiue & Zebra Muscles (left before end of game… no socres given)

9th - Provedence Packdogs

10th - BIEFS

11^th -Double Dragon

12th - Tabascomen

13th - Demon

14th - Run Silent Run Deep

15th - Ray Net

16th - Magma

17th - ROY

18th - DQ & Friends

19th - OPUS

Women

1st - Storm

2nd - PPF

3rd - sMITten

4th - Fusion

5th - QUB

6th - Bleu Nuit

7th - Scarlet

8th - Fish Fingers

Ottawa Results
GLUM finishes 5th
Firebird finishes 6th
Scarlett finishes 7th

Mixed Regionals Update- Quebec and Ontario

Nation,

Some second hand reports of the Mixed regionals for Ontario and Quebec.

Seth Sezant Grab-
Cory Berghout Photography

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Ontario

According to the UPA Score Reporter, Here are the final results (original seed in brackets)

1. Monster (1)
   
2. Mayhem (4)
   
3. Bytown Flatball Club (6)
   
4. Liquid (2)
   
5. Big Hammers (3)
   
6. Tundra (5) ____________________________________________________________
   
7. Zen (8)
   
8. The Company (7)
   
9. Big Fish (9)
   

Monster wins it's first regional crown, and will look to carry on the success at nationals. No team went undefeated through the tournament, so it remains to be seen who will outrank their Ontario rivals come nationals. Time to train and prepare for Cow-town.
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Quebec

According to OCUA fourm posts, the following four teams have qualified for nationals:

Gecko
Onyx
RIP
Wannabago

(Teams eliminated: Rockstar and Polatouches)

Given how strong RIP performed at tough, other provinces should be concerned about the fact that two teams beat RIP and will be at nationals.