UBC, UW, and Oregon Go to Nationals

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DAVIS, CA
April 26-27, 2008

The Northwest prides itself on thinking of Northwest Regionals as one of the most competitive tournaments in the country, and this year was no exception. In fact, there were 7 teams that turned-out to have legitimate shots at winning one of the three bids to the championships. In the end, the top three teams going into the weekend took the three bids, although not in the order they were seeded. Congratulations to UBC, UW, and Oregon. Represent the region well.

Saturday

The way the format was designed, Saturday's games were mostly cosmetic. As long as you didn't finish last in your pool you still had a shot at getting a bid. After pool play, the four pool winners played crossover games against another pool winner, which was purely for seeding. Without too much pressure of elimination, the four pools went roughly to seed and the top seeds were hardly challenged for a full game.

Pool A saw Washington hold onto its number one seed at the tournament. Its closest game was against Humboldt in the game for the pool. Humboldt came out fired up and scored the first two points of the game. Senior Amy Lowe was a big presence for Humboldt as she caught a number of passes long for the Hags. UW settled its offense down, reducing its rushed turnovers and went on to take half and win the game convincingly 13-4. Humboldt staved off Oregon State and Sonoma State handily. Sonoma State, a first year team anchored by Brinn Langdale, pulled off the only upset of the pool by besting Oregon State 11-8 and avoiding elimination for another round. Pool B saw a similar pattern with the top two teams rolling through their games and the only upset occurring in the 4 v. 3 game. UBC looked untouchable, only having four points scored against it in three games. All four of those points were at the hands of PLU, a team that showcased its athleticism against the lower seeded teams. Whitman pulled out a close game against Lewis & Clark, 10-8.

In Pool C, the game between Oregon and Berkeley for the pool was the most exciting match, but it too quickly became lopsided. Oregon was able to generate isolated cutters going deep and Berkeley struggled with its endzone offense. Towards the end of the game, a number of the points were lengthy affairs with multiple turnovers for both teams, but Oregon had already locked it up and won 12-5. With the speed of Darragh Clancy and Cree Howard, it was unclear why Oregon seemed to be beating Berkeley deep, but it looked like the Pie Queens' roster was being subbed relatively freely for much of this game.

Stanford started out a little slow in its first round game against UCSC in Pool D. Hannah Buoye and Lilian Berla run the show for Santa Cruz, but the squad was ultimately no match for Stanford's depth and Stanford won 15-4. Western Washington was also able to hold UCSC to a minimum of points, beating the California team 13-5. The game for the pool started out incredibly close and hard fought between Stanford and Western Washington. At 3-3, both teams had made impressive plays on offense and defense, with Alyssa Weatherford, Hannah Kreilkamp, and Mariko Kobayashi leading the way for Western. Stanford’s Emily Damon took her defensive assignment to minimize Weatherford's impact seriously, and Damon's two lay-out blocks in the first half helped shift momentum Stanford's way. Western was not quite able to shake Stanford's defensive pressure and Superfly ended the game after a 10 point run.

Washington and Oregon had a defensive battle in their game. Oregon's coach, Lou Burruss, explained that both teams' styles were so different they weren't able to generate their usual offensive looks against the other team's D. Washington slowly managed to increase a lead, finally taking half 7-5. UW scored the next point after half, and Oregon answered, but it was all for naught as the hard cap had sounded and the game ended with Oregon's goal. UW won 8-6.

On the next field over, UBC had taken an early lead against Stanford. Negar Elmieh (#4) was playing especially good D on Stanford's handlers, while Kira Frew (#19) and Tory Hislop (#21) were running the show on offense for UBC. UBC upped the ante with an aggressive four person cup that trapped both sidelines. Although Stanford eventually worked it against the cup, UBC had already been able to jump to a 7-4 lead by half-time. In the second half, UBC went on another run before Stanford started stringing points together. With the cap looming, Stanford had run out of time and UBC won the capped game 12-9.

Sunday

The quarterfinals were full of exciting games. Western Washington's top players took it to Oregon and kept the game within two (9-7, Oregon). Pacific Lutheran caught Washington off-guard with a number of unusual defenses, including a two-person cup that prevented many open looks downfield. Riding emotion, PLU was up by one at 9-8 before UW was able to score three in a row to win the game. By the end of the match, PLU's legs weren't able to run their D with the same aggressiveness and UW had calmed down a bit. Berkeley had lost to Stanford 15-9 at Sectionals, but the team from across the Bay was not ready to concede anything to Superfly. Berkeley’s offense was clicking, utilizing big inside-out breaks to space and allowing Howard to win her match-ups. On defense, Berkeley played a four-person cup that challenged the swing and allowed the disc to stagnate in the hands of non-throwers on Stanford. Kara Johnson and Emily Damon made things happen for Stanford's offense, but the team couldn't string enough passes together to keep it going. Berkeley completed the upset 13-9.

Both of the semis saw teams that cut their losses early. Berkeley was exhausted after its Herculean effort against Stanford in quarters and was not able to bring the same kind of pressure to UW in semis. UW won 14-4. After UBC gained a small lead over Oregon where the UBC offense looked untouchable, Oregon opened up its rotation to prepare for the backdoor road.

All the real action at the tournament was happening in the backdoor, and the finals did not provide the showcase that one would normally expect. Although UW had beaten UBC twice at Sectionals, perhaps the prospect of repeating the feat seemed less meaningful now that both teams had already qualified. UBC did not see it that way and was firing on all cylinders. The depth of the UBC roster is significant and the Canadians had a match-up for every one of Washington's top players. UBC took the game and the number one spot out of Regionals, 12-5.

After its loss to Berkeley, Stanford regained some of its momentum in the backdoor game against PLU. PLU's clam D frustrated Stanford’s vertical stack, but Jenny Founds opened up Stanford’s deep game and the team won by a healthy margin. Riding that into the next game against Oregon, Stanford came out strong and went up on the women from Eugene. Rachel Dyke got some critical blocks in Stanford's zone and Stanford's offense was clicking—utilizing looks to the front of the stack to generate its movement. The half-time score was 8-5 in Stanford's favor and things seemed to be on-track for Superfly to work its way back into the light through the backdoor. After half, Oregon came out with a new defensive strategy and renewed energy. Although Stanford increased its lead to 11-7, things were definitely not as easy as they had been. Playing physical D on the first in the stack forced Stanford to rely on its downfield flow more, but the cutters seemed increasingly hesitant to throw upfield. Johnson and Damon shouldered the brunt of the responsibility for Stanford’s offense and the Oregon D keyed in on them. Jess "Venus" Huynh got a critical layout block on an up-the-line cut to help Oregon come-back and all of a sudden the game was tied at 12-12. Next point wins. Stanford received and worked it all the way up before a floaty pass into the endzone was caught by Damon only be to dropped after a hard collision with her own teammate. Oregon turned around and scored the point to advance. Stanford was not going to the championships for the first time since 2000, when it lost to Oregon on double game point. If history is to truly repeat itself, then this Stanford squad that is only graduating two players will be back in the finals of Nationals next season.

While the Stanford-Oregon showdown was happening, Berkeley and Western Washington were duking it out in a parallel game. Western took an early lead in this match, capitalizing on tired mistakes by Cal. Once Cal realized they were in danger of losing the game, the team rallied and pushed back enough to tie the game up at 11's. Western pulled out the last point and made it into the game-to-go for the first time in the school's history. Western wasn't quite up to the task of repeating such an upset in the next round against Oregon. Both teams were visibly tired, but Oregon had more players to rely on in pressure situations and slowly increased its lead to the final score of 12-8.

There was no doubt that all of the top 8 teams at Regionals had outstanding players and the depth of the Region was impressive this year. UBC and PLU are losing the most seniors of any of the top teams, but programs have been established at these schools to ensure that next year is going to be another dog-fight.