Tassie Tiggers at Australian Ultimate Championships, Sydney, April 22-25 2006

Tassie Tiggers, April 2006

Having qualified for Nationals by finishing 6th in the Southern Australian Ultimate Championships, and through Eureka Goldigaz faliling to take their place, the Tiggers went on to play Nationals in Sydney in April. Despite finishing 8th at Nationals in 2005, the Tiggers were seeded 18th out of 18 teams in 2006, as a result of their ranking at the Southern Australian Ultimate Championships.

The full Tassie Tiggers team at Nationals, Sydney, April 2006: (back row) Matt Petrie, Dave Cooke, Matt Smith, Mike Baker (captain), Tory Fitchett, Basil van Riet, Warwick Reed, Felix Kennedy, Tim Johnson, (front row) John Kristensen, Anson Chun, Aaron Pinkus, Tom Caldwell. Photograph by John Kristensen (with some help from Mas).

More photos can be found at JK's Tasmanian ultimate photo gallery and in particular at the Nationals '06 gallery.

Player list

A full team list for the 2005 Tassie Tiggers who went to Sydney for Nationals in April 2006 follows:

Official report from Captain Mike!

The Tassie Tiggers Ultimate Frisbee Club recently competed in the Australian Ultimate Frisbee Championships (Nationals) at Queens Park in Sydney, on the 22nd-25th April, 2006. After initially being seeded 18th (and last), the Tiggers finished the tournament with 3 wins and 6 losses, and improved on their initial seeding for the second straight year by finishing 15th. Two of the 6 losses were to the teams that eventually played out the final (Chilly & Fakulti), while another two were one-point, sudden-death overtime losses. Also, for the second straight year Tiggers captain Mike Baker was named MVP in the Open division.

Day 1

Game 1: Fakulti P 17 def. Tiggers 6

The Tiggers initial pool also contained the first (Chilly), third (Fakulti), and sixteenth (Newcastle) seeds. The eventual second place getters, Fakulti came out relatively soft, with both teams trading points to 3-all. From then on Fakulti pulled away, no doubt helped by the loss to injury of Dave (hamstring), one of our key handlers.

Game 2: Tiggers 13 def. Newcastle 9

The Tiggers came out pumped in this game and it showed, with the Tiggers taking half 9-6, even after the loss for the game of Felix with a dislocated shoulder (which required an ambulance ride to hospital). The Tiggers pressure on defence and their quick turnover hucks to score were rewarded with their first win for the tournament. The game ended with a sweet outside-in forehand huck by Mike from the sideline on halfway, over the crowd, to a deep-cutting Tom in the endzone.

Day 2

Game 3: Chilly 17 def. Tiggers 1

The last game of the initial pool saw the Tiggers up against the eventual national champions in Chilly. Unfortunately the Tiggers couldn't improve on their southern regionals score against Chilly, despite numerous chances which saw us work the disc all the way up field on offence, only to turn the disc over and have an easy point scored on us in open play. We also dropped, or just missed several chances to score from long hucks before Matt Petrie finally took a great overhead grab in the endzone with the score on 15-0. The loss left the Tiggers 3rd in their initial pool, and saw us relegated to one of the two lower phase-2 pools, along with Newcastle, Sublime (WA), Discheads (SA), and Eastern Greys (Sydney masters).

Game 4: Sublime 17 def. Tiggers 8

Felix returned for this game, and despite playing with an obviously sore shoulder appeared to play better (maybe because he had to concentrate a little harder to catch the disc?). Again, another good start for the Tiggers, with teams trading points until about 3-all. Sublime then managed to pull away, but the Tiggers continued to apply pressure for the remainder of the game. A number of points were end-to-end affairs; unfortunately the majority, along with the game, went to Sublime.

Game 5: Eastern Greys 14 def. Tiggers 8

Another great game by the Tiggers, as we took the early lead thanks to the Greys not expecting a tough game. Once the Greys focussed in on the game they were able to retake the lead and eventually ran away with the win, but looked pretty tired (and surprised) by the end.

Day 3

Game 6: Discheads 14 def. Tiggers 13

The Tiggers came agonisingly close to winning this one, only to lose in sudden-death overtime. Neither team managed to take a lead of more than 3 points at any stage of the game, with Discheads taking half 9-7 before the Tiggers staged one of their patented second-half comebacks to take the lead 11-9. The teams were 13-12 to the Tiggers at time cap, with the Discheads scoring to make it 13-all game to 14. Heading up-wind and on offence, the Tiggers worked the disc all the way to the endzone, before gifting a turnover and watching a quick reply go all the way to the endzone. Unfortunately the Discheads player stepped on the line while catching the disc, turning the disc back to the Tiggers. The Tiggers couldn't recreate the start to the point, turning over again close to our endzone. Discheads were then able to walk it in and take the game 14-13.

Game 7: Tiggers 9 def. Wild Chilly 7

A tight, low scoring game with the Tiggers taking the game 9-7 after time cap. The Tiggers zone-offence was again called into action, with Chilly preferring to test us with zone on every up-wind point. In this game, the Tiggers scored the only up-wind point, and in the end this was the difference with Chilly unable to penetrate our strong forehand-force. The win put the Tiggers into the 13-16th semi-bracket, meaning we could finish no lower than 16th. The next game would decide whether we would end up playing for 13th or 15th position on the final day.

Game 8: G-Men (Wollongong) 9 def. Tiggers 8

Another last-point overtime thriller. From the start, G-Men looked for easy long hucks to score from their main handler, however their O-game was quickly shut down by the superior positioning and defence of Tom, Matt, and Mike marking the deeps. Consequently, the Tiggers managed to hold a lead for most of the game, with the score 8-7 at time cap. Unfortunately the Tiggers couldn't maintain the patient zone-O that had scored most of their points, and the G-Men scored the last two points to take the game 9-8, 15 mins into overtime. The result left the Tiggers in a playoff for 15th on the final day versus '74 Flood (Queensland masters).

Game 9: Tiggers 16 def. '74 Flood 7

By far our easiest win of the tournament, the Tiggers outran, outjumped, and out lasted the obviously tired masters team. By the end of the first half, the Tiggers had forced the Flood to switch from zone to man on D, and from standard to hail-Mary hucks on O. In the end it appeared our faster, younger legs were the difference, as the Flood couldn't get away on O, and couldn't keep up on D. The result: Tiggers take 15th.

Tiggers game results

For the record, the results were:

Full rankings

The final team rankings were:

The almost full Tassie Tiggers team at Nationals, Sydney, April 2006: (back row) Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed (captain), Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, (front row) Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed, Warwick Reed. Photograph by John Kristensen.