Metro East Regionals '08

This Sunday I had the opportunity to watch Pitt women (Danger) play in regional's back door bracket for nationals. It was awesome. On Saturday, I unfortunately had to work all day, but I drove down to Princeton and booked into the same hotel as Danger. From what they told me, they came in to Saturday's play strong. Ranked third, they stomped G-dub (ranked 14th) and Messiah (ranked 11th), but unfortunately lost to Maryland (ranked 2nd) 15-9 during the last game, putting them in the back-door bracket for Sunday. From what they were able to tell me about the Maryland game on Saturday, Pitt was just too tired and run-down to give it a good go. This was unfortunate, but apparently true. Now, on Sunday I saw nothing to confirm reports that Danger played with anything less than their very best.

First game Sunday was against Penn's Venus (ranked 8th going in and would end tied with Penn State for 5th). This was the first time I'd seen this years team play and I was very impressed. I came in a few points behind because I needed to catch a cup of coffee, but Pitt women kept a steady lead (I think) the entire game. One of the great things about the way Pitt was playing was that even thought they stayed a few points ahead of Venus most of the second half, they continued to play as if they were behind. This style of play I think really characterized all their games on Sunday. Anyways, the game ended 15-11 Danger.

Second game was against NYU (ranked 4th going in and would end holding seed). This game was really exciting. Alright, so the Venus game was great, but that may have just been my excitement, I'm not sure. The NYU game really was exciting though. The entire first half we were back and forth on points. Yeah, intense. After the half, though Danger came back to will 15-9.

So after playing NYU, Danger was in the position to move up and take 2nd place and the remaining spot at nationals. Third game was a rematch against Maryland (ranked 2nd going in). Maryland had played against Ottawa (ranked 1st and without real competition the whole weekend) for first place while we were up against NYU. There was really no contest in the match. Ottawa was winning 6-2 when Maryland decided to pull out their good players and just keep putting their rookies on. I can only imagine this strategy was meant to save their energy for the game against Danger. Maryland lost the game against Ottawa 15-2.

Good story, don't know if it's true: Maryland called a foul against Ottawa on Maryland's endzone. Instead of contesting it, the Ottawa girl just laughed and told her she wouldn't score anyway. What balls. Dude.

There had been an hour between the second and third games. At the end of the NYU game, Danger's adrenaline was up and I think that the hour between the games was more harmful than helpful, giving their body's time to rest, yes, but also lowering the adrenaline levels that allowed them to push their tired bodies as hard as they needed. As it was, Maryland took half 8-6 and came back after half to take the game 15-7. So Maryland is going to nationals and Danger held seed at third. Really, I think they played great and I've never been more excited on the sidelines.

Soon to come, a rundown on all the Danger girls.

You can find all the actual scores and final rankings here on the official upa scores website.