Ultimate places at Nationals

After grabbing five regional wins in April, the Georgia College Ultimate Club team, Disconnected, headed to Buffalo, N.Y., to compete in the United States of America Ultimate Division III College Championships. From May 21 to May 22, the team competed for a national title in the USAU Championship. After playing a total of six games in the tournament, Disconnected advanced to the quarterfinals and finished in seventh place out of the 16 teams that competed.

“It went pretty well,” senior history major and co-captain Peter Crupie said. “We had three games that we lost by one point, you can’t have much better games than that. We had a couple games where we got down, but finishing seventh out of 16 is really good considering all the different leagues we faced. It would have been nice to finish higher but I’m definitely satisfied with a seventh place finish.”

 

The championship tournament began for Disconnected on Saturday, May 21 at 12:30 p.m. when Georgia College faced their first opponent, Connecticut College’s Dasein.

In their first game, Disconnected suffered a tough one-point defeat against Connecticut College with the final score at 13-12.

After their defeat against Connecticut College, Disconnected played their second game of the day at 3:30p.m. against Missouri S&T’s Miner Threat. Georgia College fought hard against Miner Threat but for the second time in a row lost the game by a single point with the final score at 10-11.

After their loss to Missouri S&T, Disconnected played their third and final game of the day at 5 p.m. against Lewis and Clark College’s Bacchus. The Bacchus had also lost their first two games, and as a result the victor of this match-up would be the one to still be in the hunt for the national title while the other went home.

Determined not to be sent home early, Georgia College played aggressively against Lewis and Clark and defeated them 15-5 which was their first victory of the tournament and kept them from getting eliminated from nationals.

At 8 a.m. on Sunday, Georgia College stepped onto the field and defeated the Swarthmore College Earthworms in the 2A vs. 3D crossover game 15-7, advancing them to the Championship Bracket to the quarterfinals.

“We had eight seniors that had played together for four years, we know how each other plays,” Crupie said. “We work well with each other, and we are such a solid core group playing together for so long, it let us get there and play as good as we did.”

Georgia College played their first quarterfinal game at 11:30 a.m. on Sunday, May 22 against St. John’s. At the start of the game, St. John’s quickly began taking control of the disc which allowed them to gain a multi-point lead by the end of the first half.

Coming into the second half, Disconnected rallied and began to catch up to St. John’s. Over the duration of the second half, Georgia College caught up to St. John’s and the second half ended with the score tied at 13-13. This sent the game into overtime where the first team to score would win. In overtime, St. John’s managed to land a pass in the end zone and win the game 14-13, the third time Georgia College lost a nationals game by a point.

Disconnected’s loss against St. John’s took them out of the Championship Bracket and they had to play one last game in order to determine placing in the tournament. After a tough loss on Sunday against Truman State with the final score of 13-9, Georgia College placed seventh overall in the DIII College Open Championships and their season came to an end.

“I think the best thing will be for the guys playing next year to know that they saw top caliber teams play,” Crupie said. “They saw the best teams and it showed them how they have to play next year and how a nationals team needs to play. Now that they’ve seen it, they know exactly what it is they need to do and how hard they have to work, practice and push themselves.”

Disconnected will begin their 2012 season at the start of January. Although Georgia College will be losing six seniors, one of whom is Crupie, he is confident about the team’s potential for next season.

“I’m feeling good about next season. We should have about 12-15 guys for next year who can come out and have good commitment,” Crupie said. “We have a couple guys returning for fifth year who have good leadership and are good players who can help the younger guys out. I’m really looking forward to next season, I think they’re going to do well again.”