Texas Shootout Bout Recap: Kansas City 89, Rat City 85
Posted by Justice Feelgood Marshall on October 2nd, 2007
photo credit: insanitylabs
Kansas City and Rat City played an instant classic of a contest to cap off the Texas Shootout. The #1 seed in the west, Rat City, was heavily favored coming into the final match of the tournament, but, like #1 East seed Gotham before them, found out the hard way that Kansas City was just playing a tiny bit smarter, harder and faster than everybody else. A bout full of explosive performances, numerous lead changes, pivotal strategic adjustments and thunderous support from both teams’ loyal fanbases ended up coming down to the very last instants of the very last jam, with Kansas City barely holding off a desperate late comeback and hanging on to become the 2007 WFTDA champions, 89-85.
The first jam went 4-0 for Rat City as Miss Fortune got the better of Xcelerator, but Kansas City hit back hard on the following jam, where their defense held Burnett Down on her opening lap for a full 2 minutes while Snot Rocket scooped up 9 points. Over the course of the next four jams, the teams traded lead jammer status and wins, keeping the margin about the same. On Jam 6, between Blonde ‘n’ Bitchin for Rat City against Xcelerator for Kansas City, Rat City made a questionable strategic decision, with Blonde ‘n’ Bitchin getting 4 points before Xcelerator was sprung from the penalty box but choosing not to call the jam before Xcelerator got a chance to get on the board. The gamble didn’t pay off, and Rat City lost a chance to close the gap as the jam ended 6-6. The total score was Kansas City 26, Rat City 19 at that point, and Snot Rocket would open up the lead further by going 7-3 over a penalized Miss Fortune on the next jam (with Miss Fortune just barely picking up her 3 points as time expired in the full-length jam.) Next up, Kansas City pulled out a hole card by sending out a well-rested Dominant Jean for the first time in the tournament, replacing Fearlys in the Kansas City jammer rotation. Jean would fit right in, getting lead jammer status and scoring a quick 2-0 over Rat City’s Pia Mess. That made the score Kansas City 35, Rat City 22 with about 13 minutes left in the half, but events took a sharp turn in favor of Rat City at that point.
On the next four jams, Rat City jammers picked up three grand slam laps while their defense repeatedly ensnared Kansas City jammers — a 9-0 for Blonde ‘n’ Bitchin over Jade Lightning, a 5-0 over Miss Fortune over Dee Claw (who barely avoided more damage by getting lead jammer and cutting off the action an instant before Miss Fortune would have started her second scoring pass), and a 5-0 over Valtron over Snot Rocket. Kansas City’s only offense in that series would be a close 4-3 victory for Xcelerator over Ann R. Kissed. Suddenly, Rat City had gone on a 22-4 run that turned a double-digit Kansas City lead into a nine-point Rat City lead at Rat City 48, Kansas City 39, with about 5 minutes left in the half. It looked for a moment like Rat City might be on their way to taking control of the bout, but Xcelerator had different ideas, running up a 7-0 jam over Valtron that got the Kansas City war drums in turn 4 thumping hard. Blonde ‘n’ Bitchin would get Rat City a 2-1 win on the following jam and there would not be any time for more scoring in the period, but even though Rat City was winning at 50-47, Kansas City seemed to have the momentum simply by proving they could stick with the #1 team in the nation for a full thirty minutes.
Of course, Kansas City was interested in more than just sticking with Rat City in the second half. While the teams traded victories in the first three jams of the half, leaving Rat City with a 60-51 lead, Kansas City seriously got their game together afterwards, getting lead jammer status on an amazing 10 jams in a row. On Jam 5 of the half, Snot Rocket jammer got a massive response from the crowd when she chose to rely on her strength rather than her speed to get past Rat City’s Skate Trooper, sending Trooper flying with a block that sprung Rocket from the pack on the way to a 6-0 win. That put the score at Rat City 64, Kansas City 60, and two jams later, Rat City’s consistent problems with the penalty box put the lead in Kansas City hands, 66-65, as Dee Claw ran up 3 points for KC while Rat City’s Ann R. Kissed watched from the box. Still in the middle of their impressive run of lead jammer jams, Kansas City would win every jam for the next 10 minutes, culminating in a 8-4 jam win for Xcelerator over Pia Mess. That made the score Kansas City 89, Rat City 76 with 7 minutes left in the half, the bout and the tournament.
In those 7 minutes, though, Rat City came within a hair’s breadth of taking the bout back. Suddenly, Kansas City found themselves incapable of scoring points, and for the third time in three games had to hold off a late run. First, the Rat City defense was able to bottle up Snot Rocket for a full-length jam while Ann R. Kissed spent a minute in the penalty box in a jam that went 1-0 for Ann. Apparently rested from her time in the box, Ann R. Kissed would burst out on the following jam to lap Kansas City’s Jade Lightning, getting a 4-0 on the board for Rat City. The score was then Kansas City 89, Rat City 81, and Miss Fortune got Rat City tantalizingly close with a 4-0 over Xcelerator that made the score 89-85 with only about a minute left to play.
In the crucial final seconds, Rat City’s Valtron can’t find a way through tough defense from Princess Slay-Ya, Patti Wackin & Snot Rocket. Photo credit: insanitylabs
It would come down to Valtron on the jammer line for Rat City against Snot Rocket for Kansas City, and though Valtron burst out of the pack first, she was not awarded lead jammer status. With only about thirty seconds left on the clock, Snot Rocket took a calculated gamble at this juncture, choosing to hang in the back of the pack and risk her lap point — potentially the game-winning point — by helping her rear defenders block Valtron. The gamble worked out, as Valtron was unable to get through in the few seconds remaining, and the Austin Convention Center went absolutely wild for an enormous upset. Xcelerator was awarded the MVP trophy for the tournament, and the Kansas City Roller Warriors were crowned the new queens of the derby world by knocking off the #1 ranked team in the nation, 89-85.
October 2nd, 2007 at 9:57 am
YAY Kansas City!
I had a blast at the Tourney, and enjoyed meeting other derby girls!!
October 2nd, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Thanks for this fab bout recap! I couldn’t be there so this was the next best thing. Thanks bunches.
October 2nd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Fine recap Justice. While I don’t want to take anything away from KC’s great performance, I believe another factor that led to Rat City’s loss was that the grueling Texas bout left them with less gas in the tank than they would have liked–That bout in my opinion was the derby version of Ali-Frazier Thrilla in Manila.
October 7th, 2007 at 9:23 am
ummmm… Kansas City played two highly competitive games against Gotham and Carolina. They had every right to be pooped, too. They’re simply an incredible team.
October 8th, 2007 at 2:22 am
Thank you Dahmernatrix
October 8th, 2007 at 7:32 pm
I’m with CynicalGuy, Rat City had put everything into the Texas bout just so they could PLAY KC. I’m not saying that KC “had it easy” inthe least, but come on, anyone who watched the KC vs. Carolina bout and the Rat City vs. Texas bout has got to admit the latter was incredibly more physical. And I won’t even go into the fact that KC had 3 hours more to recover.
By now you probably could guess that I’m a Rat City fan. So read the rest with a grain of salt…
Adding to Rat City’s demise may also be the fact that the officials were incredibly biased in my opinion. On more than one occassion, I saw Rat City’s jammer called out of a jam tot he box, only to arrive at the box and be told that they were called out for reason’s unknown and to re-enter the jam. That caused the loss of opportunity to score points. And in a 4 point game, it makes a world of difference! And let’s not talk about the last jam where Rat City’s jammer made it at least halfway through the pack and was not awarded ANY points?!?
I can’t stress enough how much of a need there is for an independent, unbiased, body of officials. But then I remember we are talking about amatuer sports here…
All in all, I had a wonderful time in Austin, and can say I saw at least 8 of the greatest bouts I have ever seen. Kudo’s to all the girls!
October 9th, 2007 at 3:05 am
I am a fan of referees, so read the rest with a grain of salt (but, for the record, I was not part of the officiating staff for the championship bout)…
On more than one occasion, I saw Rat City’s jammer called out of a jam to the box, only to arrive at the box and be told that they were called out for reason’s unknown and to re-enter the jam.
I’m sure that is not what happened… a penalty box official would NEVER send a player back in the game because they were called out for reasons unknown. A penalty box official quite rarely knows why somebody is coming to the penalty box. What is much more likely and common is that a player is sent back into the game because the penalty box is already full (a team may never have more than two players in the box at the same time.) Refs are not responsible for checking whether the box is full before sending somebody to it, because they have no way of knowing whether the box will be full once that player actually reaches it.
Regarding the last jam, Valtron did pass multiple KC blockers in her first scoring pass, but her jam referee determined that she had fouled them during the passes, therefore not earning the points for them (the picture in this post backs at least one of those up, as you can clearly see a forearm foul in action.)
Finally, regarding the relative ease of the paths that Rat City & Kansas City had to the championship bout, let’s not forget that KC had two hard-fought victories against a deadly Gotham team (as anybody who watched Heartland Havoc can attest) and a Carolina team that had just beaten the #2 ranked team in Tucson. Rat City had relatively little trouble in their opening bout, to the point that they were able to rest their first-string jammers for most of the second half. Rat City / Texas was absolutely one of the most draining, physical bouts flat-track derby has ever seen, but on balance, I’d agree with Dahmernatrix and say that both Rat City and Kansas City had a equal right to be wrung out going into the final bout.
We can definitely agree that the Texas Shootout had 8 killer bouts. Already can’t wait for November 14-16, 2008!
October 9th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
>I can’t stress enough how much of a need there is for an independent, unbiased, body of officials. But then I remember we are talking about amatuer sports here…
Hey Cynical-er, I’m just chiming in here to let you know that throughout WFTDA tournament play this year, the ref squads have taken pains to ensure that no ref is officiating his or her own home league’s bouts during tournament play.
While it’s easy to disagree with some ref calls, just because of different lines of sight or opinions about the legality of the maneuver in question, I can’t spend too much time hating on officials who have spent countless hours poring over the rules and practicing their ref skills.
October 9th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
Replying to both the above:
>”Hey Cynical-er, I’m just chiming in here to let you know that throughout WFTDA tournament play this year, the ref squads have taken pains to ensure that no ref is officiating his or her own home league’s bouts during tournament play.
While it’s easy to disagree with some ref calls, just because of different lines of sight or opinions about the legality of the maneuver in question, I can’t spend too much time hating on officials who have spent countless hours poring over the rules and practicing their ref skills.”
I agree that I never saw a KC ref officiating a KC bout (or any other ref from that team’s town). True. But how about the lack of ANY RCRG ref in the ref line-up (and I did see them in attendence, so travel was not an obstacle). And I think that a ref from a team’s town that just lost, should never be ANYWHERE near the winning team’s next bout, especially if it’s the finals. Texas had multiple ref’s in for the finals. All I’m saying is that the next step in the evolution of Derby, IMHO, is to take the officiating to the next level. Half the crowd of the finals would probably agree with me, even if they can’t find this thread.
>”… a penalty box official would NEVER send a player back in the game because they were called out for reasons unknown. A penalty box official quite rarely knows why somebody is coming to the penalty box. What is much more likely and common is that a player is sent back into the game because the penalty box is already full”
Again, I think that WFTDA’s next step is to take the officiating to the next level. Maybe look at NHL for inspiration on how to deal with penalties that occur mid-action, without stopping said action? All I’m saying is that RCRG took some penalties that were dumbfounding to the spectators, caused time delays because they needed to be explained, and controversy. When a National Championship comes down to a 5 point game, penalties (and the ref’s calling them) are all of a sudden extremely crucial.
.”Regarding the last jam, Valtron did pass multiple KC blockers in her first scoring pass, but her jam referee determined that she had fouled them during the passes, therefore not earning the points for them (the picture in this post backs at least one of those up, as you can clearly see a forearm foul in action.)”
No picture was posted. I will conced that maybe Rat City needs a stricter ref system in Seattle. Obviously we have different opinions of what a penaltiy (and a major at that!) is. Example, Miss Fortune’s last jam (I believe it was the second to last jam of the bout) she was passing the pack, cleared all the KC blockers and only had 3 of her teammates to pass. She tapped one on the back to signal she was coming up, some confusion as to what side she was on led her to step across the inside line to execute her pass. Apparently this was called as a Major and she was sent to the box for it? News to us in Seattle.
My comments about the ref’s are only to discuss a better system to put in place. I’m not a “ref hater”, and ackowlege their time commitment, and dedication. My intentions are to have a better WFTDA, not to armchair quarterback with sour grapes, and I’m sorry if it comes across that way. If there was an independent body of officials, then we wouldn’t have “interpretation” problems with the rules at crucial games.
I would love to watch the footage that was taken of this bout. Does anyone know if and when it might become available? I know MavTV was recording it for broadcast, they aren’t available in Seattle…
October 10th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
Cynical-er, I was referring to the picture in the post we are replying to.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:49 am
I think the important thing is we will all be able to see the bout footage from Mav TV. From there we will have a chance to see all the fouls that were and were not called, allowing everyone to learn from the experience and for the referees to see what they need to do to start calling a tighter game.
November 30th, 2007 at 5:26 am
[...] Championship Bout (West #4) Kansas City 89 (West #1) Rat City 85 Kansas City: WFTDA Champions! Read the recap! WFTDA National Tournament Third Place Bout (West #3) Texas 110 (East #3) Carolina 46 Read the [...]
December 4th, 2007 at 12:37 am
“ummmm… Kansas City played two highly competitive games against Gotham and Carolina. They had every right to be pooped, too. They’re simply an incredible team.”
As much mad respect as I have for the deserving champion KC girls, those bouts were competitive, but they did not have the intensity of the Rat City-TX bout: KC vs. Gotham struck me primarily as a good run and gun bout and KC vs.Carolina had some hard physical play, But the Rat City/TX bout imo had more physical and emotional intensity than both KC bouts combined–They were like top heavyweight contenders trading heavy shots for 12 rounds. I’m certainly not speaking for the Rat City skaters when saying this, but I’ll take bouting Gotham and Carolina over Detroit (or any other league) and TX on the road to a final.