Women’s College Centex
50 Women’s Teams
March 26-27, 2011
Austin, TX
Score Reporter
For a complete rundown of all the action, check out Michelle Ng’s recap on USAUltimate.com.
Highlights:
Champions UCSB Burning Skirts
- For the second consecutive tournament, UCSB lost on Saturday morning, losing 15-11 to UNC-Wilmington in their first game. For the second consecutive tournament, UCSB won every other game they played and avenged their loss in the final, beating UNC-Wilmington 15-7.
- Did anyone see Tufts coming? Playing their first tournament of the year and seeded in the low 20’s, the Ewo finished second in their pool, losing to Iowa State 11-10. Tufts was able to shake off the loss and beat UNC, Carleton, and the University of Washington to reach the semifinals. After a tough 15-8 loss to UCSB, Tufts finished strong, beating Iowa 13-12 claim 3rd overall.
- Every 3 seed in the power pools won or tied for first in their pool. Only two of the top four seeds made the semifinals. Oh, and the University of Washington’s 6th place finish bumped them up to #1 in this week’s USAU College Rankings. Has there ever been this much parity in the women’s division?
We asked teams to tell us about their experiences at Centex. Here are some of their stories:
AnnaMaria Paruk (Michigan):
This weekend was expectedly unexpected. I knew there would be a lot of parity in the women’s division but I did not know how much. The teams that needed to step up did, showing that there is not one team or region that is dominant in Women’s Ultimate. Granted, UCSB has won two tournaments, but they did show that they are beatable. In terms of our team, we lost only one game the entire weekend and it was only by one point. We had a great showing which makes me extremely excited about the rest of the season.
One of my favorite parts about the weekend was the fact that I actually saw SOTG in action. I’m not one to necessarily write about SOTG (although it is important to me), but this time I most definitely have to mention it. Usually I walk out of a tournament with at least one bad experience from a team that abuses rules, makes terrible calls, or plays dirty. This weekend, at least in the games I played, that was not the case. UBC, Carleton, and Washington especially had great great spirit. It was nice to play in very competitive games where calls were made (I should clarify – the RIGHT calls were made) while both teams were still intensely competing.
Overall this weekend was an absolute blast. The results show that Nationals is up for grabs between any number of teams. Many teams are on the cusp of becoming great teams. The rest of the season is going to be extremely interesting.
Laura Glassman (Tufts):
Tufts Ewo claimed 3rd place
The highlight for me this weekend was definitely our game against Carleton College in the pre-quarters. Centex was our first tournament of the season, and we came in not really knowing what to expect from ourselves. We were super pumped from our win against UNC on Saturday, as it gave us the ability to play up in D1 and the championship bracket. When we saw that our next game would be against Carleton, I know I was excited, but definitely a little intimidated. The first few points were rough, and we fell behind 4-1. However, we came together and realized that if we starting playing our game, we could beat Carleton.
We came out from that talk and eventually tied at 6s, and began a long game of trading points between the teams. The play that stands was Mia Greenwald’s (Freshman!!!) Callahan, which was a huge break and brought us to an 11-9 lead. Claudia Tajima was all over on the mark, and forced this floaty dump flow, which Mia leapt up to catch for the score. Everyone on the sidelines went nuts and stormed the field. The energy was contagious, and gave us enough steam to keep going and win the game on universe and stay in the championship bracket until the semis finals.
Carolyn Finney (UCSB):
I would have to say the funniest thing this weekend was when our tent blew away in the middle of one of our game (I think it was against Berkeley) and proceeded to roll across an adjacent field about 50 yards. A girl tried to stop it and the giant tent proceeded to roll over her and all we could see was the imprint of her in the tent cloth. She was fine as the tent just flipped over her, and we finally caught up to it and brought it back to our field.
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