More utter dominance from the USA teams.
June 21, 2016 by Charlie Eisenhood in News, Recap with 0 comments
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ST. ALBANS — The USA delegation at the World Ultimate and Guts Championships continued its dominant performance on Tuesday at the UCL Sports Grounds outside of London, extending its undefeated cumulative record to 23-0.
Only the Master’s Men’s team had a competitive game — a 15-12 win over Denmark in the last round of pool play — as the other four teams cruised to victories.
Discussion has to begin with the Mixed team, which bounced back (relatively) from a sluggish performance yesterday afternoon by playing their best ultimate of the week against Germany this afternoon. It was a game that looked early on like it could be truly competitive. The Germans got holds on their first two offensive possessions and looked fast and aggressive. The US answered in kind and sent out a D-line featuring Reid Koss and Kelly Johnson. Both played tremendous defense as Koss came up with multiple blocks as the teams traded turnovers. Finally, the pressure of the Americans was too much and a German swing pass along their own endzone line popped up in the air; Koss leapt and intercepted the disc for a Callahan, putting the US in front for the first time, 3-2.
Fear set in quickly for the German offense, which started getting huck-happy and throwing discs either too far or at powerful defenders like Sandy Jorgensen. Erica Baken ripped a massive IO backhand huck to Sam Kanner to make it 4-2. Then Johnson got a big layout score to extend the lead to three.
It was off to the races. The team was stifling on defense and precise on offense. A mentality change was apparent from the previous day. Their effective play was epitomized in the second half by a stunning layout Callahan from Sam Kanner on the first throw off the pull. After those initial two holds, Germany never scored again.1
The Men’s and Women’s teams simply offered more of the same today: smashing victories against all comers. The Men’s team beat the Czech Republic 15-1 and South Africa 15-4 to move to 2-0 in their power pool. The Women’s team wrapped up pool play with two more wins, 15-7 over Finland and 15-0 over Singapore. They began pool play like they started it, with a bageling of an opponent in about 45 minutes.
The stat of the day: the Women’s team spent 30 seconds on O points during the Singapore game, when they received out of halftime. Their other 14 scores all started on defense.
The Women’s Masters team looked phenomenal today against Japan in what was a highly anticipated matchup. It ended up not being competitive. The US ran out to a 5-0 lead before taking half 8-2 and eventually the game 15-4. Their physicality and size gave Japan a lot of problems and they swarmed every hanging disc on defense. They also put in a full team effort: 16 different players scored or assisted in the game. The Women’s Masters team also easily defeated Germany 15-7.
The Men’s Masters team had the toughest game of the day. Denmark, led by the four first half goals from Mads Bakkegaard, became the first team to hold a lead on a United State team at halftime (Denmark led 8-7). The US team was only able to generate a single break in the first half. But the second half was a different story. All week, the Men’s Masters team has been a strong second half performer; the match against Denmark was no exception. A Casey Degnan layout block and bookends score got the game back on serve to start the second half.
That set the tone. The US added three more breaks in the following seven points to go ahead by three and never look back.
Jared Inselmann had a strong two goal, five assist performance to lead the Americans.
The Men’s Masters team also beat Switzerland in the first game of power pools, 15-7.
Tomorrow
- The Men’s team finish up power pools tomorrow morning with their first true challenge: a matchup with the undefeated Australians (4:30 AM Eastern) on a showcase field. A win clinches them a spot in the quarterfinals and a seeding crossover game against the winner of Pool L (either Canada or Japan). A loss sends them into the prequarters. The crossover/prequarter round is at 8:30 AM Eastern.
- The Women’s team has clinched a spot in quarterfinals after winning their pool today. They will face Colombia in a seeding crossover game (10:30 AM Eastern).
- The Mixed team faces off against Ireland (6:30 AM Eastern) in the final game of power pools. A win clinches them a spot in quarterfinals and a seeding crossover game against the winner of Pool K. A loss could still mean that the US wins the pool, or that they are forced to play a prequarter. The crossover/prequarter round is at 12:30 PM Eastern.
- The Men’s Masters team finishes power pools with games against Great Britain (6:30 AM Eastern) and Australia (10:30 AM Eastern).
- The Women’s Masters team continues pool play with matchups against Australia (6:30 AM Eastern) and Great Britain (12:30 PM Eastern).
It’s worth noting that this same German team put up nine points on the Japanese. ↩
