Sectionals.

I'm sorry that I haven't posted in a couple of weeks. I kept meaning to get on this thing, but my life has been pretty hectic and time has (as usual) gotten away from me to some extent. I'm going to skip a lot of that period in this post, but hopefully I will be able to backtrack and better document that time when/if I get around to throwing together an end of the year summary.

I guess I should start my Sectionals recap by talking about our Series Staches. This year, at Robin's behest, nearly all of Zoodisc is attempting to grow out playoff mustaches. The one problem with this plan is that it wasn't officially announced to the team until the Tuesday evening before Sectionals. Since our team mostly consists of prepubescent schoolgirls, very few of our members were able to rock full and noticable mustaches for this weekend. Only Henry, Josh (who already had a mustache), and I, to be specific. Several other people displayed some ragged peach fuzz, though I hope that the two weeks between Sectionals and Regionals will give them enough time to grow full and manly mustaches. Robin and Ryan bought Just For Men beard dye, which they thought that they could use to accentuate the fuzz on their upper lips, but they experienced mild allergic reactions and only succeeded in dying brown streaks of skin. It was hilarious.

As per the schedule, Saturday of Sectionals pitted us against three easy teams before we ended the day against Middlebury. I believe that these were wins against Williams C (15-1), Westfield State (15-5), and Amherst College B (15-1). While I was happy that our team managed to remain (somewhat) focused and intense throughout these beatings, they really didn't say much about our team. We played with completely open defensive lines and managed to get turns and score at will, even when we didn't exactly play good offense or defense.

Our final game of Saturday was against Middlebury. Based on their past results this season, we knew that Middlebury was going to be a tough opponent. They have a lot of height and a lot of speed, which helps to make up for their high-risk offense. Middlebury has always had a knack for completing big throws to covered receivers, and this year is absolutely no exception. They came out fired up for this game, but so did we. For the first couple points, we basically traded. I think that we might have given up a break on our first offensive possession, but we held fast and got a break back few points later. Maybe we gave up another break, but I think that we were only down a point or so - and very much in the game - when tragedy struck. Josh lobbed a pass into the middle of the field to Mitch, not seeing that another cutter's man had poached out into the lane. Though it looked like the Middlebury defender tried to duck away from the contact, his head smashed directly into Mitch's leg just above the knee. The next thing we knew, Mitch was writhing and moaning on the ground. We probably spent the next ten minutes or so trying to figure out the extent of Mitch's injury before we finally sent him to the emergency room and resumed the game. I believe that the doctor's still don't know exactly what sort of injury that Mitch sustained, but one theory is that a bone chip lodged itself into one of the ligaments in his knee. Whether or not this is actually the injury is incidental, however; my main thought and hope is that Mitch can recover from his injury quickly and without complication.

The team was visably shaken after Mitch left the field. In retrospect, we should have taken a little extra time to have a team huddle and to try to recover some of our intensity, but I didn't really think of it at the time. Mitch has been a huge part of our team all year, both as a cutter on the O Line and as a leader on and off of the field. His loss has a tremendous impact on the team, but we should be able to fill the void left by his presence. I mean, we wouldn't really be much of a Team if we collapsed at the loss of any single player. Mitch's loss, however, impacted our performance more than if he (as a player) merely wasn't there. In watching us play, it was obvious that everybody on our team was thinking about him as much as they were thinking about the game. Our cutting looked timid, as people seemed afraid to be injured in a similar manner. Defense was less physical and less intense than it was at the beginning of the game. Our throwing decisions and our overall level of concentration lapsed, and we had a number of uncharacteristic turnovers and blown defensive assignments that lead to easy goals. Middlebury easily scored the point after Mitch's injury and then went on to break three or so times to take half. After half, Middlebury continued their run. They broke time after time when they pulled to us, and they either worked it down the field or hucked for a score whenever they got the disc. We continued to look timid and unfocused, and Middlebury capitalized on our mistakes. I think that we only scored three times after Mitch left the field, giving up a crushing 15-7 loss.

On the bright side, our loss to Middlebury came at the best possible time in our Series run. We didn't have any games after this loss on Saturday, which gave us plenty of time to go home that night and forget about our frustrations. Instead of having to bounce back immediately from such a tough loss, we were given the opportunity to forget about it and move forward into Sunday with minimal consequences.

Sunday's play kicked off against Vermont B. Vermont B is a pretty good B team, but they are still a B team and we walked to a 15-2 win. This brought us to our semifinal matchup against Williams College.

Williams, as a team, is rather similar to Middlebury. While they have the ability to work the disc under and move the disc among their handlers, they usually rely on height and speed in an impatient and high risk offense that takes a lot of chances and moves the disc quickly down the field. Traditionally, there is a lot of animosity between our two teams, and both of us started this game hard and fast.

We began the game with a lot of desire and emotion, though this sometimes seemed to work against us offensively. We had a couple of early turnovers when a thrower tried to do too much with the disc, squeezing a throw to a tightly covered man or overthrowing a receiver on a difficult throw. Defensively, we surged past our men on several different occassions to nail spectacular layout d's, but we were not often able to convert these defensive efforts into goals. I think that we went down three breaks before our offense really got going and started working the way that they should. Our defense was able to get a break back, and Williams took half 8-6. We were down a couple of points, but we felt as if we had the momentum to come out and take control of the game in the second half.

Boy, were we wrong. Williams came out flying after halftime, and we weren't able to stop their O Line from scoring its first point. Our O Line, however, was quick to show its mortality. Throwaways and drops characterized our offensive effort as Williams broke us several times in rapid succession. These mistakes seemed to worsen as the game went on, as our players were clearly rattled. On several occassions, a cutter pulled up on a cut as if to make sure that he wouldn't drop the disc, only to be layout d'ed by a Williams defender. These instances demoralized our team and pumped up Williams. In a scene that was eerily reminiscent to the end of our game against Middlebury, we were only able to score once in the second half, yeilding a 15-6 loss.

This devistating loss made it impossible for us to obtain our Section's first or second bid to Regionals, but the third (and final) bid was still within our grasp. Luckily for us, our capitulation to Williams left us with plenty of time to relax before our semifinal game in the third place bracket, which was to be against Vermont. Each of us, in our own way, had the task of forgetting about Williams and getting ready for our first game. We warmed up as a team as if this would be our first game of the day, and managed to get pretty fired up to play Vermont.

Zoodisc came out flying against Vermont. We played some of our best defense of the year against them in the early going and then played good offense against them once we got the turn. I think that we broke to take the first three points of the game, scored, and then broke again to burst out to a 5-1 lead. Our O Line was not to be outdone, however. Though they never fully allowed UVM to tie or take a lead, they seemed determined to give back any break that we wrested from Vermont's hands. We refused to let this happen, however, and took more breaks than our Offense managed to surrender. In our 15-12 game against Vermont, the D Line managed to score 7 or 8 points, which is highly unusual (to say the least). It was clear that the Offense still wasn't playing to their full potential.

Our final game of Sectionals matched us against Amherst College, our hometown rivals, for the third bid to Regionals. While Amherst doesn't have the depth and athleticism that we enjoy, they have a couple of exceptional players and a fantastic zone defense that gives a lot of trouble to a lot of quality teams. On Saturday, Amherst managed to beat Vermont 13-10, and they lost 17-13 to Williams after being up 14-13 or so. Furthermore, Amherst College had strolled to a win over Westfield State while we battled against Vermont. Amherst is a dangerous team that was better rested than we were, and we knew that we would have to bring our best to secure a victory - and a berth in Regionals - over them.

As with the start of the Vermont game, we came out flying against Amherst College. We went up a couple of breaks early, with exhilerating defensive stops and tight offensive performances after we got the turn. Unlike the Vermont game, however, our O Line didn't demonstrate any desire to blow the show. They cut hard downfield, made good throwing decisions, and executed well. I don't believe that we gave up a single break the entire game. While we had to work for every goal that we scored against Amherst College, they were unable to hang with us and we pulled ahead to a fairly substantial lead. I believe that we finally ended up winning to the tune of 15-8, earning our way to Regionals.

While we didn't always play the way that we expected, I am pretty happy with our performance this past weekend. It's difficult for a team to recover from a demoralizing loss, and we managed to recover from two of them. Many teams, including past Zoodisc teams that I have been a part of, would have struggled to pull themselves together mentally and prepare for success in these circumstances. I am very proud of our team. While we certainly aren't where we need to be in order to be successful at Regionals, I know that we are going to continue keeping a positive attitude and continue moving towards our goals. Most of our team's improvements this year occurred within two weeks of Sectionals, and I expect to see similar improvements in the period leading up to Regionals. Nobody expects us to win our Region, but I Know that we are going to give a game to anybody that we encounter.