SB1 at Mixed Indoor Regionals 2016
A misty morning in Cambridge. An excited SB1 team set off on the drive to Norwich.
Humaira Bhadelia, Tasha Smith, Elsa Elsa-Elsa, Charlie Daffern (C)
Luke Smith, Jonny Slaughter, Perry Hong, James Richardson, Tejas Guruswamy, Alex Jones
SATURDAY
Pool Games
Cambridge 1 vs. LSE (11 – 3)
Cambridge 1 vs. UEA 2 (11 – 0)
Since we won the tournament last year – weren’t we good! – we started the weekend seeded first, with a couple of pretty chill pool games to get us into the swing of things. Given we only had two hours of practice beforehand, this was something of a blessing as it gave us time to settle into our offense, work out some kinks on defence and find our roles within the team. Turns out Tejas is still a handler.
Cambridge 1 vs. Essex 1 (9 – 4)
Our first kind of test of the weekend came against Essex 1. They were made up of a bunch of tall guys, and suffice to say they did not play the Cambridge style of offense. Scoober up the line, who knew? (Inspired.) We traded for the first few points, then scored about five in a row to take the game home.
Cambridge 1 vs. St. Mary’s 1 (5 – 4)
Our last pool game of the day, against the second seed in our group. We scored a few points early in the game through exploiting a lovely little IO gap in their zone, which (to their credit) they realised and managed to close up. We then went 2-4 down to them, before storming back to a victory. There was a huge amount of contact in this game, and about half way through I went and spoke to their captain asking that they reign it in a bit as we were pretty concerned about players getting injured. One guy threw himself at Elsa – who reacted gloriously by breaking him anyway. Their team had a core of two or three guys who played the majority of the points, were quick, and could mostly throw. This caused our guys a few issues on defence, particularly with surprise overhead looks. Nonetheless we persevered, and a HUGE layout block from Perry in the final point of the game ensured the win. Seriously, HUGE.
Power Pools
We went into power pools with a game in hand, as our victory against St. Mary’s carried forwards. Sweet.
Cambridge 1 vs. KCL 1 (5 – 7)
Our first loss of the weekend was at the hands of KCL. This was the first time a team had women who in any way challenged us, and it showed with a slow start to the game on defence allowing them some fairly easy scores off the back of their ISO-handler-up-the-line play. They also ramped up the pressure hugely on defence compared to what we were used to – having just played two games versus zones – and our offense showed some weakness. Also, Iceni player.
Cambridge 1 vs. Brunel 1 (8 – 5)
This was a do-or-die game, as we knew that we’d have to beat Brunel to come in the top half of the power pool, avoid the six-to-twelve crossovers, and get the latest start the next day. So we went out and smashed it. The offense tightened up and did a better job of working against their man defence, our ladies took the initiative to shut down their women, and despite some quick plays from their guys we managed to prevail. Hurrah!
We anticipated a second place finish in the power pool, as we expected KCL to beat St. Mary’s in their last game of the day. Much to our glee, St. Mary’s came through for us and won the game, putting us into a tie with Brunel on wins and losses, which we came out on top of due to the head-to-head victory. Nailed it. Thus, we went into Sunday retaining first seed, and with our first game of the day (the 1v8 crossover) starting at 12:08.
SUNDAY
One-to-Eight Bracket
Cambridge 1 vs. UCL 1 (9 – 3)
Yuuuuuu Weeeiiiiii was playing with the UCL first team, along with Dan ‘The Man’ Janman, so with two Cambridge alumni on the opposition team this was a bit of a family affair. Beforehand we were focussing on processes, not goals. Don’t get broken around, and don’t get beaten to the open side. (This was pretty much the mantra for the whole weekend, but this was the first time it worked when it really mattered.) We crushed them. Our ladies ran circles around them – proud of you – and the guys did a solid job as well. They tried playing ISO but got pretty flustered when we did some sneaky poaching, and numerous turnovers resulted. I reckon we got at least two stall-outs. Go defence!
Cambridge 1 vs. UEA 1 (7 – 8)
Ooooh, this was tough. We were up six points to three, doing pretty well for ourselves. And then we lost in universe point. I think they started power-lining their guys; their guys were good. Later in the game they ramped up the defence hugely, and as in the KCL game our offense broke down slightly, with separation occurring between the cutters and the handlers. Now, as a magnanimous captain I wouldn’t blame anybody for the loss (we win as a team, we lose as a team), but JR did throw away in universe point. So you can draw your own conclusions from that. On the plus side, Imperial 1 (feat. ex-SB-captain, ex-GB-player Rolo Turnover-Ritson) also lost their semi-final, so we got the match that we really wanted from this weekend.
Cambridge 1 vs. Imperial 1 (4 – 6)
Unfortunately, we then lost the match that we wanted from this weekend, despite Rolo turning over on every single scoober that he threw. There were at least three, perhaps more.
Game-to-Go (to Division 2 Nationals)
Cambridge 1 vs. KCL 1 (8 – 5)
Now, we’d lost to these guys on the Saturday. We’d then driven over an hour home, reconsidering our loss to these guys. Meanwhile their star Iceni player didn’t return on the Sunday. So, things were looking up for us. And we nailed it. Our defence took a considerable step up to start shutting down their ISO players, and our offense made better choices (e.g. always throw to Humaira in the endzone). It was good - the win took us to a fourth place finish overall. And now, Nationals!
#nationalsisnationals
MVPs: Jonny and Charlie (who also took home the bright pink sunglasses as reward for marginally winning the team’s MSP vote).
The team finished third overall in the regions spirit standings! This is ace, go team. We also had the highest overall scores for both Rules Knowledge & Use and Communication. Wonderful.
JR accepts some responsibility for both the good and the bad.
(‘You don’t have to write that.’ – JR, 2016).
