It's @MachineUltimate taking the first men's semifinal on Universe point win, defeating @BravoUltimate 15-14 in a thriller!#USAUltimate | #USAUNats pic.twitter.com/qJGKJPqpU2
— USA Ultimate (@USAUltimate) October 22, 2023
This year has been challenging for Bravo. We're title defenders but certainly not title favorites. We've had a solid regular season, but haven't cemented ourselves as anything other than a pretty good team. We didn't win our region (again). We aren't entering nationals as a top seed. Expectations for the team, at least externally, aren't high.
Despite all that, I'm so f'ing pumped up for where Bravo is in this moment. We've dealt with injuries all season. We've struggled to find an offensive identity. We've got a ton of talent, but we haven't quite put together all the pieces together. But the real reason I'm excited isn't because I think we're guaranteed to make another "miracle" run to the title, but rather because I know that this team believes in ourselves and each other.
That's the crux of it right there. We believe in ourselves and each other. It sounds like cliché cat poster material, but it's the reality of why Bravo is such an amazing team.
The Tournament
I was really excited for the World Cup Draw seeding this year at nationals. A quick rundown on the new seeding process: the 1st-4th seeds were determined by the USAU post-regionals rankings, then the 5th-8th ranked, qualifying teams were randomly assigned as 2 seeds in each pool, the 9th-12th ranked teams as 3 seeds and 13th-16th as 4 seeds.
Honestly, my enthusiasm for the new system was about knowing our pool a lot earlier than normal, giving us more time to prepare for specific opponents. The rest of who ended up where wasn't important - it was all about that prep time.
We were drawn into pool A with DC Truck, Raleigh Ring of Fire and Eugene Darkstar. It was literally the top overall seed (Truck), the highest ranked 2 seed (Ring) and the highest ranked 3 seed (us) - an absolute juggernaut of a pool. I have no idea what Truck thought about it, but getting placed into a pool with us (again) and with the 2021 champions (Ring) must have stung after their dominant regular season.
We stormed out of the gates, breaking Truck five times on route to a 15-14 victory. Our defensive attack was headlined by Mathieu Agee and Jay Froude who set the tone early with a pair of absolutely jaw dropping blocks. This win wasn't an upset from our perspective - Truck has been overall best team of the past two club seasons in the men's division - no question. However, three of their previous four losses dating back to 2022 US open were to us. This is a matchup we look forward to every single time because we know it's going to be an absolute slug-fest.
Heading into our second game against Ring we knew it was essential to keep the energy high. Beating Truck could quickly be rendered moot if we followed it up with a loss to Ring and create the potential for the dreaded 2-1 three-way tie. Early the game, Ring's defensive pressure was spectacular. Our O was holding on by the slimmest of margins before we found our footing late in the first half and pulled away in the second with a handful of breaks winning 15-12. This clinched the pool for us and gave us some breathing room heading into our last game of the day against 0-2 Darkstar.
The first half we struggled to find the right energy and Darkstar showcased a polished deep game. The halftime score was only 8-7 and despite the fact that the outcome of the game wouldn't change the pool standings, we wanted to finish the day strong. First year captain Justin Abel lit a fire under the team with his half-time speech and we pulled away, allowing only a single point in the second half and winning 15-8.
This was a far cry from our 1-2 finish in pool play at the previous year's nationals and gave us a cushy 11:45am start time the following day against the winner of Austin Doublewide and San Francisco Revolver for quarterfinals. Doublewide had kicked our butts in the South Central regional final and Revolver had beaten us 15-13 in a blustery game at Pro-champs. Truck, meanwhile, had lost to Ring in another thrilling 15-14 game, dropping the top overall seed to a 3rd place finish in the pool.
The coaching staff got to the fields early to watch the prequarters matchup and scout our potential opponents. My hope was that Doublewide would win, not because I felt they were the easier matchup, but rather because we knew we had a better showing in us that what we'd brought in the regional final. My hopes were dashed as Revolver handled them 15-7, but we were still excited to have a quality game against a great opponent.
We knew Revolver would leverage the vertical threat of Adam Rees and Kevin Tien and we had phenomenal matchups on both our D lines for those two in Mathieu Agee, Saeed Semrin, Jay Froude and Kai Marshall. Feeling good about the personnel pieces, we came out strong, breaking four times in the first half, feeding off fresh legs and good vibes. Revolver punched back a bit in the second half, breaking us twice, but we righted the ship and cruised to a reasonably comfortable 15-11 win. This was our cleanest offensive game of the tournament. Revolver likes to switch and bracket a lot in the downfield but our backfield core of Jon Nethercutt, Connor Tabor and Nate Buchholz kept calm, moved the disc from side-to-side confidently and gave our cutters the time to negotiate the brackets and switches.
On the other side of the bracket, Machine trounced Rhino 15-9 setting up a semi final between the only two remaining undefeated men's teams at the tournament, us and them. Truck had squeaked by Atlanta Chain lightning in pre-quarters then won a controversial universe point game vs Boston DiG in quarters. Ring had beaten Vancouver Furious George in prequarters and then beat an absolutely loaded New York PoNY team in quarters, 14-13. All three of the top teams from our pool had pushed through to semis - a wild, but not overly surprising outcome. Thanks world cup draw!
We started strong in the Machine game. We knew a lot about their personnel and what they liked to do as well as having a reasonable expectation for how they'd approach the game on both sides of the ball. All tournament long they'd utilized the 1-2 punch of Joe White and Nate Goff off the pull. They weren't looking just to huck but rather were looking to leverage those two to chunk the field early with the combination of speed, size and Joe White's throws. Often they'd move the disc out to the high side-line (there was a reasonable crosswind basically the entire tournament) and then break the mark to Joe with Goff chunking the field on the next continuation.
Similar to Revolver, this was a dual vertical threat that we felt good about our ability to match on. We started the game strong, breaking early and often. On the offensive side of the disc, they played a lot of soft junk and poaches but we slid around the shallow spaces and worked through their sets. Denny Bechis spent the whole game running through poaches and switches to keep Machine on their heels and in the first half, it worked wonderfully well. We led by three breaks at half and were starting the second half on O.
In the second half Machine made a very clear and concerted effort to play more physically. Early in the half they committed to a more dedicated zone then zagged into more physical poachy D, headlined by Johnny Bansfield. The game turned into a scrum. Players were hitting the turf left and right. Things were getting chippy and heated. They broke three times to tie it up at 11-11 then we slogged through a 15 minute point with 8+ turns before finally punching in the score. We had started the point with one of our D-lines receiving but lost Noah Coolman, Mathieu Agee and Saeed Semrin to injuries, so by the end of the point, it was a mish-mash of whoever had survived.
Machine held on a quick huck from Joe White to Paul Arters on the next point then we worked it up wind before Connor Tabor hit Alex Atkins for a hammer score. Bansfield bid into Atkins on the catch and Atkins gave him a stare down then a huge spike. As he was walking away, Bansfield shoved him in the back and was ejected from the game.
The energy and tension that had been building the entire second half bubbled over in that moment. On top of the ejection, Machine received their third yellow card which resulted in a reverse brick for them on the subsequent pull. After the dust finally settled and Bansfield left the stadium, Machine again responded with a quick hold on a huck from Joe White. Adding to our injury list, Erik Hotaling separated his shoulder on the deep pursuit. The game was tied at 13-13 with us receiving.
On the subsequent pull, a rushed throw from our backfield popped up in the air and Andrew Sjogren elevated for a massive block. Bechis unfortunately had pursued super hard on a directional change after the disc floated over his head and ended up in Sjogren's landing space unable to adjust and Sjogren landed hard and had to be carted off the field.
Machine broke shortly after to take their first lead of the game 14-13. We held quickly which tied it at 14s, setting up universe point. We took a time out, called our line and reinforced that we'd do it together. It's embedded at the top of this entry, but Machine worked it cleanly down the field before Joe broke the mark around for the score and win. He was untouchable in the second half on O - an absolute world-class talent.
Big props to Machine for the comeback and the amazing game. I'm sure this is a game that people will continue to re-watch for a very long time for a whole bunch of different reasons. Congratulations to Truck Stop for avenging their loss to Ring in the other semis then taking down Machine in the finals 15-12 for their first ever club title - a very much deserved win. I hope other teams are taking notes. (The strategy is to go 1-2 in Pool A).
Wrapping It All Up
About a year ago I reflected on our 2022 National Championship. It was an amazing, affirming and transcendent experience having the opportunity to work with that group of individuals and for all that work to pay off with winning the title. We didn't quite get there this year, but I would argue this year was just as successful as last.
We preach a lot on Bravo about being process oriented. This is on both a micro and macro level. For example, we approach defense from a lens of maximizing what we identify as high leverage situations. We know we won't get them all, but work hard towards creating as many of those moments as possible, so that over time we consistently perform at a high level. There's a level of trust built in that what we're doing and how we're approaching things is moving things in the right direction, even if the outcome isn't always there.
Having truly bought into the mindset of detaching from outcome is how we're able to rise to the biggest moments when the spotlight shines brightest. We know that we could have lost the game in prequarters last year to Sockeye and not won a title - a single play could have changed that entire season. But the fact that we didn't panic. We didn't implode. We stayed calm, kept running our sets, didn't worry as much about the outcomes that were out of control but stayed focused on process - that's how we came back and won the game - and from that point on, nobody could touch us.
I care deeply about winning. I'm wildly competitive. Bravo also cares deeply about winning. We're a group that's come together to compete at the highest levels of the sport and to win championships. People spend 10 months in the gym, at the track and on the practice field prepping to compete. But what makes this team so special is that we know there's so much more there than just the wins. Knowing that your teammates have your back when you screw up. Knowing that you're going to be lifted up whether the outcome of a moment is a positive or negative. Knowing that the journey is genuinely as important as the result literally makes us more likely to win.
In close games, it really comes down to a handful of individual moments that can go either way. We work hard to make sure as many of them go our way as possible, but that's not always the case. One moment or outcome that didn't go our way doesn't change who we are as individuals or who we are as a team. The person who threw our last turn vs Machine is also the person that got the block that led to our first lead of the Sockeye prequarters game last year. Was he devastated at the turnover vs Machine? Absolutely. Is there a single soul on the team that felt any negativity towards him for that throw? Absolutely not.
There were a lot of Bravo tears when that game ended. A whole lot. But I promise that those tears weren't because we didn't win. They were tears because we know this was the last time some of our players would wear the rocket on their chest. They were tears of knowing that we didn't have practice together the next Tuesday. They were tears of knowing we wouldn't have another game together with this exact group, ever again.
I'm generally known as someone who likes advanced tactics and schemes. I've got hundreds of powerpoint slides with clips of different situations; descriptions of how to approach situation X Y Z; justifications for the what the why and the how of what we want to do on the field. Anyone who knows me, knows I'll sit down and talk Ultimate nuance for hours on end (DM me, I'll totally chat any time). If folks watched me closely at nationals this year you probably saw me mouthing something to myself pretty frequently. It wasn't advanced tactics. It wasn't working through all the matchup permutations. It wasn't planning for specific pull plays or sets. It was simply my energy matters more than scheme. My energy matters more than scheme.
I talked last year about growth as my why. I talked about how I respond to negative situations as being an area for growth. I'm proud to say I've made a lot of progress and I'm really excited to see that growth continue into future seasons.
For all of y'all who worked your tails off this club season, congratulations. Your work is noticed. It matters. Thanks to the USAU staff, observers and volunteers that put on such an amazing event. It's always a pleasure spending time engaging in this wonderful, wacky sport.
Lastly, thanks to my amazing wife and daughter - Shayna and Mila. Having their support at the tournament this year meant the world to me and I literally couldn't do what I do without them.
Until next time.
-TK
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