Big Muckamuck: UCLA BLU Preview

16 college alumni teams representing the best Open and Women’s teams from the past decade square off for the title of the best of the best. The Big Muckamuck will find the likes of the Hodags, CUT, Superfly and Burning Skirts competing on July 2nd-3rd at the annual Potlatch tournament in Redmond, WA. As part of our ongoing coverage of the event, Skyd caught up with Anna Nazarov of UCLA to find out more about what BLU is bringing to Redmond.

Roster:

Name – Grad Year – Current/Recent Club Team
Lili Gu –  2014  –  N/A
Meg Batavia – 2013   –  N/A
Elizabeth Melnikas – 2013   –  Safari
Meghan Kemp-Gee – 2010   –  N/A
Marisa Mead – 2010   –  Zeitgeist
Rebecca Delshad –  2009  –  N/A
Yvette Fisher –  2009  –  LA Metro
Krisztina Jozsef – 2009   –  Knock Out!, LA Metro
Andi Coleman –  2008  –  Mischief
Angie Sanan – 2008    – Mischief, LA Metro
Anna Nazarov – 2007   –  Zeitgeist
Holly Schwarz – 2007   –  LA Metro
Lisa Vampola –  2007  –  Mischief, Zeitgeist
Annie Skaron –  2007  –  D’OH
Jamie Nuwer – 2004   –  Zeitgeist

Briefly share the history of your school’s Ultimate program. How it started/developed into a competitive program.

Anna Nazarov: Bruin Ladies Ultimate (BLU) began as a UCLA club team named Blue Lightning many years ago, started by several grad students. However, with few undergraduate students, Blue Lightning fizzled.

In the fall of 2003, a not-so-young upstart named Jason “Popeye” Schissel, decided enough was enough. UCLA had gone far too long without a women’s team. He took it upon himself to recruit young, athletic women to play ultimate frisbee. He had members of Smaug, the UCLA men’s Ultimate team, tabling and encouraging women to show up to an informational meeting.

Alex Korb and Jamie Nuwer became the first coaches of the newly dubbed BLU. Korb played for Brownian Motion as an undergrad and Monster for club. Jamie Nuwer, at the time, was starting her first year of med school at UCLA. She had graduated from Stanford where she had played with Superfly and was now going to spend her last year of eligibility coaching and playing with the girls of BLU.

We had high hopes that first year, setting our sights on competing at UPA College Nationals in Seattle, WA. Unfortunately, we lost the game to go to Claremont by 2. Our second year, we set our sights equally high. We played an intense game against Colorado in semi-finals of Regionals, tying the game at 11s after being down 5-11. We lost on a double game point. Our third year, however, we defeated Colorado in the finals of Regionals to win the #1 bid in our region to Nationals! After a hard-fought weekend in Columbus, OH, we played Stanford in the finals game and finished a strong 2nd. BLU finally went from team to program.

What are some of your school’s biggest victories/games in the past decade?

• 2004 Stanford Qualifier: beat SB in our 9th game of the weekend to qualify for the Invite in our first year of existence
• 2004 Stanford Invite: beat Brown (our first win at a high level tournament)
• 2005 Sectionals: our first Sectional Championship!
• 2006 Regionals: our first Regional Championship!
• 2006 Nationals: the aforementioned 17-16 dgp semis win against Kali to go to finals, Pooja Shah gets 2nd in Callahan race
• 2007 Regionals: our second Regional Championship!
• 2007 Nationals: close win against Bella Donna in quarters that people called the most exciting game of the weekend, Anna Nazarov wins Callahan
• 2008 Regionals: our third Regional Championship!
• 2008 Nationals: made it to semis after graduating all but one of the original blu founders, Angie Sanan gets 4th in Callahan race
• 2009 Nationals: upset over Kali in prequarters after losing to them twice at Regionals
• 2010 Nationals: upset both UW and Stanford

Who on your roster will be making some of the big plays at the BM?

The handling trio of Angie “Taz” Sanan, Lisa “Clyde” Vampola and Anna “Maddog” Nazarov should bring teams back to 2006 and 2007. Andi “Gizmo” Coleman and Yvette “Powski” Fisher will dominate the deep air space and the rest of our young, in-shape cutters and handlers will make things difficult for all the old peeps out there.

Which match-ups are your team most looking forward to?

Kali for sure. Our teams went through a 4 year period where no game was decided by more than 2 points.

Why is your team going to win the BM?

We’ve got youth on our side. Our team didn’t start until the 2003-2004 season so we won’t have the iconic, poachy oldies slowing us down.