#7 Charm City Defeats #3 Philly, 149-74

By Justice Feelgood Marshall, Last updated Tue Sep 21 2010 2:13am

BALTIMORE, MD -- On paper, Saturday night's long-awaited, year-delayed regional grudge match between hosting Charm City and Philly looked to have the potential to be one of the best of the 2009 season. The teams were ranked back to back in the official WFTDA Eastern Region rankings at #2 (Philly) and #3 (Charm City), while the unofficial DNN rankings had them both in the top ten of the nation at #3 Philly and #7 Charm City. Both teams had already been dominant in very similar schedules this year, having both beaten Eastern rivals Boston, Carolina and Maine along with inter-regional defeats of Kansas City and Rat City.

Even more interestingly, it looked very likely to be a preview of a semifinal match at the upcoming Eastern Regional tournament in just three weeks. With the tournament seeding already set in stone, Charm City and Philly are very likely to meet next month with a trip to the regional championship -- not to mention a guaranteed trip to Nationals -- on the line in that bout.

As it turned out, though, that last part turned out to be the reason that this particular matchup didn't quite live up to its billing. Philly chose to rest about half of their primary players, including almost all of their first-string jammers. Without Teflon Donna, Mo Pain, Violet Temper, Persephone, Olivia Face or Dara Licks, the Philly team played with intensity but simply didn't have the depth to handle Charm City's A lineups, making a potential late-season classic play a bit more like a pre-season experiment. Relatively new addition Elle Viento, along with primary blockers Ivana Rock and Robin Drugstores, shouldered much of the jammer duties alongside all-star mainstay Shenita Stretcher; Leggs Benedict and Gefilte Fists played their first bouts as Belles while Dotti Horror was also given playing time.

Charm City suited up one rookie in Thoroughbled, but other than that they played their primary roster with plenty of recent team experience, and it showed on the scoreboard. Charm City claimed a big 149-74 win, but with Philly likely to show Charm City a significantly different roster in Raleigh,  Saturday's outcome doesn't say too much about what might happen should the teams meet at Regionals.

See the play-by-play in the archived text boutcast from Vixen Van Go-Go, Slack Kerowhack and Justice Feelgood Marshall. Check back for archived bout video coming soon.

Charm City hampered their start with multiple jammer penalties near the start of the bout that gave Philly an early lead. A second-jam 14-0 power jam for Philly made it 15-4 after two, and then Philly's Robin Drugstores and Charm City's Lady Quebeaum played musical chairs as jammers in the third frame, with LQ hitting the box twice in that jam. When that sequence was finally over with Quebeaum's release in the fourth jam, the score stood at 19-8 favoring Philly.

Philly held the advantage for one more jam at 22-10 after about 10 minutes of play, but from that point out it was nearly all Charm City. They hacked away at the lead with small-margin wins while keeping Philly totally off the board and took the lead 26-22 with a 5-0 for Bambi's Revenge over Robin Drugstores at about the 15 minute mark. On the following jam, the increasingly raucous home crowd blew up for a huge 15-0 jam for Duchess of Torque over Philly's Gloria Grindem, who had the bad luck to face Joy Collision, Dolly Rocket and Lady Quebeaum in a particularly heavy-hitting pack and got lapped thrice.

It was then 41-22 with about 10 minutes left in the half. The Belles' Shenita Stretcher (one of the few first-string jammers to remain in the lineup) finally ended the scoreless drought for Philly with a 3-1 win, but Charm just kept dropping the points on Philly for the remainder of the half. It ended 64-28 after the opening thirty minutes, with Charm City having put together a thoroughly dominant 54-4 run over the last 20 minutes of the half.

The 36 point halftime lead consistently grew through most of the second half for Charm City; they broke the 100 point mark about 12 minutes into the half at 101-41. Philly made a little bit of a run going into the final 10 minutes, helped by jammer penalties on Charm City that Philly turned into a 8-0 for Shenita Stretcher and a 10-0 for the tenacious Elle Viento.

That brought the margin to an edge-of-possibility 48 points with 7 minutes remaining, 118-70, but Philly only could score 4 more points over the remainder of the bout while Charm City tossed up an additional 31, bringing the final margin to 75 points at 149-74.

Flo Shizzle was named MVP for Charm City, while Shenita Stretcher got the award for Philly.

In the undercard bout between the B-teams from the two leagues, the Philly Independence Dolls absolutely dominated Charm City's Female Trouble, breaking the century mark before halftime (103-29) on their way to a big 110-point victory at 186-76. The Dolls were led by very impressive jamming from Antidote, while Female Trouble's points were mostly provided by O'Shanku. The game marked the first bout back for 2008 CCRG all-star Mibbs Breakin' Ribs since last year's Eastern Regionals tournament.

Charm City has one more bout before this year's Eastern Regionals as they head to Chicago this Saturday to try and knock off the second-place team from last year Nationals, #4 Windy City; DNN will provide full coverage of that bout on August 29. Philly does not have any more bouts scheduled before the Regionals, which kick off on September 11.

Photos: Craig Lammes