Santa Barabra Invite 2010

Kattan's throw'n-go to Forge

Short Recap:

• Tourney gets cut down to 12 teams so the whole thing can be played on turf due to prior week's rain.
  
• Decently good conditions during play
• SDSU jumps up on us early as we are slow to warm up. We win on DGP in classic Squid fashion. I would be really pissed at the squids if I were state (see: Regionals '09)
  
• Santa Cruz is missing one of their key guys who helped them beat us twice at Sean Ryan (but hey, we were missing Bobble at that tourney)
• Cal tares us a new one in the 1v1 crossover. Pumba gets injured and thinks his collar bone is broken. Forge gets skied by a 5'10 guy. Twice. Its all bad.
• Tide in the 8pm Quarterfinals. Pumba figures out it is not a broken collar bone, just a sprained joint so he plays through. Pumba is such a fucking man. Besides the first point which was a fucking disaster (while Pumba is still warming up on the sideline), the O only turned the disc once. Tide throws a lot of juky zone and we absolutely shred it. Pumba has a really nice scoober. With that win we are slated to play Colorado tomorrow morning in the Semis.
  
• Woodstock's is still delicious. Apparently they stop selling booze in IV at 12. We leave Woodstock's and head to the liquor store...at 12:20. Fuck! Epic journey to find booze. Epic invasion of the hotel room of guys who didn't want to hang with the team and study instead. Dollar introduces the Squids to the Lunchbox (beer, OJ, Amaretto), Meowth swears to never drink anything else ever again. Ziggy is the coolest Psycho by a long shot. We finally leave Monstro and Coppa's hotel room at 3, he can finally get back to studying. We make it to Jawa's house (Fish. Sweet throws.) and try to get some sleep. Bobble is out like a light, others decide it would be a good idea to recount some of the better lines from "The Emperor's New Groove". For 30 minutes, ugh.
  
• We get to the fields on time and start to warm up, unsure of what to think about the defending National Runner's Up. Bobble's broken toe (Lei Out. Yeah, Angery Kevin is pretty fucking pissed about it.) is hurting a lot so he can't play. We talk about a super quick transition-poach-zone to stop the side stack plays(why did we not do this for other side stack teams?).
• We go up 2 breaks quickly because of this new zone, shit is clicking really well. Pumba hucks from the brick to Kattan and Forge who are both so open that they have enough time to talk about who is gonna catch it. Yay Pumba. Next brick, Pumba gets footblocked because he is trying to make shit happen. Boo Pumba. We go to half on serve. Soda is playing really well.
  
• We are doing well with working it against their constant poaching but the troubles come with actually scoring. We are shutting down their big man (#30 Hielka sp?) but having trouble with their smaller shifty handler dude (#13 Matty). We (and by that, I mean Kattan and Forge) are getting Ds on their hammers which is surprising seeing as how we've been having a lot of trouble with hammers the rest of the weekend.
• We pull on DGP, they work it and then huck to #30 who has it easily but somehow drops it. Pumba picks it up on the cone, they poach real big so he swings it to Coppa who throws it into the ground. Colorado takes a time out, they set up in Iso, Matty makes a up-the-line cut, its thrown, Kenobi get a piece of the disc but it pops back up into the cutter's hands. Mamabird wins 11-10. Have the Squids EVER beat Colorado? Fuck.
• We talk for a bit and decide its really not good enough to be happy with such a close game with them. We are all gunning for them, we are going for the jugular next time we play. This game helps us realize that we CAN work the disc verse a well-disciplined defense.
  
• 3rd place game vs Santa Cruz; we agreed to not report the score. Time to give the fish some playing time, . All of them are money and getting better every week. Look for Jawa, Mangle, Eomer, Frau, Cable, BeBeep, and Flounder to be blowing up tourney recaps in the next few years.
• 4 teams (UCSD, Davis, Cal, Santa Cruz) finished better than Tide but were not given a bid to Sanford Invite while Tide did get one.
  
• Freebirds after the tourney is still fucking delicious. Pumba fucks up talking to a hot chick from his high school days in from of the entire team. Mangle goes back to finish what he didn't the night before at Woodstock's; confirmed by Frau.
• 3rd place aint bad but we could have played a lot better. We will have another shot at Cal at Prez Day this weekend. Hope to see some of you old Squids there.
• PS-New jerseys are sweet!

Here is the writeup posted by Booble on the Club Sports page:

The UC San Diego Mens Ultimate A-Team headed up the coast for the Santa Barbara Invite. The tournament had been downsized because of the recent downpour that hit Southern California but the team was still ready to show that last season’s top 15 national finish was not a fluke. The first game against cross-town rival San Diego State started off less than perfect. A few turnovers from veteran players allowed State to hang in the game much longer than we had hoped. Fortunately when the game was tied and then next point would decide the victory, senior captains Guy Hughes and Justin Elliott connected on a deep shot to seal the first victory of the year , 11-10.

The next game against the always competitive UC Santa Cruz Slugs was as exciting as it promised to be. The wind had started to pick up in the cold Santa Barbara air and the two teams were locked for most of the game. Once again we found ourselves in a situation where the next point would decide the game. This time senior leader Josh Nickerson bolted to the endzone and Elliott let his playmaker go get the disc, and he did with the typical awe-striking athleticism we have come to expect from him over his career at UC San Diego (SD 10, SC 9).

California Berkeley was our next opponent and unfortunately we were not on top of our game this time. Several mistakes from our best players let Cal take a big lead and they handled us with not much difficulty, 11-5 (that’s all we’ll say about this one).

The final game of the day was against our biggest and most storied rival, the UC Santa Barbara Black Tide. This was the quarterfinals of the tournament and we had renewed our focus and were ready to put the pressure on our rivals. Thanks to great play from 5th year Stephen Hubbard handling the disc, we were able to navigate the zone defense that Santa Barbara has become famous for over the years. Once we went up we never looked back and the final score of 10-8 doesn’t quite reflect how well this game was played on our part.

Sunday meant the semifinals and our regional rival Colorado. They have historically dominated the Southwest region but we ignored the hype of last year’s national runners-up. With a few players injured we knew that vets were going to have to step up their game and battle through the soreness of 4 games the previous day to reach the finals. After getting out to a quick lead thanks to successful conversion of a few Colorado miscues, we coughed the disc up a few times ourselves and went into halftime down one. Then a constant battling for every point led us to our third double game-point situation of the weekend and despite a turnover by Colorado, we were not able to convert and Colorado scored to win the game (on their way to winning the tournament) 11-10.

The third place consolation game was a rematch against Santa Cruz and both teams agreed to play a rookie heavy scrimmage. This was a great opportunity for our first year players to get some more in game experience after spending much of the weekend watching and learning from the stars of our team. Adam Meckel, Aaron Lee, Rand Norberg, Donny Kleinhen, and Sean O’Donnell all developed tremendously and have really given our team hope for the future. Overall the weekend was a success and we did break seed (seeded 4th, finished 3rd). Once we’re free of injuries this team is going to be feared by everyone in the country.

Nationals 09

Im really sorry to our alums that nothing was ever written about our first national's appearance in 3 years. I certainly would like to write about what happened in each of our games but Jacob from CSULB came to Ohio and graciously video taped most of our games. He did really good work, so here it is. This is more of a summary than I could ever write:




Friday:
Game 1 Standford 12-15L
Game 2 Michigan , pt.2 10-15L

Saturday:
Game 3 Minnesota , pt.2 13-14L
Game 4 UVA, pt.2 12-15:

Sunday:
Game 5: Georga 15-11W!
Game 6: Luther - no video 12-14L
Game 7: NC State (SCHWAAAAAAAAANNNN!!!) - no video 15-13W!

Check out Amy "Meeko" Chang's photos of the Squid's (and some others) games


Full UPA score reporter on the tournament. (Notice that pool D was the toughest: D had the fewest single didget losses, two of them being 15-9, and we put 3 teams in the quarters) Each game was very tight and each opponent gave us a really tough game. Each loss felt very very winable.


Once again, big props to Jacob Baumer of Longbeach for the videos and Meeko for the photos.

Other fans that made the trek include: Nami, Wormser, Kubiak, and Soda's parents (and their cowbell). Thank you very much to them.

Sean Ryan 2009

The UC San Diego Men’s Ultimate team, the Air Squids, traveled to Santa Cruz this past weekend to compete in the Sean Ryan Memorial Tournament. The Squids were seeded 5th out of 12 teams going into the weekend but were determined to prove that they were not a fluke team last season. A solid returning core, and a host of new players with lots of potential made the Squids a daunting task for the teams in their pool which included UCSC, Chico St., and Humboldt St.

In the first game against Chico the Squids came out ready to play and were led by captain Guy Hughes and graduate student Brooks Taylor. Both were confident with the disc and made it their responsibility to dictate the play on the field. In his first game ever, rookie Shreyes Boddu came up with a huge defensive play in a tight spot. The Chico “Hops” showed though that their program has improved over recenet years and gave the Squids a late scare. Fortunately, the Squids snuck out with a 13-11 win.

Next up was Humboldt St. and the game started off with Humboldt taking control. Their zone gave some of the most experienced (however rusty from the offseason) throwers some headaches, but once the Squids were able to figure it out, they surged back. Thanks to multiple scores from senior leader Josh Nickerson and rookie Sean O’Donnell stepping up, the Squids were able to squeak out another close win, 11-10.

The final game of the day was against the No. 2 overall seed, host team UC Santa Cruz. The winner would win our pool and although there was a lot of fire for the first part of the game, the Squids were not able to overcome a plethora of mistakes from veteran players. The lack of early season conditioning was also apparent and despite big defensive play from rookies Aaron Lee and Albert Lee, the Slugs from Santa Cruz were able to capitalize on more turnovers than the Squids and won decisively 13-7.

Finishing 2nd in their Saturday pool, the Airsquids were matched up against northwest powerhouse Stanford for their quarterfinals game on Sunday. Having only beat Stanford once in Squid history, the team came out fired up. With a few veteran D’s coming from grad student Patrick Metz, UCSD easily went up 7-5 at the end of the first half. Stanford’s disciplined offense and a few Airsquids mistakes let them come back in the second half to tie it up at 12-12. However, UCSD would not settle for a loss, and after a savage defensive stand, Josh Nickerson caught the final goal with a grab over 2 Stanford players, Airsquid victory 13-12.

For the semifinal game, UCSD played against southwest regional rival, the Claremont Braineaters. With the wind picking up, both teams started the game easily trading points. Claremont rapidly moved the disc up the field with short quick passes while the squids lengthened the field, with Stephen Hubbard throwing deep bombs to the big receivers. Once again, the squids found themselves playing a close game, down 11-10 with only 5 minutes to go. And once again, UCSD proved that they wanted it more, quickly tying the game up 11-11 and pulling to the Braineaters. Claremont crumbled under the defensive pressure, missing a pass at half field. The Airsquids capitalized, securing a place in the finals with a 12-11 win.

The final game gave the Airsquids a second chance against UC Santa Cruz. This time, the squids came out swinging. With solid offense by Sophomore Murphy Hitchcock and Nicholas Miller, UCSD kept pace with Santa Cruz, trailing by only one point at halftime. Unfortunately, the UCSC defense proved too much in the second half, and with energy flagging, the Squids offense made a few mistakes that cost them. Unable to make a comeback, the game was ended 12-8 UCSC. Even with this loss, the UCSD Airsquids placed 2nd overall in the tournament, proving that they are a team to be reckoned with for the coming season.

Presenting...your 2009 UPA College Nationals Open Teams

And here we go...

Virginia
Georgia
NC State
Carleton
Wisconsin
Luther
Minnesota
Cornell
Pittsburgh
Texas
Kansas
Colorado
UC San Diego
UC Santa Barbara
Illinois
Michigan
Tufts
Williams
Stanford
Cal Berkeley

The Squids are going to Nationals!!

UCSD Ultimate traveled to Denver this past weekend to compete at Southwest Regional Tournament and, ultimately, for one of 3 bids to Nationals. All year the team worked toward this tournament – this Regionals was the most important tournament of evey team members’ Ultimate careers.

------Saturday

The Squids go into the weekend with the major advantage of good seed because of their dominant performance at Southern California Sectionals two weeks previous. Saturday’s first game at 9:00am featured biting cold not seen all year in San Diego – I’ve gone skiing in warmer weather. Thanks to a quality warm-up directed by Coach Kevin Stuart and the luxury of our first game being against a less skilled team, the Squids were able to raise their level gradually through the day.

Air Force had many athletic players which allowed them to play tight defense on our cutters but we were able to work the disc, albeit with some difficulty. The cold really was an issue and while we made some conditions related turnovers, they seemed to have the same amount or more despite the fact they are used to playing in such conditions (they are located in Colorado Springs). Our D runs away with this one, 15-6.

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Everyone agrees that we must raise our level against the next team which we know little about. Colorado College was vastly under seeded due to a fluke underperformance at their Sectionals tournament which was apparently played in a blizzard. They give us a great game but we always seem to be in control. While the wind and cold were still a factor, our throwers such as Brooks "Cork" LaComte, Mark "Dibs" Johnston, and Stephen "Pumba" Hubbard chose their risks wisely with calculated attention to how the particular wind direction would affect the disc. Colorado’s out-of-bounds pulls were a great help to our offense and served as a reminder for the importance of working to keep our own pulls in bounds. Final score: UCSD wins 14-10.

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The last game of pool play was against Azusa Pacific who were shaping up to be the Cinderella team of the tournament. It was not to be against the Squids however as we jumped out to an early lead with pretty looking throws to and from Dibs, Hyzer, Monstro and absolutely filthy D’s from Cork and Soda. Our D recognizes that they rely on their one superstar’s throws to score and effectively shut him down. Dibs finishes the game with a 70 yard backhand to a ridiculously open Soda after he breaks his defender’s ankles with sharp cutting. 15-3

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Such a swift victory affords us the time to rest before the next game and watch the UCSB/Arizona battle who’s winner would be our next opponent. Arizona pulls out a difficult double game point win over UCSB and so are matched up with a rested Squid team to determine seeding in the elimination bracket.

This game verse Arizona may well be our best and most complete game this season. Although they are notorious for their great throws, our defense was forcing them to cough up the disc and was persistent in converting. It was plainly clear that they did not have the legs run with us when we were on O and had to resort to putting up prayers when they had it because their cutters could not get open. Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, different teams learn to play Zone O differently and one of our Zone D sets gave them absolute fits. We routinely backed them up into their own endzone with this containment zone with a turn coming eventually after their pass count skyrocketed. The marks in this zone, Didj, Bitusa, and Threeve seemed absolutely impenetrable and generated many of the turned in this setup including a crafty layout by Didj and a handblock by Bitusa. Junior Captain Bobble made sure to remind everyone that he has the biggest flick on the team with an utterly monster jack upwind to Kattan . Everyone seemed to doing the right things and we run away with it 15-8. This game is certainly a statement to many across the nation as Arizona is held to be a very good team after their Quarterfinals appearance at last year’s National Championship. Additionally, we proved to ourselves the value of our depth and stamina (which we must credit to all those lifting sessions and Monday night track practices.)

4-0 on the day makes you feel good and a buffet dinner afterwards makes you feel even better.

-----Sunday

Our first matchup of Sunday was against cross-town rivals SDSU. Admittedly, we were looking past them and such a mental state is just asking for disaster. The game started well with us breaking them often – Monstro has an amazing reception for one of those breaks - we kept scoring and the mental energy settled and that’s when they pounced. Instead of breaking when down like other teams, SDSU forced 3 turns in 3 points and scored each possession. We took half ahead by one but we could have taken half with an impressive margin if not for our opponent’s surge. We obviously did not fix whatever problem we had over half. The O line continued to turn the disc verse their zone until we stopped playing around with the disc and went for the harder but rewarding throws – our own zone continued to be shredded. We received the disc at 12-12 with the soft cap about to go on – all we had to do was continue to score our O points and we would win. We couldn’t do that though and their Doffense had the quick strike to score the upwinder. 12-13, game to 15. Going up wind we seemed shaky at first, especially pushed into our own endzone, but the disc was moved passed most of their players with a good looking over-the-top throw from Bobble. Unfortunately though, we turned the disc on an in-cut reception. We prepare to play D and eventually force them into a floaty hospital pass into the endzone but they somehow come down with it.

Down 12-14, its time for the gloves to come off. We score our O point and then send out our stacked D line 13-14. Our sidelines are loud as our on field players desperately look for a turn. It came almost too easily as Cork smacks down a poach D after only a few throws and then breaks the mark to a blazing Biel for the conversion. 14-14. Pulling downwind on double game point, our D appears to be getting beaten. SDSU works the disc the entire length of the field but we are holding our ground at our endzone. A speeding pass goes up but is beyond their outstretched player and our fully laid-out defender, Hutch. SDSU doesn’t even have time to regret the chance they mucked up before our players get the disc gets moving and then Cork gets his missile lock set on his favorite receiver, Biel. The massive forehand huck is quickly heading OB but Biel shows why people can’t even pretend to guard him: our fastest player by far chases the pass down and makes the difficult catch at the last moment. Clutch. 15-14 Squids! The second amazing comeback in 2 weeks!

With intensity and energy the highest its ever been all year, I almost felt sorry for the next team in our path, UCSB. Almost.

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UCSB is our most storied rival. The continual fight between the UCSD Air Squids and the UCSB Black Tide has been raging for as long as we have had a program and we have only recently begun to assert our dominance against what is the winningist team in all of college Ultimate history. Our teams’ 2 previous matches this year are split 1-1.

The wind maintained a 10-15 mph average with sporadic gusts for the entire Semifinal match and thus zone D was standard for both teams. Instead of being flustered by the zone as we were in the previous game however, we immediately go for the throat with blades, hammers and floaty hucks to our big guys for them to gobble up over their deep defenders. Yui starts the fun with a zippy backhand down wind which was the model for the rest of our shots. Kattan, Forge, Bobble and Hyzer are playing well down wind. Getting breaks upwind, however, was what won this game. Biel has some tricky grabs on messy upwind deep throws. Dibs has a long IO forehand break across the face of the endzone to end another up winder. We all were pretty sure the game was in the bag when Forge makes the most ridiculous grab I have ever seen for an upwind score, skying a 5 person pile including our own best receivers.

The Offesne receives the disc, going down wind, to finish the game. We start well but an up-the-line pass is a tad too far and Tide converts. There are a few jitters but shake it off and receive again. This time however, every pass is smooth, cutters are open, and the Squids will not be stopped. Our downfield moves the disc so well that the last throw from Bobbke to Biel is a easy, completely open forehand. THE SQUIDS ARE GOING TO NATIONALS!!!!

Pure elation. Cloud Nine. Indescribable.

Our goals for the season had been accomplished and we made a definite statement with the commanding 14-9 win over our long-time rival.

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The final game against University of Colorado at Boulder was to determine the winner of the region but we were both guaranteed bids to Nationals. Right before the game started the wind picked up to 30mph and the Squids are just not trained to play in such conditions while Colorado practices in similar wind often. They could throw and catch, we couldn’t period. We really didn’t really do anything well in this game (although Hutch and Threeve played well) but such a whopping will certainly show us what we have to work on in the coming weeks to shore up our weaknesses.

We left Colorado cold, wet, and tired but it is going to be a few weeks before the unwavering smile fades from our faces. Perhaps the best part of going to Nationals is that it gives us another month to spend together. From here on out we can focus on getting better and having fun. And fundraising – tickets to Columbus are expensive.

Finally, I’d like to personally say that I have never been more proud of a group of teammates. I’ve never been more proud to be a part of any group in any setting – we all worked incredibly hard the entire season. Thank you Squids.

-Stephen “Pumba” Hubbard

SQUIDS WIN SECTIONALS

Dibs' sectionals writeup. I took a significant portion of this from Bitusa's personal blog.

This past weekend, the UCSD Air Squids, traveled an hour north to Long Beach to participate in SoCal Sectionals.

The Squids entered the tournament seeded 2nd out of 25 teams, so the competition on Saturday was pretty easy. We faced local rival USD first in moderate wind. USD had one player with nice hammers that shredded our zone in the first couple of points, but after a while we switched defenses and ran away with the game, winning 11-5.
Game two was against Redlands, a very young and inexperienced program. Our fish got a ton of playtime, and the D line led by Brooks "Cork" LeComte and Eric "Beil" Abhold held strong the whole game. We won 11-3.
Game three was against UCLA's B-team who are coached by ex-squid captian Brian "Millhouse" Chen. Again, our young D line was able to play almost the entire game as we won 11-2.
Game four promised to by our hardest game of the day, as we faced off against SDSU. These guys beat us last year at sectionals and we were not about to give up a loss this year. Our offense came out strong and we stacked both the O and D lines to start the game. Our hard pressure D and clean offense led us to an easy 11-5 victory.
Our last game of the day was supposed to be against Cal State Fullerton, but they decided to forfeit, so we got to go home early with an 11-0 victory.

Our strong performance put us in the Semi-final at 11am on Sunday. Both the semi and the final were games to 15. We faced UCLA, another team coached by an ex-squid, Jon "Yugo" Miles. UCLA came out fired up and put on a strong showing breaking us in the second point of the game for a 2-0 lead. They held that break and gained two more before half. We tried to regroup at halftime, but after halftime they put a little run together to go up 10-5 on us. We managed to trade some points but they held their own to get to 13-8.
Then the Squids found some magic. We started to string a series of scores together and finally stopped making the stupid mistakes that got us into the 5 point hole to begin with. We slowly crept closer to UCLA. At 14-12, we were 6 minutes from hard cap, so we knew we had to score quickly. By taking the underneath cuts that UCLA was giving our tall set of cutters, we quickly moved the disc down and scored in only a minute. Now we were within one point of tying them. With the score 14-13 UCLA, and the sidelines packed with both squad's B-teams plus a pack of cheerleading girls who had come down from LA, we pulled for what could be the last point of the game. The frisbee went up against a significant crosswind and then proceeded to blade back at a mild angle towards UCLA's handlers. One of their players went to catch it and... dropped the pull! We ran down and I picked up the disc and realized that my defender was forcing me the wrong way! An easy throw to Josh "Forge" Nickerson brought the score to 14-14 as hard cap went off. Double game point. Squids pulling to UCLA for a spot in the Sectional finals versus UCSB. Our most experienced players filled the line, and prepared to pull for what would be the last point of the game. UCLA caught the pull this time, but the Squid line covered well and immediately put pressure on the worn down UCLA line. After several swing throws among their handlers in the backfield they dropped a pass and we had a chance to end the game. Once again, we would not waste a prime opportunity. We moved it quickly down the field and I was able to catch a pass up the line on my defender and threw it to Justin "Bobble" Elliott on the open side for the game winning score. The sidelines erupted! Ice and Lite (A and B team) rushed the field screaming and jumping with eyes wide and jaws dropped. For all the yelling we were doing it was hard for all of us to believe what had just happened. This is the biggest comeback I've ever been a part of as a Squid. We took the game 15-14.

Energy was flowing and we were pumped up to beat Black Tide who had defeated us with a victory at their home tournament three months earlier in the season. It was time for revenge, and we were not going to wait for Santa Barbara to hand it to us. We started the game with a 7-2 run. We took half 8-3. Tide's team leaders were not at their finest and while we slacked towards the end of the game, they only turned the disc over more. We never let them get closer than 4 points and finished the final with a win 15-10.

By winning Sectionals, we have locked down the second seed going into Regionals in two weeks in Colorado.

Origins

So, I split the squid history into 4 parts. This is the first of the 4.

Beginnings (1980-1990)
The origins of the Air Squids go back to 1980, when a group of grad students got together and formed the team. At the time the team was known as Entropy. It wasn’t until the 1988-1989 season that the team became known as the Air Squids. The name Air Squids was originally a joke. A player named Peter Ritson, who had previously played for UC Santa Cruz, would call his teammates a bunch of squids whenever they didn’t play hard. Since squids were spineless and soft. Dave Adelson is said to have come up with the name Air Squids. The idea was that the team would temporarily be named the Air Squids, until they became a better team. In theory as the team was to get better, the squid would move up to be something like Air Sharks or something higher up on the phylogenetic scale.
At the time, the early UCSD ultimate team was not as big and well structured as it is now. The team was under the radar in the ultimate scene in the mid 80’s due to lack of interest and organization. However, one thing that was known during this time period was that UCSD used to host a tournament known as Winter Crystal Palace. It wasn’t until later in that decade the team reappeared back on in the ultimate scene.
The 1988-89 season had a core of 9 regulars and 3-5 additional guys who would sometimes show up to play. A big problem for the team during this era, was the lack of competition. To solve this problem UCSD, Cal State Long Beach, Caltech, UCLA, UCI, and Northern Air Force base collaborated to form the SCCUL (Southern California Collegiate Ultimate League). The structure of the league had 4 of the 6 teams meeting every other week and playing a round robin of 3 games each. Additionally, scrimmages with SDSU and UCR were organized.
After that season, the popularity of ultimate spread throughout the campus thanks to the start of an intramural league. Along with the intramural scene, a huge factor which raised campus awareness about ultimate was the sale of $5 discs. The team sold discs not for profit, but rather to raise awareness of the sport. John Toman was one of the original team members who did the designs for the shirts, discs, sweaters, and various Squid paraphanalia.
In order for the Squids to grow and become more competitive, the local competition had to get better as well. That meant there was a lot of cooperation with other regional/ local teams to help their programs develop as well. Although the SCCUL was formed, it wasn’t until the addition of teams from Northern California and Oregon which really helped competitive college ultimate grow. Pat Pohl, the current coach of Las Positas college and collegiate regional coordinator of the western region* at the time, made the Winter Collegiate Tournament. There was a huge effort to get the teams from so cal and nor cal/ Oregon to come together and play this winter tournament. This was a huge step for not just UCSD ultimate, but west coast ultimate as a whole, since the tourney brought together all the west coast teams for the first time.
An interesting side note from this time period is that we were the first team west of the Mississippi and second team in the nation to hire a coach (Tony Pellicane).

A picture of the crystal palace tourney shirt




A special thanks to Dave Adelson and Nami for getting me in contact w/ Dave .

Sectionals this weekend...some teams are about to get shat on by the squids.

<3 monstro