Both the men's and women's ultimate frisbee teams came away with second-place finishes at last weekend's tournament at UMass-Amherst. The strong finishes come at a perfect time for both teams since they started out the regular season slow and hope to gain momentum with only one tournament left before the playoffs in late April.
The men's squad cruised through the 23-team tournament, winning every game up until the finals, when it lost to host UMass. For the Jumbos, the result was great since they were missing two key components: senior Neil Pallaver and sophomore Matt Abbrecht.
"We have to attribute the solid finish to strong legs," junior Ian Schneider said. "Missing two good players like Matt and Neil meant that the reserves had to step up and play more throughout the tournament, which they did and they did well."
The team's reserves are credited for helping Tufts gain momentum in the latter portion of the season. The team started the season with two mediocre finishes, one at Stanford University and the other in Atlanta. After the first two meets, the team had a 5-8 record.
Over spring break the team started gelling and picked up the slack at a UNC Wilmington Tournament where they advanced to the semifinals.
"We have improved because the younger guys are playing more," Schneider said. "We are able to sub them in more often and still run our main offense. All of team members are on the same page so we have the ability to put in fresh legs without missing a step."
The Jumbos latest finish at UMass came at a perfect time, as the squad is now geared up to play in this weekend's tournament, the Yale Cup. The Jumbos play in the New England Region of the Ultimate Players Association (UPA), and at this tournament they will face some of the strongest teams from the region, including their two biggest rivals, Brown and Harvard.
"We beat Harvard once this year, but we know that both Brown and Harvard will get up big time to play this game," Schneider said.
"We will really be able to gauge where we are in terms of Regionals and Nationals from this tournament," senior Mike Zalisk said. "A solid performance at Yale could mean good things when the playoffs roll around."
The playoffs begin April 27 at Tufts. The first phase is Sections, where the Jumbos will play the seven other teams from the Metro-Boston Section. The top four teams from each of the five sections advance to a 20 team Regional playoff. The top one to three teams in the region than advance to play at Nationals. Only the UPA can decide how many teams from a region can advance.
For the women, their finish at UMass was exciting as they also lost only one game. They placed second, losing to rival MIT in the finals.
The women also started their season slowly, but the emergence of several young players has helped them to perform better down the stretch.
"Freshmen Emily Estrada, Emily Kaplin, and Liesbeth Gallon have really come on strong, allowing us to play them more and stay fresh the whole game," senior captain Liz Korb said.
The team struggled in the first meet at Stanford and then started seeing a change over the two spring break tournaments in Atlanta and North Carolina. "We started practicing better and the younger players really started to excel under the leadership of the veterans on the team," sophomore Amanda Sommers said.
The women's team will also travel to Yale to compete against the stronger teams in the region. The Jumbos are excited to play their rivals, Brown and MIT. Though the team has lost to both rivals this season, Korb feels confident in the rematches. "Our loses to them this year were not representative of our team," she said. "We will be fired up if we meet them this weekend."
A strong performance by the team will help it as it enters sections at the end of this month. The team is confident that it can pass through sections easily and go on to Regionals.
Making it to Nationals might be hard for the squad but if its play continues to improve, as it has throughout the season, then the Jumbos will have a legitimate shot at advancing.
The postseason starts on the weekend of April 27 and 28 here at Tufts. Both the men and the women hope they will begin a strong playoff run from their own home fields and continue all the way to Nationals in Spokane, WA.
