This game started extra thick. The air was Thick. The grass was Thick. The puddles were Thick. And Navy gave us a Thick push outside our Royal comfort ‘zone’.
We started the game the way we always start our games: start on D, play a point of person defense, and then move to a zone. We did get the turn and scored first but Navy came back and punished our zone with 3 straight points. Thankfully for us they called a timeout, and we tried to pull ourselves out of our funk. Royal talked a bit about our zone and went back into it. We fought hard but Navy would not let up and they took half 6-8.
Half time we normally like to just throw the disc around, pet puppies, and barely even get a cheer in. This half we took every second to brainstorm how to get out of this Thick slump. Our MVP this week and honestly every week, Pete, suggested we move to person defense. So that we did.
We came out on O, scored, then moved into our person defense. What a difference this made for us! Navy’s experience, speed, and talent pushed us to work hard, but our Thick Royals decided we were not going down without a fight. Second half was hard fought by both teams but Royal ended the game 15-10.
Perhaps most importantly, this game would have made the Spirit gods of frisbee very happy. After the first pull we all paused before starting to have a very hilarious but needed discussion about what constitutes as down as the grass was literally knee height (okay maybe just my knees but still!). We had many calls made on the field by both teams – picks, out calls, fouls, strips, all the things – and each call or discussion was met with a simple agree/take-back/contest/catch up – move on. What an incredibly fun, competitive, and evenly matched game. 10/10 would enjoy playing Navy again.
Royal MVP: Pete Bubenik. Pete is the workhorse of Royal that has way too much frisbee knowledge. He will give you a small nugget of info or patiently wait to give us the insight we need to make us better. He always shines in our handler space, is always open, and literally never stops working and pushing our team.
Royal highlights:
- Cody with great heads-up defense
- Gianna and Emily with some juicy hucks downfield
- Anton providing much needed short up-field movement
- Jeffery constantly opening the field up and chasing down one of said juicy Emily hucks
Navy MVP: Tanya Lopez. Tanya was super focused this whole game, constantly making cuts and getting open on the under or in the handler space for her team. She also came to her team’s rescue with a sliding catch to pick up a disc that wasn’t even meant for her (good thing we discussed up calls with that grass!).