MUDI recap
Been a while since the tourney now but I’ll try to recall the pertinant details…
We entered the tournament at the #3 seed out of 14 coed teams, which led to an uneven 3-pool system. We were in one of the 5-team pools so 4 games on Saturday. Games were deliberately kept short (to 11 pts) due to the crazy hot weather (something like 37 C for the high). Quick synopses follow:
Hot Dish (W, 10-6). Hot Dish is Minneapolis’ 2nd coed touring team, not quite on the same level as Flaming Moe, nor the same level as us. However they game us some trouble early on. We barely eked out a halftime lead before finishing strong in the second half for the win.
KaBLAMMO! (W, 10-5). Minneapolis’ 3rd coed touring team, featuring one of our Trogdor winter leaguers back in the Cities for the summer. They looked decent overall but again not quite on our level… nevertheless we again managed to struggle early on, even trailing 3-2 at one point, before rebounding for the lead and this time a shutout in the second half.
Funk Dancing for Self Defense (W, 11-1). Clearly not an organised team of elite players. We dominated throughout but lost the elusive goose egg late in the second half.
So Many Ducks (W, 11-?). Don’t remember much about the details of this game. We were never challenged for the win, but the game wasn’t too enjoyable as there were a lot of calls that slowed the game down and by the end it felt like both teams were just going through the motions to finish out the game, no doubt a function of the heat and fatigue from three previous games. Finally it ended and we finished 4-0 on the day.
Saturday night: there was a bit of a dinner at the fields but we headed back to the billets shortly after. Our billet this year was the same as last year, one of the tourney organisers and a great guy. Unfortunately he had forgotten to leave the back door open this time so we were stranded outside while he was still behind at the tourney site running the dinner and party there. We eventually figured out that one of the storm windows could be removed and then the screen lifted so were able to ‘break in’ to the house with no damage and minimal inconvenience… never told the billet this though! Got inside, napped a bit and then hung out there the rest of the night. A bunch of the DingWop boys were in for the night too… those guys know how to have a good time. I had a great time too, unfortunately a bit too much so…
Sunday Games:
Quarter final - New World Love Clan (W 13-7). This team appeared to be made up of Madison players who weren’t quite good enough for the elite men’s and women’s teams. They were probably as good as the first two teams we played Saturday. I was feeling a bit groggy from the night before and didn’t really contribute much… nevertheless we won without too much of a challenge.
Semifinal – Flaming Moe (L 13-6). Finally a true elite opponent, Minneapolis’ top coed team. This was a team that came ready to play and didn’t make mistakes, and capitalised on our miscues. Just a few too many turns for us and we were unable to stop them on D. I was getting absolutely schooled by a few of their cutters, who seemed to have unlimited endurance and were as fast as I was on a good day. And I was not on a good day – the last night of partying had left me ‘slow as ass’ to repeat a later assessment by one of our captains. The game ended decisively for Flaming Moe. While overall we had a decent game, and certainly did not fold, we finally saw a team that was just that much better – fitter, more organised, more mistake-free. The type of team we’ll see for at least a few games at nationals, so a good early test. Just a month left to bring it to that level, we’ll see if we’re up to it.
We entered the tournament at the #3 seed out of 14 coed teams, which led to an uneven 3-pool system. We were in one of the 5-team pools so 4 games on Saturday. Games were deliberately kept short (to 11 pts) due to the crazy hot weather (something like 37 C for the high). Quick synopses follow:
Hot Dish (W, 10-6). Hot Dish is Minneapolis’ 2nd coed touring team, not quite on the same level as Flaming Moe, nor the same level as us. However they game us some trouble early on. We barely eked out a halftime lead before finishing strong in the second half for the win.
KaBLAMMO! (W, 10-5). Minneapolis’ 3rd coed touring team, featuring one of our Trogdor winter leaguers back in the Cities for the summer. They looked decent overall but again not quite on our level… nevertheless we again managed to struggle early on, even trailing 3-2 at one point, before rebounding for the lead and this time a shutout in the second half.
Funk Dancing for Self Defense (W, 11-1). Clearly not an organised team of elite players. We dominated throughout but lost the elusive goose egg late in the second half.
So Many Ducks (W, 11-?). Don’t remember much about the details of this game. We were never challenged for the win, but the game wasn’t too enjoyable as there were a lot of calls that slowed the game down and by the end it felt like both teams were just going through the motions to finish out the game, no doubt a function of the heat and fatigue from three previous games. Finally it ended and we finished 4-0 on the day.
Saturday night: there was a bit of a dinner at the fields but we headed back to the billets shortly after. Our billet this year was the same as last year, one of the tourney organisers and a great guy. Unfortunately he had forgotten to leave the back door open this time so we were stranded outside while he was still behind at the tourney site running the dinner and party there. We eventually figured out that one of the storm windows could be removed and then the screen lifted so were able to ‘break in’ to the house with no damage and minimal inconvenience… never told the billet this though! Got inside, napped a bit and then hung out there the rest of the night. A bunch of the DingWop boys were in for the night too… those guys know how to have a good time. I had a great time too, unfortunately a bit too much so…
Sunday Games:
Quarter final - New World Love Clan (W 13-7). This team appeared to be made up of Madison players who weren’t quite good enough for the elite men’s and women’s teams. They were probably as good as the first two teams we played Saturday. I was feeling a bit groggy from the night before and didn’t really contribute much… nevertheless we won without too much of a challenge.
Semifinal – Flaming Moe (L 13-6). Finally a true elite opponent, Minneapolis’ top coed team. This was a team that came ready to play and didn’t make mistakes, and capitalised on our miscues. Just a few too many turns for us and we were unable to stop them on D. I was getting absolutely schooled by a few of their cutters, who seemed to have unlimited endurance and were as fast as I was on a good day. And I was not on a good day – the last night of partying had left me ‘slow as ass’ to repeat a later assessment by one of our captains. The game ended decisively for Flaming Moe. While overall we had a decent game, and certainly did not fold, we finally saw a team that was just that much better – fitter, more organised, more mistake-free. The type of team we’ll see for at least a few games at nationals, so a good early test. Just a month left to bring it to that level, we’ll see if we’re up to it.
posted by Druski at 10:25 p.m.
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