Southern California Open Sectionals Recap

Saturday was the typical tournament day for Long Beach weather. Extremely overcast with very damp fields upon arrival. Clear skies, beaming sun, and some strong wind gusts by early afternoon. Nothing crazy, though, so overall game conditions were exquisite.

The Santa Barbara Condors had a schedule that included 4 games in a row, allowing us to end our day early. Our first matchup was against Santa Bong Beach, a team comprised of college players from Santa Barbara Black Tide and Long Beach State Stalkers. Condors won 11-0. I played 3 points and had 2 assists, while the whole team looked energized (which isn't common for our us during our first action of the day) and we played relatively well. Considering it was our first game (and this our first tournament) together as a full team against other competition, it was a good start.

Our second game was against Recess, a team of mostly college guys from UCLA. We came out of that with an 11-2 victory. I had fun going up against a couple of friends and former Monster teammates(Penguin and OJ). The game ended relatively quick, and we were able to get an hour rest before our game against the 405.

When we played the 405 at the Santa Barbara Scramble (it wasn't too organized, so don't worry about it), neither team was at full strength. On this day, the 405 was still missing a couple key players (Smeltzer and KG). This game was way tougher for both sides than it should've been. One horrific marathon point saw both teams make at least 6 turnovers in addition to calling a timeout each. Terrible decision-making, horrible goalline offense, and some pretty spectacular defense (Bacon's layout D near the endzone, Jacuzzi's layout point-block that was ruled a foul to name a couple) accounted for a point that lasted close to 10 minutes. Alas, we prevailed 11-8.

Our last game on Saturday was against a team of USC players. Final score 11-2 or so... I don't really remember much about that game. Let's move on.

Sunday was identical to Saturday in terms of the weather, but playing conditions were a little worse due to the fact that school likes to have the sprinklers go in the middle of the night, so there were puddles and mud pools in various spots. (Note to CSULB Facilities staff: Watering/soaking the fields while a tournament is going on is NOT a good idea. That's how the fields get so messed up. C'mon!)

Our last 2 pool play games were against what Dan Bellinger referred to as "jokes." Starting with the La Jolla BAGS, made up of college guys from San Diego. While we went in anticipating another shutout, our lack of discipline and crappy decision-making led to allowing 4 points. Which then led to a very unhappy postgame huddle in which we were mildly berated (that sounds oxymoronic) for our lackluster play.

Game two was against the Nice Guys, a group of older guys who had some skill but seemed to not all be on the same page and communicated poorly with each other. We ran around them pretty easily and won 11-1.

Undefeated in pool play put us into the Finals against also-undefeated San Diego Streetgang, the matchup we had been anticipating going into the tournament. I was expecting us to get 8 or 9 points against them. You should never go into a game expecting to lose (believe me, I've watched enough ridiculous upsets through a variety of sports to know better), but based on the season up to this point (Streetgang competing against Nationals-caliber teams regularly, and winning very often; this being our first real competition) and how we had played so far on Sunday, that was my prediction.

The game started pretty even, with both teams holding on offense, though in completely different ways. Streetgang has some unbelievable throwers and managed to score their points within 2 or 3 throws. Contrarily, they threw a good zone against us, and it took us some time to work it up the field, which we managed to do relatively well. And then it stopped. We started making some bad decisions, forcing some questionable throws, and accumulating turnovers. Streetgang capitalized on the opportunities we gave them (key word: GAVE) and extended a lead. We had some spectacular moments, with insane layout D's by Jason Craig, Ryan Boutcher, Dan Bellinger and myself, but couldn't convert most of the time. The final score was 13-6 with the game-winning grab being made by Forge as he burned me deep.

After the finals game we had to play the Beyondors for seeding. We again played horrendous at the start (I had a drop in the endzone that might be one of my lowest moments in Ultimate) but after a strong disagreement with them at around 5-4, we turned on the jets and cruised to a 13-7 victory to finish 7-1 overall and claim 2nd place and a presumed 3rd seed at Regionals.

We know we have a lot of work to do if we're going to make it to the level we need to be at for Regionals if we're going to actually compete with Streetgang and Johnny Bravo for the coveted spots to Nationals. Hopefully we get those things ironed out at our practice the weekend before.

An unfortunate storyline of the finals game was two seemingly major injuries on Streetgang's side. Keenan and Bevers had their shoulders dislocated as a result of Jacuzzi and myself laying out. Hopefully their injuries aren't too severe and they can return for Regionals. Get better guys!

See you all in Oxnard/Santa Barbara in a few weeks.

Southern California Club Sectionals

SoCal Sectionals are this weekend in Long Beach! The only teams I know of amongst the 13 (yeah, 13. What a stupid number for a tournament. Hopefully that changes.) that are participating are us (Condors), 405, Streetgang and Seduction. I guess Recess, too. I'm relatively worried about how we're going to perform for a couple reasons. 1) We haven't really played anyone up to this point. There was a one day, round robin tournament with two other Santa Barbara teams (the Beyondors and a Black Tide team) and 405, but the Black Tide team consisted mostly of our guys, so we weren't even playing with our full team. 2) We have a couple injured guys who won't be playing this weekend. We still have some pretty good talent, so I'm thinking we're still going to finish no worse than 2nd overall, behind Streetgang. Who knows, maybe we can pull off an upset? I'm not banking on it, since they have been playing (and regularly beating) Nationals teams all summer, while we've been playing ourselves. I'm actually just hoping that we play well enough to not have 405 or Seduction surprise us. Jeff and Dan would NOT be happy...

2010 SoCal Sectionals Highlight Video

(What is actually happening) Re-dedication

You may have read the title and, if you know me, thought, "What? The only way he could be more dedicated to Ultimate is if he were a disc!" And while I am re-dedicating myself to Ultimate, I'm also re-dedicating myself to life. 

The Situation:

I wasn't going to play Ultimate this semester. I couldn't afford to go to school, thus I wouldn't have been eligible to play this semester. The decision had been made. I was still going to be around, at practices, at tournaments, etc. But I wasn't going to be playing.

Funny thing is, I have really good friends. Friends who believed I meant enough to the team (certainly more than I thought I meant to the team) to come forward and offer a solution. I really try not to accept favors like that. (This is mildly hypocritical because: a) I tend to always be in a position where I almost have to accept them and b) When the tables are turned I am adamant that friends accept favors from me.) They clearly wanted to make this happen, and I couldn't disappoint them by saying no. So I accepted.

The Result:

Biking home that night, I decided something. If I'm going to allow them to make this huge sacrifice for me, then I'm going to do the same for them. I can't allow myself to just go through the motions this year when they are clearly depending on me to be something I didn't think I was. So I've decided to become that.

This starts by giving up television, in all its capacity. No TV shows, no sports, no movies, no anything. You might be inclined to say, "That's not that big of a deal." I assure you, it is. I spend hours of time each day watching television. This is not to say that I'm some couch potato who doesn't get out and do anything, which I'm not. However, there are large chunks of time spent watching ESPN, Fox, NBC, dvd rentals, etc. By giving that up, at least until the end of the semester (with the only exception being the NCAA basketball tournament aka March Madness), I can fill my time with much more productive activities, including:

-Training. I plan on running more, throwing more, and working out in some capacity. I'm going to restart the Air Alert jumping program, in addition to running multiple miles around the track multiple times a week. I also plan on getting into the gym at least once a week.

-Reading scripture. Thanks to another good friend on a completely unrelated situation, I have finally gotten into a pretty good routine of reading my Bible daily. This will continue, in a greater capacity.

-Other reading. In the last couple of weeks I have completed "What's So Amazing About Faith?" and "The Lightning Thief." I am currently reading "The Catcher in the Rye" and plan on reading quite a bit more, including finishing the Eragon series, reading the rest of The Chronicles of Narnia, and searching for more religious material including other works by C.S. Lewis and Philip Yancey.

-Building relationships. Relationships can always be improved, and I plan on doing so with my teammates, co-workers, the high school students and anyone else I come across.

-Sleeping. I don't even like sleeping, but I know that only getting 5-6 hours of sleep on a nightly basis isn't as good as 7-8. So we'll see how that goes.

Lastly, I am also greatly indebted to the aforementioned friends. Therefore, I'm going to be much more tentative about my monetary habits. WAY less eating out, with a lot more peanut butter, pasta, fruits and vegetables (that's all healthier anyway, right?). Absolutely no unnecessary purchases (movies, music, clothes, etc.). All the money I now have technically isn't mine, so where do I come off spending it on things that aren't helping me achieve my goal? I've had a loan before. I didn't handle that situation well, and it's not going to happen again.

It's highly unlikely that this all comes together the way I planned. Which is fine, because I'd rather it come together the way God planned. But I am going to put everything I've got into this. If my friends feel I'm worth that much to them, then I'm going to make sure that they have a reason to believe so.

PS: I can't do this alone. Any help and encouragement any of you can give along the way would mean the world to me.

(What was going to happen) Until Next Year...

This might be the toughest decision I've ever had to make. Not that I have difficult decisions ever. The hardest choice I ever have to make is deciding which football(s) game to tivo. But this was actually a life decision, one that I didn't want to make, but felt I had no choice.

I will not be competing in the UPA Series this semester.

In the grand scheme of things, this isn't really that big a deal. But I love this sport and the people who are in it so much that to have to say I won't be able to compete until next year hurts me a great deal, especially with all of the work that has already gone into this year.

The main reason is that it's not fiscally possible. In order to compete, I have to be enrolled in class. I'm already done with the coursework I need for my degree. The only reason I was enrolling in school this semester was to play Ultimate. I figured I could scrape by for one more semester and go from there. While there's a slight chance I would be able to pull it off, it creates a lot more problems in the future than it is worth for now. 

By not playing (and not having to pay for school), I can begin saving money for the future. I plan on going back to school next spring and pursuing a graduate degree, which needs to be paid for. I can live somewhat comfortably now with the little money I earn, while still being able to travel with the team and have fun enjoying places like Stanford, North Carolina, and Colorado instead of being holed up with nothing to do because I have no money to do anything with. 

If I were to play, I would be reaching far and wide to make ends meet in order to come up with the money to pay for school, travel, food, etc. 

Hopefully my teammates understand this position and don't get upset with the position I have put them in. However, I don't feel like my absence hinders their ability to play well. As a matter of fact, hopefully it makes them even better. I'm not a great defender in general, and the way I'm built to play offense is the exact opposite of what our offense is designed to do. I have seen us run a very smooth, efficient offense quite often without my presence. As a matter of fact, it runs well when I'm on the field just standing still. 

In moving forward, I am in no way distancing myself from the team. I will still be at every practice, pickup, scrimmage and tournament, doing everything I can to help out the team. Also, I will be using this time to focus, train, and prepare for the club season. I'm excited for the possibilities for the next year and year after that. 

Besides, with all the time I've already spent watching from the sideline this season due to some incredible misfortune for our team, what's another few months?

See you on the field. Kind of.