As a number of the readers of this blog are surely nursing their weary bodies, and slowly getting into the working week after a fantastic weekend of Ultimate, I will reflect on the Heroes' participation at the 16th Halibut tournament. The tournament had an Olympic theme this year and with no less than 15 Olympic events, and numerous gold medals on offer, there was a lot of fun to be had in between the frisbee.
Our weekend started off fairly poorly. We were matched up against the 2nd seed Moose Knuckle (arguably top seed with the amount of stars on the team) and in very very windy conditions we never really had a chance. Unfortunately, we were unable to get a single point on the board and Moose Knuckle were given the pleasure (or horror) of seeing many Heroes pantsless around the spirit circle.
The second game was against the Lounge Lizards who had narrowly overcome the Pick-up team in the first round. The wind had partially subsided and we reveled in the slightly more favourable throwing conditions to jump out to a slender lead 6-4. From there we had a bit of a lapse and the play of the Lizards improved and they went on a 4 point run to take half 8-6. After the half-time break we traded points until time cap was called at 10-8? I'm not sure of the score but it was a two point margin. This was a game that we were certainly in for the duration and the Lizards took it away from us with composed play. Special mention to friends of the club George Salisbury (Heroes BPL Captain) and Notty who played exceptionally well for the Lizards.
Our final game for the Saturday saw us against the unknown of the Pick-up team. This game was a see-sawing affair with both teams able to string some good plays and points together. The Pick-up team had a handful of experienced players leading the way with plenty of athletic types rounding out the team. We lost a bit of structure, and increased our unforced turnovers with basic skill errors in the second half of the game to go down by 1 at the hard time cap. End score was 10-9 Pick-up.
A few notes on the party. Good venue, Crowne Plaza hotel was very nice. The toga party theme was awesome, wearing nothing but a bed sheet and underwear is extremely comfortable. I had my face in a bowl of pasta for close to 10 minutes for the Olympic eating event, Stefan Rappazo won the "gold medal". Heroes rep Ginny came in a close second at the ice-cream eating contest. Dusty's gold in the toga walk-off event was seen as a formality, the other contestants were really just competing for silver.
Sunday morning; Heroes vs UQ, last round of pool play. UQ were a mess, no, actually, Goose was a mess. In true Goose style he arrived at the fields still dressed in his toga, with nothing else, and exclaims, "Where the f^&* is all my shit!" Goose found his things and the game went ahead. UQ played the entire game with 6 players and although we tried to exploit this it worked against us at times as we did not stick to our man well enough in defense and tried to poach off to get blocks. They played a smart game and waited for our errors and converted well on the turn, throwing numerous times to big man Josh Kane who was often mismatched against smaller Strelans. Ashlee Dodd also played well and knows exactly where the end zone is and the fastest and most direct route to get there. Heroes again had patches of great play. At times we were able to cut our way through their zone at will and when our skills held the points were scored easily. Again the hard time cap was our nemesis as we lost this game 12-11.
The cross-over game saw us against Monstarrs. This game had plenty of friendly banter, and good spirited play. Myall, Reece, Kalin, and the super tall and athletic Scott led the men and Gio, Connie, and Danni led the women. The Heroes had our best half of frisbee of the whole weekend to be even at 6-6 and down 8-6 at half. Unfortunately, the half time break was not kind to us and skill errors again cost us numerous points. We managed to hold on for a couple more points but the Mostarrs were too strong and took the game 15-8.
Our final game was the 9th-10th play off against the Griffith A-team. Their shirts read "I pity the fool that isn't on the Griffith A-team" and from seeing how much fun this young group of guys and girls had all weekend I believe it. We were able to set up a good zone against them and put pressure on their handlers to create turns. Our offense also clicked well this game and we were able to connect with a number of longer shots and played a fast short game that Griffith were unable to match. They had some great points including one of their tall players taking a great catch over my diving bid in the endzone. Certainly a team to watch for the future.
Wrap-up: Heroes finished 9th. One loss by 2 points and 2 losses by 1 point. We were competitive in every game bar the pantsing by eventual tournament champions Moose Knuckle. The halibut tournament is a fantastic weekend, thanks to Stef, the organising committee, and the volunteers that made things happen.
One last note, the Final between MK and Dericioustan was a fantastic game to watch. The highlight reel could have had numerous plays from every single point. Congratulations to MK, narrowly edging out Dericious 15-14.
Thanks for reading this far, any and all comments welcome below.
Our weekend started off fairly poorly. We were matched up against the 2nd seed Moose Knuckle (arguably top seed with the amount of stars on the team) and in very very windy conditions we never really had a chance. Unfortunately, we were unable to get a single point on the board and Moose Knuckle were given the pleasure (or horror) of seeing many Heroes pantsless around the spirit circle.
The second game was against the Lounge Lizards who had narrowly overcome the Pick-up team in the first round. The wind had partially subsided and we reveled in the slightly more favourable throwing conditions to jump out to a slender lead 6-4. From there we had a bit of a lapse and the play of the Lizards improved and they went on a 4 point run to take half 8-6. After the half-time break we traded points until time cap was called at 10-8? I'm not sure of the score but it was a two point margin. This was a game that we were certainly in for the duration and the Lizards took it away from us with composed play. Special mention to friends of the club George Salisbury (Heroes BPL Captain) and Notty who played exceptionally well for the Lizards.
Our final game for the Saturday saw us against the unknown of the Pick-up team. This game was a see-sawing affair with both teams able to string some good plays and points together. The Pick-up team had a handful of experienced players leading the way with plenty of athletic types rounding out the team. We lost a bit of structure, and increased our unforced turnovers with basic skill errors in the second half of the game to go down by 1 at the hard time cap. End score was 10-9 Pick-up.
A few notes on the party. Good venue, Crowne Plaza hotel was very nice. The toga party theme was awesome, wearing nothing but a bed sheet and underwear is extremely comfortable. I had my face in a bowl of pasta for close to 10 minutes for the Olympic eating event, Stefan Rappazo won the "gold medal". Heroes rep Ginny came in a close second at the ice-cream eating contest. Dusty's gold in the toga walk-off event was seen as a formality, the other contestants were really just competing for silver.
Sunday morning; Heroes vs UQ, last round of pool play. UQ were a mess, no, actually, Goose was a mess. In true Goose style he arrived at the fields still dressed in his toga, with nothing else, and exclaims, "Where the f^&* is all my shit!" Goose found his things and the game went ahead. UQ played the entire game with 6 players and although we tried to exploit this it worked against us at times as we did not stick to our man well enough in defense and tried to poach off to get blocks. They played a smart game and waited for our errors and converted well on the turn, throwing numerous times to big man Josh Kane who was often mismatched against smaller Strelans. Ashlee Dodd also played well and knows exactly where the end zone is and the fastest and most direct route to get there. Heroes again had patches of great play. At times we were able to cut our way through their zone at will and when our skills held the points were scored easily. Again the hard time cap was our nemesis as we lost this game 12-11.
The cross-over game saw us against Monstarrs. This game had plenty of friendly banter, and good spirited play. Myall, Reece, Kalin, and the super tall and athletic Scott led the men and Gio, Connie, and Danni led the women. The Heroes had our best half of frisbee of the whole weekend to be even at 6-6 and down 8-6 at half. Unfortunately, the half time break was not kind to us and skill errors again cost us numerous points. We managed to hold on for a couple more points but the Mostarrs were too strong and took the game 15-8.
Our final game was the 9th-10th play off against the Griffith A-team. Their shirts read "I pity the fool that isn't on the Griffith A-team" and from seeing how much fun this young group of guys and girls had all weekend I believe it. We were able to set up a good zone against them and put pressure on their handlers to create turns. Our offense also clicked well this game and we were able to connect with a number of longer shots and played a fast short game that Griffith were unable to match. They had some great points including one of their tall players taking a great catch over my diving bid in the endzone. Certainly a team to watch for the future.
Wrap-up: Heroes finished 9th. One loss by 2 points and 2 losses by 1 point. We were competitive in every game bar the pantsing by eventual tournament champions Moose Knuckle. The halibut tournament is a fantastic weekend, thanks to Stef, the organising committee, and the volunteers that made things happen.
One last note, the Final between MK and Dericioustan was a fantastic game to watch. The highlight reel could have had numerous plays from every single point. Congratulations to MK, narrowly edging out Dericious 15-14.
Thanks for reading this far, any and all comments welcome below.
