Nationals Day 1: Minnesota and UCSD

Minnesota

magnUM opened Nationals first thing Friday morning against 5th seeded Minnesota. Although they were the lowest seed at Nationals, Grey Duck had a strong season, posting wins over fellow nationals qualifiers Tufts and Kansas. To add a little spice to the game, the Little Brown Jug has been expanded to Ultimate.

Right before the game began, magnUM was surprised with special Nationals jerseys (thanks Derek Towster’s Dad and Pretzelmaker company…“freshens with a twist”).

Followers of magnUM will recall repeated references in this blog to slow starts. Rest assured, we held on to that for Nationals as well. magnUM received the opening pull and proceeded to get broken. After trading a few points, magnUM was broken a couple of more times to fall down 5-2. Andy Dunn helped supply some of the waking up material with a sweet leaping layout catch, dubbed a ‘rocket jump’ by a fellow 1020 E. Ann resident. After a scoring to make 5-3 that featured another one of those Neff hammers, magnUM D rattled off two breaks, capped by sweet bookends from Tim Lee. The rally continued through to half, when Seth Collins D’d a huck, then sent the disc back sailing to Dave Fumo to take half for magnUM at 8-7.

Grey Duck was far from finished though, and after trading a couple points early in the second half, they returned the break rally to take an apparent commanding lead, 12-9. Trading points to 13-10, magnUM called timeout. Coach Eikstadt called for a rally, saying that if the O line would just score one, D line would take care of the rest. He was very nearly right, as magnUM went on a 6-1 run to close out the game. Gordon Siegfriedt broke Grey Duck’s back by running down a slightly tipped huck for a layout grab, and Jeff Pape caught the winner from Dave Fumo.

Other notable contributions came from Alex Kaulins (scores goals), Patrick Collins (led team in skymiles Friday) and Alex Fegert (two layout D’s near his own endzone). Some highlights of the game made it on the UPA Championships website.

UC-San Diego

After a tough opening win against Grey Duck, magnUM had a bye before facing the 4th seeded Air Squids. UC-San Diego opened with a tough game against 2nd seeded Stanford and came away on the short end of 15-12 score.

The Air Squids immediately presented a change of pace of magnUM with the ‘stand in front of you, barely mark the thrower and take away the downfield looks defense.’ Accustomed to opponents making us work for each pass, being given a free three yards simply confounded the O line…and magnUM was again down early. magnUM would rally to take half on serve at 8-7, but only after Coach Purcell threatened self-amputation, Dave Fumo screamed through an entire timeout, and Tim Lee got bookends…again.

The second half was much more Natty Mich. O line was deadly and chilly, even taking a chisel point against the aforementioned D with no less than 30 passes completed, 20 of which were less than 5 yards long. D line got its breaks, plenty of them.

Ollie Honderd headlined defensive highlights, including chasing down a huck and making a sick layout D on a huck. Meatwolb (aka Meatball aka Meatwad aka Derrick Wolbert) had a couple of nice D’s in addition to leading the team in macked discs to the other team. Ben DeLand and Dave Fumo anchored the D line as usual with their share of highlights. DeLand almost had an instant youtube highlight when he skied at least two feet over his mark to nearly pull down a huck, only to be fouled and lose the disc.

Like the Minnesota game, magnUM closed out the Air Squids on D, earning the turn with hard work, followed by Alex Fegert working the disc to Seth Collins, who threw the winner to Tim Lee. Final score: 15-10.

All in all, a successful Day 1 of Nationals for magnUM. Neither win was pretty, but they both were wins. A much tougher awaits in Day 2. Hope to see you there.