Pain Train at Brown's Hucka-Hunka-Burning-Pumpkin

Dartmouth rolled into Rhode Island for its final tournament of the Fall Season, and the first since the official split between the Pain Train and the Discomfort Trolley. Before we even got to the field, Kevin Pfeiffer proved his dedication to Dartmouth Ultimate by spending the entire trek in the trunk of Charlie’s car (don’t worry, we poked some airholes in there to keep him conscious.) Dartmouth was the second ranked team at the tournament, a position we had earned and intended to keep.

Pain Train vs. Brown B

Brown entered no less than 4 teams into this tournament (they also entered no more than 4, but whatever) and we started out against their B squad. As we got our legs under us, we made quick work of their defense most of the time, the main exception being a 20 minute hell point that featured more turns than I am comfortable acknowledging on a public blog. Still, that hell point ended with the familiar cries of ‘Fiesta!’ and started the trend of pulling out the grittiest points that Dartmouth extended throughout the tournament. The kid on Brown B who was dressed as a Campbell’s Soup Can last year (until his costume exploded on a bid in the endzone) reprised his role as “Slow guy in a spherical cardboard costume” by playing as a can of Pawtucket Patriot Ale. No sweet bid this year, but I’m sure he was game for it.
Dartmouth 13 – Brown B 0 (what? We never bagel teams…)

Pain Train vs. Boston University

BU refuses to get rid of all their wiley handlers. Luckily, they have lost a few, and the corp of Russian-looking big men all seem to have graduated. The game started close, with Dartmouth’s man defense shutting down everything except for the upline cuts from BU’s handlers. Once we prioritized that element, this game came together, because the sick fakes they were throwing didn’t get their babytalk cuts open. (yay! Jargon!) After more or less trading for the beginning of the first quarter, Dartmouth buckled down and finished to halftime strong, before rolling in the second half. BU scored at most 1 or 2 after half, and our honest man created both hurried throws on their part and lots of opportunities for Ds on our part.
I’m sure more sweet stuff happened too. But, like, whatever.
Dartmouth 13 – BU 5

Pain Train vs. UMass

This was the game we needed to win to start defending our seed. The third seed in the tournament, UMass graduated only a few players from the team that lost in the game to go last spring (although they were missing a few other key components). Our mental game was still surging, despite coming off a bye round, and we came out firing. We outscored Zoodisc solidly in the first half, and Seigs, recently arrived to offer his coaching skills and help out the captains by observing our play without worrying about his own play, helpfully reminded me that it is ok to some times beat a team soundly. “They’ll get over it,” he promised, but if there is one thing the Pain Train has learned over the past years, it is that Seigs’ advice is usually best left unheeded. So we decided to let them back in it.
UMass certainly won the second half, and because Brown and Harvard were back in Providence playing their last round as a showcase match, the fields were emptying out around us. At 11 – 9, we started discussing the cap rules, which are ludicrous at Brown every year – an absolute time cap, so you finish the point, if the game is tied you play one more, if not then the game is over, no matter who scored the last goal. We pulled to them and they marched up and scored their fastest point of the entire game, which came at the perfect time as the horn was blown within 10 seconds of the score. Per ultimate convention, the next point was thought to have started (although there is some debate as to whether a point starts with the pull or the goal caught before it). Anyways, it was 10 – 11, and if they scored we would play a Universe point. We finally realized that Seigs did have somewhat of a point, and that winning sooner we significantly better than winning later, and therefore marched the disc up the field and stuffed it in for the score and the win. The pool went to seed, and we headed back to the Brown campus for the night.
Dartmouth 12 – UMass 10
The Night

Highlights include:
The fact that nobody on Brown’s campus has ever heard of Diman House… even though it is a real dorm.
Learning that lots of Brown’s frats are physically connected to particular dorms.
The Borat movie – “Buckaw!”
Hiking back from the Borat movie.
Observing the Brown scavenger hunt, refusing to partake.
“No, if you do, I’ll punch you in the neck.”
Seigs eagerly rallying party backup.
Dartmouth men losing to BU women in flipcup.
Seigs not being there when we woke up.

Dartmouth vs. Harvard

This was our third meeting with the best college team from Cambridge this season, and after splitting the first two appearances, we intended to win this one. We started out on D and absolutely took Red Line’s lunch money. The 1-3 got us a break, our clam got us a break, and then gritty man D got us a break. We cruised to what we thought was half up 7-3, but were then notified that none of us had read the tourney packet, and that games were to 15. Rounds were just as long as on Saturday, so adding points seemed pointless, but whatever. We got broken on our way to taking half, and went into it up 8 – 5.
In the second half, Harvard’s zone gave us a plethora of problems, just as UMass’s had the day before, in an important development that I am not going to go back and add in now. Because our wings were staying a bit too close to the disc, their deeps were able to come in and make plays on the hammers and blades we put up to the poppers or as long swings. However, we eventually figured out the spacing and started to tear through the cup much easier, as the poppers were getting open for blades and then seeing the wings already streaking deep for the continuation scores. The game got tied up at 9s, but Harvard pulled to us and our Universe line marched to about half field, where Watson saw his opening for a look to Dermott and put up a flick that floated over the scrum in the endzone. On a similar note, Derm appeared to float above them as well, and he ripped down the score over Harvard’s captain despite being fouled as he did so.
Dartmouth 10 – Harvard 9

Dartmouth vs. Tufts

Tufts upset UMass in their quarterfinals game, saving us a rematch of the day before by giving us a rematch of our season ending loss from the year before. Just as we did against Harvard and UMass, the Pain Train came out with intense D and fairly crisp offense. Unlike against Harvard and UMass, however, we didn’t let up. The only downside of this entire game was the first and only hell point that we lost all tourney, a point where our offense struggled while our D dominated, only giving up real pass by Tufts during all of the turns. Unfortunately, that one went for a score. However, the rest of the game was all Dartmouth. Robin Myers ’10 got one of the sickest layout Ds of the entire season at one point, and our Ho stack kept ending our offensive points quickly, allowing the D to get back on the field and break the E Men again. Pretty damn satisfying to win this one, after struggling against them all last season.
Dartmouth 13 – Tufts 8

Dartmouth vs. Brown

Wow, the finals. Cool. As the top two seeds, Dartmouth and Brown had both shown their ability to avoid choking so far, and now battled for the win and de facto title of winner of the fall season. We played them at PV a few weeks before, and won that game 13 – 12, but the specter of who wasn’t there that time (Mahoney, Colin) hangs over that result. Finally released from DoG’s practice schedule, the Brown star rejoined his teammates and seemed to give them the spark they needed to derail the Pain Train (whoops, guess I gave away the ending of this game). Neither of the two teams played as well as they could, and while individual players performed out of their minds (hi Nate!), the disappointment of this game was not the loss itself, but the knowledge that we could have done a bit better.
Dartmouth 10 – Brown 15

Hey, second in the tourney ain’t too shabby. We held seed and played our hardest against some of our most intense regional rivals. Feels great to go into a long, dark winter of conditioning and Scully-Fahey sessions with a successful outcome in our last tournament, but with the knowledge that we still have teams to beat inside the region.