I’m a freshman on Colorado State University’s Men’s Ultimate team, Hibida, and here’s Trouble in Vegas weekend from my point of view:

Vegas baby, the city of entertainment. Most people don’t travel to Vegas to chase flying plastic, but I guess we aren’t most people. Hibida piled into the vans bright and early Friday morning, around 6am, and a long 13 hours later we were hitting the neon lights of the City of Entertainment. We did what any Vegas tourist would do and went straight to In-N-Out Burger. Fitz (#7 Luke Doyle) and Bam-Bam (#13 David Cuellar) had spoken highly of In-N-Out; making it sound similar to the food of the Gods. After our bellies were full and we found our hotel, we hit the hay ready for whatever trouble Vegas was going to throw our way.

On a side note: at a random gas station along the way, we had a team Ro-Sham (rock, paper, scissors) to wear a temporary tramp stamp of a butterfly….I lost. So I spent the whole weekend humoring my teammates and showing my lower back to them whenever I did something cool or if they just wanted to see a butterfly.

Every Frisbee player shares the same greatest enemy, wind. We woke up Saturday morning to 17mph gusts, but this was a valuable surprise. Playing in the wind really pushes your limits as a thrower and these windy conditions would serve as valuable experience for our indoor ridden team. Getting to the fields and seeing the beautiful dark green grass was a huge surprise! I have heard stories of the dead brown Vegas fields and how last year Hib had played on a field that had a broken glass bottle, but not this year! These fields were better than the ones we had played on at Pres Day! Now I would like to thank Skip Sewell and everybody else that helps put on this tournament. I had a ton of fun and so did the hundreds of other people that came.

Our first game of Saturday put us up against regional rival Denver University. They are a young program with Vegas being their first sanctioned competitive tournament played at in many years. The wind made it a game of zone, and as the game progressed, our depth and experience just overpowered DU. They had some talented players. #18 (Avery Nelson) was tossing dime flick hucks both down and up wind, and #33 (Alex Kunzer) was making spectacular plays all over the place. Alex is only a freshman, but he had the confidence of a college veteran. He’s definitely a great piece to build a program around. Our team had struggled against zones at Pres Day, but with our patient offense and a stifling zone of our own, we were able to take the game handily 13-4. I love seeing young programs like DU, and I’ll be cheering for them for this year and forever.

Our second game pitted up against the D3 powerhouse, Puget Sound Postmen. I knew a couple Colorado Cutthroat YCC products played on this team, Rob Korbel and Cam Waugh. The first half our athleticism and depth showed as we overpowered Puget Sound’s man defense and were able to find holes in their zone. We ended up taking half 7-3, but then the second half was a totally different story. The Postmen’s cup tightened up and soon they were clawing their way back into the game. We had a clutch D by #18 Dylan Johnson, where he terminated Cam Waugh from the handler position and then D’d the upline throw. We were able to punch that break in. Hard cap sounded off and Puget punched in one last score, but we had done enough and held them off, winning by the score 9-8. Rob Korbel played fantastic for their team. He handled the disc, making the hard throws, and protected their endzone as the deep-deep in their zone. It’s going to be fun to watch this team shred it up in the D3 series.

The final game of pool play for Saturday featured us against Occidental Detox. We came out firing on all cylinders, and even our D-line’s offense could do no wrong. Led by the upwind handling of #50 Logan Stagg, #13 David Cuellar, and #3 Noah Brown, we attacked Occidental’s traditional Sideline-trap zone, managed to launch some upwind hucks, and rip through holes in their cup. We handily took the game 12-5 with our O-line getting some rest because of our chugging break train. Occidental was a solid team with some athletic weapons and good throwers, they’ll do well in the D3 Southwest region this year.

Another side note: We had another team Ro-sham, this time to see who would have to wear kitty cat whisker eye black….I lost again. This warpaint gave birth to a plethora of new nicknames. Puma, Skitty… The list goes on.

Having gone 3-0 in pool play pushed us into our last game on Saturday, pre-quarters verse Santa Clara. This game can be described by how each team warmed up. We started doing our plyos and running drills about an hour before game time. Santa Clara sat and watched another game until about 20minutes/30minutes before game time. We were just better prepared for the match up. We came out with a force middle mark and people poaching into the throwing lanes. Santa Clara realizing our strategy started getting some handler movement leading to some power position break hucks, but our defense was too overpowering and we handily took the game 13-5.

With our Saturday over, we hit the hot tub and pool. I was going to travel with a handful of the other guys to check out the Strip, but I laid my head down for 2 seconds and “boom” it was 7 am Sunday.

Our quarters match up was against Utah, a team we had a lot of history with, usually playing each other a couple times a year. Though this was my first time playing them, it was a close game. We began by trading points, and they took the first half 5-7. They had a huge cutter (6’6”), #66 Josh Zdrodowski, who scored about 90% of their first half goals. Then in the second half, our very own #24 David Miller clamped down on him. We broke back to take the lead, eventually winning 12-9. Utah was a great team. I enjoyed playing against them and can’t wait until we get the chance again.

Coming off a quarters comeback, we went into the semifinals verse Chico State. We found out afterwards Chico State was ranked 40th in the nation. Athletically Chico State is the only team we have played this year that rivals us. From the beginning, this game was heated and tempers were flared. The game got really chippy and there were a couple of hotly contested foul calls from both sides. Even Papa Wheels (number one fan) was claiming his disgust from the sideline. Then #0 Wade Foreman got a huge layout D for us, but a Chico player had bid on top of him. Wade got a concussion and his ribs were sore (maybe broken). There was a timeout called, and as we huddled up, TK (our coach) told us to drop it and quit acting chippy. So we cleaned up our side and soon Chico was playing cleanly as well. This game was a dogfight, even without the chippyness both teams were very athletic and making huge skies and monster bids all over the place. We punched in our last break, making it 9-9 and forcing universe point. We pulled to them and a clutch D by #37 Scott Wheeler put the disc in our hands. Then after a pick call, #34 Cody Spicer threw an upline to me and I tossed it in to #24 David Miller for the score and universe point victory. We had earned back the title of “The Real CSU” that TK’s generation had lost. Chico State was a fantastic team, they have the talent and the skill to do really well in Southwest this year. Look for them going deep into bracket play at regionals.

We did it. We made the ship, meeting regional rival Colorado College in the finals. The state of Colorado had confirmed its sweep of Trouble in Vegas. The game started out with them pulling to us. They had a huge layout D by #42 Matt Zelin and ended up breaking us twice and taking an early 0-2 lead on us. A key match-up fun to watch was two of the upperclassmen battle each other, #42 Matt Zelin of CC and #25 Marshall Rawley of CSU. They were battling it out all game, getting D after D against each other, very fun to watch. They took half 5-7 on us, but then we came out with a zone look and started to force them to take shots and turn it. We would punch in several breaks and take an 11-10 lead. We pulled it down to them and threw our stifling zone at them. The zone forced turns, but our fatigued legs were unable to convert on any of them and CC scored. Making it 11-11 and forcing universe point. They pulled it down to us, and only about 4 throws into the point, #7 Luke Doyle (Fitz) made an upline cut and bid for the disc. The disc was hidden from the view of the rest of the field, but he popped up and tossed the disc down, saying no catch. A “wow, talk about spirit of the game” call came from the CC sideline, and now we were on D. CC tossed an upline throw into the endzone and #34 Cody Spicer bid for the D and forced the receiver out of bounds. As they were discussing the call on the field, TK jogged over and told Spicer if it was a force out it would result in a goal. Spicer agreed it was a force out, and CC won 11-12.

Overall, it was a very successful weekend for us. We had taken silver by one point at Trouble in Vegas, but we upheld the Spirit of the Game and that makes me even more proud of my team. Often times competitiveness gets the better of us, especially in intense situations (universe point of the finals), but it was impressive to see two of my teammates uphold the Spirit of the Game over the competition. Props to Fitz and Spicer. That’s one of the reasons I love Ultimate so much, and I’m proud to be able to call both of them my teammates. My excitement grows with each tournament. The closer that we get to sectionals and regionals, the better Hibida becomes.

Next stop: Huck Finn.

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