Unfortunately, we have an Ultimate tournament this weekend. Every year, I know when spring is coming because Notre Dame has their annual Whitesmoke Ultimate tournament. It just happens to fall on the same weekend as the wedding that is the reason for the family visit.
The good news is the weather is looking good for this weekend, at least on Sunday. Upper-50s
and sun with a little bit of wind. Just about perfect weather for throwing a Frisbee around. I am going with a team from Goshen College. We won't have much experience, but I think we'll have enough to take advantage of some pretty awesome athletic ability. I'm excited about throwing to the 6'8" guy.Last weekend I also went to a tournament. There was a pickup team from Ann Arbor that needed a few extra players so I went up to Mount Pleasant, MI, to play the Double Down tournament. We actually ended up winning the tournament (which I have no illusions of doing this coming weekend), but the most exciting game of the weekend was the first one on Sunday. U of M had already played one game and was used to the gusty conditions and slick mud. Having won all of our games on Saturday, we had a first round bye on Sunday. We came out flat and they were already warmed up. Stupid mistake after stupid mistake led to an 8-3 deficit at the half. I had made several poor decisions resulting in discs floating away in the wind. One other guy kept dropping the disc. I went up to him right at the start of half and told him that it was time to step up and play better because we both knew that we could. It was my first time outside since last fall and I was just making poor decisions.
A pep talk at half time brought us out fired up. We traded a couple of points and then it was 10-4 which is what they would finish the game with. We went on a 7-0 run. When it was 10-8, time was running short so we capped the game at 11. In other words, we just needed to score three more before they scored any.
The next point we were working the disc up the field. One guy made a great catch just outside of the endzone. I ran up and got the disc from him and then found a guy wide open in the back of the endzone. The throw started out straight at him, but the cross wind caught the edge and moved it about five feet to his left. I watched him track it without really moving his feet. He ended up leaning over to catch the disc and fell into a giant puddle of water that was still sitting in the back corner of the endzone.
Did I mention that it was 40 and windy? There were still a couple of snow banks in places. The water was cold and the wind made it colder. But we were tied at 10-10!
While Jason went to change into dry clothes, we started the last point. The game was straight to 11 so whoever scored this point would win the game. It went back and forth a couple of times before I turned it over in our half of the field. While I wasn't too concerned, I knew that was a bad place to turn it over. Two throws later they throw it right to one of our guys, who catches it on our goal line. Since we were slightly down-wind in this cross wind and he saw someone cutting to the opposite end of the field, he winds up and hucks a backhand the length of the field. It doesn't take a normal flight path since the wind is blowing and he kept the edge down, but our receiver tracks it down over his head and lunges to grab it, just short of the endzone. He gets up and throws a little forehand to an open teammate for the score.
We win!
While it isn't all that rare to score 7 points straight (in fact the next game we won 15-2 with a 10 or so point streak), it is rare to come from behind with 7 straight. It didn't mean a whole lot, but it was one of the most exciting games I have played in a long time.
By the way, Jason got most of his wet clothes off before the water soaked into his skin. It took him a little while to warm up his extremities, but his core stayed warm.
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