Conference Coverage
Apr 10th
The USA Ultimate Championship Series starts this weekend at various Conference Championships around the country, and while it doesn’t really heat up until regional tournaments start in two weeks, there’s a lot of action worth paying attention to over these first two weekends. Joaq and I have a number of conferences that we’re hoping to take a look at, so stay tuned throughout the week.
In college, every year of Sectionals (it’s going to be hard to stop calling it that) was an important stepping stone on the path toward the ultimate player that I am today. In the fall of 2005, I packed into the back UVA B-team captain Jason Heuay’s two-door Acura and headed to B-Deviled, the first tournament of my ultimate career. On the way, Jason told us about Sectionals the previous spring and how Mary Washington’s Connor Maloney snagged a layout callahan on universe point in the game-to-go against William & Mary– a team that was at Nationals the year before. In 2007, UVA’s season ended at Sectionals after Virginia Tech sent us and our overconfident asses to the backdoor bracket and Connor ripped down a hammer from partner in crime Andrew Eaton in the final game. In ’08, winning Sectionals was our season-long goal, and when we beat William & Mary and the zone that had given us fits in the fall, the entire team felt a sense of accomplishment. And in 2009, the year we made Nationals, Sectionals got us back on track after we had fallen short in the finals at Southerns and Easterns.
A stepping stone, yes. But Sectionals is just kinda cool. Stay tuned…
Youth Coaching
Apr 8th
This summer, I’m hoping to write a lot more about coaching youth. It’s an area where I’ve got a lot to learn, and it’d be sweet to get people talking about their best ideas and practices. I recently wrote a story for the USA Ultimate magazine about the ultimate program at HB Woodlawn, a school in Arlington, Virginia, so be on the lookout for that.
For now, check Anna Nazarov’s interview with Jordan Rose, the Bay Area Disc Association’s Youth Director. A few take home points from the article that I’ve also seen while hanging around at HB:
- If the coaches can’t dedicate enough time, or the schools don’t care that much… teams don’t achieve their potential. They remain recreational and a two tiered system begins to develop, where one team is learning how to run hard, how to pivot and throw a flick (with one or two highly talented kids leading them), while another one is working on more advanced stuff like the trap zone and an effective horizontal stack.
- If your kids are having fun and developing a disc culture, then gradually the more athletic ones, the ones with previous skills and experience, they start coming too. And then you know you stand a chance against the established teams.
- I really hope you don’t have to be an elite player to become an elite coach!
The first two points aren’t too different from the college level. When teams have dedicated coaches and organizers, fundamentals are reinforced more easily so that advanced aspects of the game can get more attention. Also, though cultures vary, it remains that good players tend to show up because the team they’re coming to has one they enjoy.
The third point is extremely important. There’s a perception that youth coaches have to be elite players. If anything, it’s ideal that they are teachers because their schedules and skill sets are shaped for working with kids, but bottom line, it’s much more beneficial for a coach to be able to manage individual and team dynamics than it is for them to be a great player.
Preliminary Final Rankings
Apr 7th
USA Ultimate’s preliminary final rankings came out today. They are preliminary because while Michelle Ng has checked all of the rosters, they need to be double checked (which is part of why they have been made public). Here is what we’re looking at for bids to the College Championships:
From last week’s rankings, all that has changed is that New England gained a bid while the Great Lakes lost one. Also, you’ll notice that Virginia is absent from the top 40. They had a roster verification issue that I’m told is being worked out.
Link Dump
Apr 5th
Been meaning to comment on these for a while…
http://www.youtube.com/user/brodiesmith21
I’m sure everyone has seen Bro Tips by now. I think they’re important because right now, we don’t have too many standards for teaching fundamentals in our game. Also, Brodie is among the best players doing it right now, so it’s interesting to hear how he’s been instructed. I think coaching fundamentals has a lot more to do with how you teach than what you teach, but still, these could really push the envelope by providing coaches with quality content to pass on.
http://gravityandlevity.wordpress.com/2009/05/28/braesss-paradox-and-the-ewing-theory/
The Ewing Theory was Bill Simmons’ term for his observation that the Knicks played better when Patrick Ewing wasn’t on the floor. Put another way, it’s the idea that even though a player may be the best offensive option on a team, he should not take all of the team’s shots because at some point, he stops being productive. A big reason for this is that the more shots he takes, the more a defense focuses on him, but another is that sharing the ball makes teammates better at executing when that player is not on the floor. It’s interesting to apply this to ultimate. Teams like Florida (Cole Sullivan), Harvard (George Stubbs), and Whitman (Jeremy Norden) put the disc in the hands of one player quite a bit, and I wonder how their team’s overall execution rate relates to their star players’ amount of touches.
http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/26105/heat-where-is-the-lob
Also basketball related and on a similar note, this just talks about how much better the Heat could be if LeBron didn’t have the ball in his hands all the time. Brodie and Doublewide come to mind as a good parallel, but at the same time, Brodie’s throws were a big part of Doublewide’s run to the semis last year.
Any other examples of star ultimate players that might benefit their teams by getting fewer touches?
Weekend Re-Cap
Apr 4th
As the last weekend in the 2011 regular season, this was a big one. In One Nightstand, Huck Finn, and the Wahoo Challenge, you saw quality teams from around the country transition from tournaments based on national competition to ones that look a lot more like what they’ll be seeing at the conference championships and regionals.
I think this kind of transition is important for two reasons: For one, you’ve got to get out of conferences and regionals in order to get to Boulder, so seeing that competition before elimination play is an obvious way to prepare. For two, it’s important to play teams that aren’t as good as you. If you don’t, it’s easy to overlook them at regionals and wind up playing down to their level, which can lead to prolonged rounds or even a bad loss. If you do, you can work that stuff out before it really matters.
Here’s how the weekend went down:
- Tufts took down Harvard, 15-9, to win One Nightstand. The semis also included Middlebury, who is still looking to improve at the handler spot, and Vermont, a team that has a number of strong Amherst grads and one that a few people I’ve talked to are calling a darkhorse in New England. As far as how Harvard played, I was able to catch up with coach Josh McCarthy briefly this morning. Handler Andrew Vogt made his return from a wrist injury but was out after rolling his ankle on Saturday, handler Whitt Virgin-Downey returned from a foot injury and made a difference, and handler Adam Fagin was healthy enough to play, but the team was missing multiple other mid tier starters with minor health issues or academic conflicts. He also said that the tournament was pretty strong upwind/downwind.
- Wisconsin beat Minnesota, 11-6, to win Huck Finn. Semis included Ball State and Illinois. Illinois always seems to have a poor regular season and then turn it on at regionals, and I wonder if they’ll do the same this year. For more on Huck Finn, check out the awesome Ozark Ultimate blog.
- Virginia beat Virginia Tech, 10-8, to win their Wahoo Challenge. Virginia Tech had an up and down weekend, losing to William & Mary on Saturday and then going on a big run against Virginia in the finals. The teams had to be completely off of the fields by 11am on Sunday, so shortened rounds made comebacks harder.
One thing a number of my friends have mentioned is the possibility of teams tanking games in order to give their region’s second-best team a shot at moving up in the rankings and snagging another bid to Nationals. Virginia and Harvard are the specifics. In Virginia’s case, I know that his option wasn’t considered since it seemed like a loss to Virginia Tech probably wouldn’t put Tech above Virginia in the USAU Rankings. Even if it would, Virginia would risk falling out of contention for a team strength bid, so the Atlantic Coast would remain at one bid. Finally, Virginia Tech’s loss to William & Mary on Saturday took the idea completely off the table. In Harvard’s case, my guess is that this was not what McCarthy was focusing on. Instead, I assume he opened up lines a little bit against Tufts in order to continue addressing his team’s biggest weakness, which is depth.
April is a funny month for college ultimate. Competition hits a a lull for just about everyone, but it’s a good time for cold weather teams in the Northeast, Great Lakes, and North Central to catch up to those playing outside year-round. Peaking too early is a big problem for lots of teams, and I think staying inside for so long is what has allowed Carleton and Wisconsin to really bring their best game into the Series over the last five years or so.
Other thoughts?
Wildcard Bids Part II
Mar 30th
There’s a new set of USAU Rankings out, and with it, we have another post from our boy Franklin D. Bluth (check out his first one here). Remember, in order to rank teams, USAU uses an algorithm that factors in strength of schedule and margin of victory that you can see here.
Wildcard Bids
In the last weekend of the regular season, just 4 of the top 20 teams in the rankings are in action. All four teams, Wisconsin, Harvard, Virginia, and Minnesota, are comfortably ahead of the teams that are fighting for the last team strength bids. Minnesota, the lowest rated of the 4, has a rating 130 points higher than California, the highest rated team not to earn a team strength bid. Basically, as long as these teams don’t completely flop this weekend, they will stay in the top 19.
As you can see in the chart above, all the bids are projected to go to teams in the top 19, except the automatic bid for the Metro East. The highest ranked team is Cornell, and they are 44th.
Right now, Michigan State, Iowa, Washington, and Whitman are holding onto the last 4 team strength bids. Since none of these teams are playing this weekend, they can do nothing but cross their fingers and hope that this weekends results are in their favor. A lot of teams on the bubble will be playing, including Tufts, Wisconsin-Whitewater, Illinois, Virginia Tech, Texas A&M, and Ball State. It should be an exciting weekend of ultimate as the last few bids to nationals are decided.
Below, I use the Winners/Losers format to give a rough idea of who gained/lost in these rankings.
Winners:
North Central – With Wisconsin’s strong performace at Easterns they are back to having the four bids they have become accustomed to the past couple years. Iowa is barely holding on to a fourth bid, while Wisconsin-Whitewater has a chance to get an unprecedented 5th bid by doing well at Huck Finn this weekend.
South Central – By winning every game at Centex, Colorado College (not to be confused with the University of Colorado) has moved into a position to give the region a third bid. 3 bids seems fitting for this region with 3 teams who have established themselves as contenders followed by a bunch of clearly second tier teams.
Northwest – Washington and Whitman have both moved up to take 2 team strength bids, giving the region 4 bids total. Since the Northwest has the last 2 team strength bids, this weekend’s results could possibly result in both bids being gone by next week’s final standings.
Losers:
Ohio Valley – Went from 4 bids to 1. Penn State continues to beat chumps and thankfully, they are not being rewarded for it. Ohio showed themselves to be a true top 20 team by placing 11th at Easterns, but not the top 10 team that the computers had touted them to be. Both Ohio and Ohio State lost to Georgia teams at Terminus this weekend, and now the region is down to a single bid. Their last chance for a second bid will be this weekend with Ohio State playing at Huck Finn.
Southwest – The Southwest region is back to just 2 bids. California is sitting one position outside the all-important top 19, and will have to hope for some luck this weekend to move back up. With 8, count that, 8 teams in the top 40 (and 7 in the top 30) and only 2 bids to share, this region is shaping up to have the most exciting regionals tournament.
Ties:
Atlantic Coast and Southeast – Though both regions have a strong team at the top, no one else has stepped up in either region. Georgia from the SE went winless at Easterns, and UNC-W moved out of the top 40. Virginia Tech has an outside chance to move up by playing well this weekend at the Wahoo Challenge.
Metro East – Cornell showed at Easterns that they still have a long way to go. Does this region deserve a bid to Nationals?
New England – Harvard is definitely a top team. Tufts went 2-5 at Stanford and beat a bunch of teams at Southerns that probably won’t be making an impact on Sunday of regionals. Based on last year, Tufts and Middlebury have potential, but they haven’t shown it yet. Both teams and Dartmouth have a chance to earn a second bid this weekend as all 3 teams are playing in One Nightstand.
Great Lakes – Went from a comfortable 3 bids to 2. Michigan showed themselves to be a contender with a 4th place finish at Easterns. Michigan State and Illinois, however, have yet to live up the preseason hype. Last weekend, Illinois lost to Georgia at Terminus, while Michigan State dominated lesser competition at the Chicago Invite, giving Ball State their only loss so far this year. This weekend, Illinois and Ball State will get one last chance to earn a team strength bid as they compete at Huck Finn.
Until next time,
Franklin D. Bluth
Terminus Injury Report
Mar 25th
There was a pretty good response to the injury reports that were put together for Easterns, so I thought we’d try to continue it for Terminus. Problem is, I don’t really know of anyone that is banged up or out for the weekend.
If you’ve got info on injured players on teams playing at Terminus this weekend, post it!
Below, I’ll update as I get more info:
Out:
Robert Goode (Wilmington), shoulder
Elliot Erickson (Georgia, hamstring
Fletcher Hartline (Georgia), hamstring
Michael Slade (Georgia), hamstring
Andrew Fish (Georgia Tech), leg
Victor Lesniewski (Georgia Tech)
Tyler Plunkett (Georgia Tech), ankle
College Terminus Preview
Mar 25th
First, apologies about not previewing Southerns, Tufts won and that is important for them going into the Series, more on this later.
With all the hype surrounding Easterns, and to a lesser extent Centex, College Terminus is a good tournament that’s remaining under the radar. In some way Terminus is more important than Easterns was. While Easterns featured many of the top teams from around the nation, Terminus features the teams that will determine the bid allocation going into Nationals. Here is what I’m looking at going into the weekend . . .
- Currently the Northwest, Ohio Valley, and Southwest regions all have very tenuous holds on team strength bids. Where those last three team strength bids go will be determined by how teams fare this weekend at Terminus. The lowest ranked team holding down a strength bid is Ohio and #19. The top four seeds at Terminus are #21 Tufts, #19 Ohio, #22 Ohio State and #27 Illinois.
- The number one seed, Tufts, had an alright Stanford Invite with a convincing win over Texas, but also a double game point loss to host Stanford. They followed that up by trouncing lesser competition at College Southerns. The question is, will Tufts be focused after a week of spring break?
- Can Ohio bounce back after a rough Easterns? And how will they fare at their third tournament in four weekends?
- Will OSU avenge their loss to Ohio at the Easterns Qual?
- Can Illinois build on a sneaky good Centex performance (two losses by a total of 4 points) at Terminus?
- What team outside of the top four will play well? Both Middlebury and Georgia qualified for Nationals last year. Georgia Tech and North Carolina had a good amount of early season hype. Also, Stanford and UNCW have both had up and down seasons, and if either of those teams is hot at Terminus they could very well win the thing.
For results throughout the weekend keep an eye on the Score Reporter: http://scores.usaultimate.org/scores/#college-open/tournament/8501
College Top 20
Mar 23rd
Another big weekend of college ultimate is in the books, and it’s round about that time for a new set of rankings. While Southerns didn’t play a large part in our rankings, both Centex and Easterns factored in heavily.
At this point in the season it’s impossible to pick 20 teams and not feel like you’ve left someone out. Sure we could expand to 25 teams, but it’s already hard enough to rank teams 15-20, what would we do if we had to rank 20-25. Excuses aside, let us know who we left out, why they should be ranked, and where they should be ranked.
Again, these rankings are based on where teams stand now, not where we think they will finish. Teams still have a lot of time to grow and reach their potential, and the rankings at the end of the season may very well be different then they are now. We again ran into a lot of debates with regards to how to rank teams, especially outside of the top 14 or so. How do we deal with teams like Kansas, Kansas St. and Illinois? How about a team like Texas A&M who had an awful Presidents Day and a very good Centex? Our answer is that we’ll do regional power rankings once the series starts.
With all that in mind, here we go:
- Florida
- Carleton
- Pitt
- Michigan
- Colorado
- UBC
- Harvard
- UCSC
- Wisconsin
- Oregon
- Colorado College
- SDSU
- Texas
- Iowa
- Minnesota
- Virginia
- Whitman
- Ohio
- UNCW
- Washington
The list of notable teams continues to grow. At this point we have Tufts, Middlebury, Cal, Stanford, Illinois, Ohio State, and Texas A&M. Wow, that’s a long list. It’s exactly that fact that has us wanting to do regional rankings, and we will.
Also, expect another bid allocation breakdown and a Terminus preview within the week.
Oregon at Easterns
Apr 6th
Posted by Neeley in Commentary
1 comment
Oregon just threw their Easterns highlight video up on RSD.
Something that was noticeable all weekend in Wilmington is that Cody Bjorklund (#6) and Dylan Freechild (#10) have a great chemistry together. It’s particularly impressive given that Cody’s a 5th-year and Dylan is a freshman.
What other two-player connections are as potent? Alex Thorne and Tyler DeGirolamo at Pitt comes to mind, I think Stubbs-Fagin (Harvard), Sullivan-Sage (Florida) have been pretty good as well. Also, Grant finds Patrick Roberts a lot in the endzone for Carleton. Still, I’m not sure that either of these have quite the thrower/receiver balance that Cody and Dylan do.
Thoughts?