Reflections of AUG Part 2

After a sweet party on Wednesday night, we had to front up for the game where the tournament really began for us.


Day 4

After originally believing we were up against ANU, a reshuffle of a three way tie determined our new opponents. We were facing Edith Cowan Uni in the Quarter Nine-als. This was the game we really wanted to win as it would a) put us on the way to beating our seed and b) automatically give us our best ever finish at AUG (previous best was 13th in 2007). ECU were an athletic bunch, but had virtually zero experience outside a tournament or two in the west and a season of social league. We were very careful not to go into this game being too cocky, and approached it like we did with any other game. But ECU came out harder than we did and we had a very tough battle on our hands. Neither team could get any kind of breakaway going. Looking back, we never got out of first gear, and ECU simply wanted to win more than we did. But there were two distinct areas where we were simply rubbish. Catching, and transition from O to D. If we had have caught every throw that went to our endzone, we would have won 15-5. But to quote my under 12s cricket coach, "Catches win matches." We put down too many easy chances. As soon as we turned, ECU would have three or four long cuts straight away. I tore my vocal chords to shreds trying to get our team to "point to who you are marking" but it was a mess - guys marking girls, then girls marking guys, then guys not marking anyone because they can't see who was open. ECU just about always got in 4 or 5 passes to poached players before we were able to cover them. By the time we sparked up, it was far too late and ECU took the game 11-9.

We then had a long walk to our next game against RMIT. If you ever wanted to talk about how a positive mindframe can make a huge difference, a perfect example of what not to do would have been this game. RMIT were going in with absolutely no confidence and complete apathy, while we went in with no energy or enthusiasm at all. Our senior players were devastated that we'd just lost such a winnable game and having that mood filter through to our rookies was inevitable. Our offence was better in this game than the ECU game, but our defense was...well, non-existent. On any other day we should have convincingly beaten them, but on this occasion we simply couldn't get our shit together enough to string a few points together. We lost on universe point 11-10.

After this game I was in a filthy mood. Not with anyone or anything in particular, but a combination of hangover, two shitty losses, playing around 70% of all points and fulfilling team manager duties caught up with me and I simply needed to be grumpy for a while. We'd done everything as a team all week, but that afternoon was declared "free time". I pulled up a chair to watch the Melbourne v Flinders semi final, and some Robsquading with Doobs cheered me up.

That night I got a stern talking to from our trainer and coach for being such a dickhead. I had it coming.


Day 5

By this point, we were over the competitive aspect of Uni Games and we wanted to have some fun. In the 15th/16th playoff we were facing ANU. We arrived at the fields at 8:27 (game time 8:30) to see ANU in the middle of throwing drills. The following quote was delivered from one of our leadership group - "If they want fifteenth place THAT bad...they can fucking have it!" We threw seven on the line as I considered cleating up. This game we brought up all the usual shenanigans - upside down throws only, underwear points, disrespect D (aka Protect The Castle), and created the Pinball Point, although ANU weren't keen on the idea of a Multi-disc Bonus Round. At this point I should mention ANU weren't joining in our tomfoolery and were playing their normal game. ANU took out the win 10-5, which puts another game on the "we probably should have won that" list.

Flashback to Thursday night - our trainer and I joined a couple of other Uni of Ballarat people at our backpackers bar for a trivia night. Nice relaxing night, and plenty of laughs were had. In the end, our table won convincingly and got a $50 drink card for our efforts (which equaled five jugs of beer between 7 of us. Good return). I was about to pack it in for the night when I was invited up for the Impossible Question Cash Jackpot Round. Now, I like going to trivia nights because I know a lot of useless shit. The question - "Which brand of Ford car celebrated it's centenary this week?" My first reaction - "Are you from Syria? This question is worth one hundred bucks?" The MC tried to build up the suspense while I was trying to take the mike off him to give the answer (this is the answer, by the way). Well, I won $100, and immediately took it to the bottleshop to buy vodka, goon and cheap champers.

Flashforward to Friday morning - I busted out the booze stash for the team and we watched the Latrobe v Deakin 9th/10th playoff and taught the newbs how to play Fantasy Ultimate and Stubby Guts. We got our Robsquad on in the final with the Monash and Latrobe boys and all in all had a really fun day. It was the perfect antidote to the sour mood the day before. It was also the drunkest I have ever been prior to 3:00pm.


I like winning. Most people do. But AUG was still a lot of fun for me because we were able to make the week fun. We came third in spirit (in fact, we've finished 3rd or better in spirit every time we've been to AUG) through no particular effort - we play hard right to the end, and we bloody love our ultimate. It's no secret that I'm disappointed with our 16th place finish, but we took 11 new players to their first AUG, and they're already looking forward to AUG2009. Which means we have a good player base to build on. For once.

Yeah BUUF.