Charm City Intraleague Recap: Junkyard Dolls 74, Night Terrors 63
Posted by Justice Feelgood Marshall on May 6th, 2008
BALTIMORE, MD — In the second of back-to-back narrow upsets in Charm City’s third season opener, last year’s third-place Junkyard Dolls surprised the two-time CCRG champion Night Terrors by a final of 74 to 63.
Both teams relied heavily on new blood in this contest. The Night Terrors, adjusting their gameplan after losing most of their jamming core during the 2007-2008 offseason, got a solid debut from rookie Minnie Piledriver — who led the Terrors with 18 points — and also key performances from Speed Regime transfer Psycho78 (17 points) and third-year veteran Rosie the Rioter (15 points.) The Dolls also had a significant Speed Regime transfer in Flo Shizzle, who led the scoring with 32 points and sealed the win with some late-game heroics.
As the bout kicked off, the Terrors immediately fell into a hole when leadoff jammer Marzipain went to the penalty box in the very first jam on a cutting-track major — opponent Flo Shizzle would score 7 points in that full-length jam, and followup Doll jammer would get a 9-3 win over Marzipain in the following frame. This left the Terrors looking at a disheartening 16-3 start after just two jams, but they’d regroup quickly.
Pulling lead jammer on 5 out of the next 6 jams, the Terrors went on a dominating 31-7 run — keyed by an 8-0 for Psycho78 over Ella Fitz-Peril in both jammers’ team debuts — that lifted the defending champs to a 34-23 lead.
But with things starting to look a little grim for the Dolls, team captain Dolly Rocket chose that moment to give her team a major boost by taking the jammer star on consecutive jams — first, she got lead and a 4-2 win over Psycho78, and then went right back to the jammer line for an explosive 10-0 win over Minnie Piledriver that put the Dolls back in front, 37-36.
While Night Terror Radar Love tied it up with a narrow 1-0 win over Flo Shizzle on the next jam, it was Dolly Rocket yet again powering her team with a 4-0 jam over Psycho78 that ended the half’s scoring at Junkyard Dolls 41, Night Terrors 37.
As the second half started, the Terrors finally got the better of Dolly Rocket — while she did pull lead on her jam against Psycho78, her normal nonchalant scoring slice through the pack was terminated by Terror blocker Frenzy Lohan’s notorious booty block, and Psycho nabbed a 3-2 win just as Dolly furiously called off the jam.
On the next jam, the Terrors got a bit of a break as Coach Ballbricker, jamming for the Dolls, took a block that sent her careening past the entire pack on the infield, sending her to the penalty box on a cutting-track major, but they couldn’t capitalize, with the jam ending 0-0 as Radar Love couldn’t complete her first pass. A following 4-4 between Ballbricker and Minnie Piledriver set the score at Dolls 47, Terrors 44.
Psycho78 got the Terrors back in the lead on the following jam, but not without a highlight-reel takedown by the Dolls, as Psycho burst past Ali Kaida and Dirty Trixie on the outside and was about to leave the pack behind when Ali gave Trixie a monster unexpected push that sent Trixie hurtling out-of-control into Psycho — while Trixie got a major for the resultant illegal takedown, the push had done its job and Psycho was forced to call the jam at 4-0 rather than going for more.
A 4-0 for Rosie the Rioter over Killer Kitten would make the score Terrors 52, Dolls 47 with about 14 minutes to play, and the Terrors managed to hold off the Dolls for 11 of those minutes. On the half’s 8th jam, Flo Shizzle cut the lead to 56-55 with an 8-4 win over Radar Love, but a clutch 5-0 grand slam for rookie Minnie Piledriver over Coach Ballbricker opened it up again.
Two jams later, it was the Dolls’ rookie’s turn to shine, as Ella Fitz-Peril scored her first career points at a critical juncture, getting a 4-0 over Minnie Piledriver that made the score Terrors 61, Dolls 59 with less than five minutes to play.
And then, with the game on the line, it was time for Flo Shizzle to duplicate Dolly Rocket’s feat from the first half. Flo took lead and a 3-0 win over Rosie the Rioter that finally put the Dolls back in front, 62-61, with 3:43 showing on the clock — and then went back to the jammer line for another go, this time against Radar Love. Hampered by some punishing Doll defense, Radar would go to the penalty box during that jam — and Flo Shizzle scampered for 9 unanswered game-sealing points, making it a 71-61 Dolls lead with less than two minutes to play and Radar stuck in the box to start the next jam. That last jam went 3-2 for Killer Kitten, and the Dolls had joined the Mods in turning Charm City expectations directly on their heads.
Stats
Flo Shizzle led all scoring with 32 points on 8 jams, outscoring her opposing jammers by 12 points and getting lead 3 times. While Dolly Rocket didn’t have as large a total (20 points on 6 jams), she was arguably even more effective with a +15 jammer point differential and grabbing lead on 5 of those 6 jams. Coach Ballbricker tossed in 13 points on 5 jams, with a -3 JPD and one lead jam; Killer Kitten had 5 points on 4 jams with a -4 JPD and one lead jam; and Ella Fitz-Peril contributed 4 points on 4 jams, with a -9 JPD and one lead jam.
For the Night Terrors, the scoring was fairly evenly spread out — Minnie Piledriver had 18 points on 6 jams with an even JPD and three lead jam calls, Psycho78 had 17 points on 7 jams with a +7 JPD and two lead jams, Rosie the Rioter had 15 points on 4 jams with a +7 JPD and three lead jam calls, Radar Love had 7 points on 7 jams with a -13 JPD but four lead jam calls, and Marzipain (who did not jam after the fifth jam of the first half) had 6 points on three jams, a -12 JPD, and one lead jam call.
Oddly enough, in both bouts of the doubleheader, the team that got lead jammer more often and committed fewer penalties still lost. The Terrors got 13 lead jammer calls to 11 for the Dolls, and the Terrors got 54 minors and 3 majors to the Dolls’ 71 minors and 8 majors,
The doubleheader’s results put the Dolls in second place behind the Mobtown Mods, and the Terrors in third place ahead of the Speed Regime.The Dolls try to keep the momentum going with a June 14 battle against the 0-1 Regime, while the Night Terrors try to get back on track in the other half of the doubleheader as they face off against the 1-0 Mobtown Mods.
Bout photos: jwiv // Team photo: Geoff Graham
May 6th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
and the team photo is credited to Geoff Graham…dedicated hubby of Maiden China…and the ‘64 Impala is courtesy of Scotty P from the band Stout.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
I’m confused at how you’re figuring out the team ranks when there’s really nothing to compare the mm/sr game to the nt/jyd game.
May 7th, 2008 at 12:39 am
In the case of ties in wins/losses, rankings are determined by point spreads in bouts. Since the Dolls (1-0) won by a smaller margin in their bout than the Mods (1-0), they are in second place. As the Terrors (0-1) lost by less than Speed Regime (0-1), they are in third place.
~j.z.