Warmed up and awake, on the lovely pitches in Cardiff, our first game was against Nice Bristols. Despite the few early-morning turnovers, we outplayed them with our offense off the pull play, and a number of quick scores gave us a strong lead. We finished the game 15-8.

In the next game, we met again with our old friends from Leeds. We’ve become quite familiar with how they play, and we knew we would have to increase our focus to stay in the lead. As the game wore on, Leeds upped their defence and increased the pressure on our cutters. However, we utilised our handlers effectively, patiently moving the disc across the field until we could put it in to score. The hooter went at 12-11, and we kept pushing, taking the game 14-12.

Coming straight from the tough game against Leeds, we faced Brighton. Tiredness and poor decisions combined to produce a sloppy game, with a number of unforced turnovers. While we pulled it back and took the game 15-5, we’ve learned that staying focused when we’re tired is something to keep working on in upcoming tournaments.

Sunday began with a 9am quarter-final against Swift. We got to the door of the fields and were a bit put off to discover that the pitch was a) shorter than regulation size and b) locked, without any outside access. As any top team would do, we refused to be deterred and eventually found a man with the key.  After a quick warm up, we threw ourselves into the game. Swift played very aggressively, pulling down lots of swill. Still, we dominated with a combination of short and long play, as well as a variety of zones. We won the game 15-2.

During our Swift game, Dirty Olive won an exciting game against Brighton, knocking Brighton out of the top four for the first time this season. Facing Dirty Olive in the semis, we played a strong game against them, moving the disc quickly through both their zone and their man defences. Dirty Olive had several lovely hucks, but they could not shut down our offensive scores (including a Callahan!) The final score was 15-3.

In a surprising turn of events (just kidding), we faced Leeds in the final, and they were very keen to make up for their near-sudden death loss from Saturday. From the first pull, both teams gave everything they had. Leeds scored two in a row to make the score 4-2, but we countered with back-to-back scores of our own. From 4-4, we were trading points until 11-11. At this point, our energy and enthusiasm on the sideline really pulled us through, and we scored the next three points. At 14-11, after forcing a turn, captain Whitney Kakos cut deep, caught the disc in the endzone, and hung onto it when a Leeds player collided with her, ending the game 15-11. Winning a hard-fought game is always a great way to end a tournament, and our other captain, Aura Mackenzie, took the final MVP.