Feature Preview: (4) Windy City @ (13) Minnesota

By Justice Feelgood Marshall, Last updated Fri Jun 15 2012 5:40pm

ST PAUL, MN -- The top spot in the WFTDA North Central region will be on the line this weekend when Minnesota (2NC WFTDA, 13 nationally via DNN) hosts Windy City (1NC WFTDA, 4 nationally via DNN) at the Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St. Paul.

Live coverage of this bout is available on tv.mnrollergirls.com. 40 minute undercard bout of NSRG Northern Lights vs MNRG Team B begins at 7:30pm Central on Saturday, June 16; Windy City vs Minnesota begins at approximately 8:30pm.

The visitors from Chicago will be attempting to extend their all-time undefeated streak in the region to 25-0. Thus far, they've held off Minnesota in each of their 5 meetings, though Minnesota has consistently given them a tougher time in each meeting. In May 2011, the teams played to a 74-74 stalemate at halftime before Windy City dominated the second half to win 172-105; a few months later in the final game of the NC playoffs, Minnesota led 55-41 at the half but WCR rallied to win 123-100.

Windy City and Minnesota have had two shared opponents this year, with those outcomes predicting conflicting results. Both teams have played Naptown earlier this year, with Windy City cruising 187-69 in late March while Minnesota traded the lead almost all game long with Naptown before getting out with a 149-114 victory in early May.

However, just two weeks ago at Midwest Brewhaha, WCR and MNRG both faced and were defeated by Charm City in quite different games -- Minnesota lost a 102-55 lead over the last 22 minutes and was on the wrong side of a 174-168 final, while Windy City trailed from the second jam and lost 187-151.

With those results and Minnesota's steadily increasing success against Windy City, this game looks to be a toss-up on paper. Power jams were enormous factors in both teams' losses to Charm City, with Windy City giving up 10 jammer penalty minutes against zero for Charm City and Minnesota giving up 5 against two for Charm; with Windy and Minnesota apparently quite well matched, it's likely this bout will be decided by the amount of points scored on power jams.

Neither team has any more bouts scheduled before the second-quarter rankings close at the end of the month, so the winner of this game is all but guaranteed to hold the top seed at September's North Central regional playoffs.

Minnesota debuts two new all-stars in this game with Buzz Tightrear and Shiver Me Kimbers; Windy City's roster has no first-game debuts, but does contain two first-year all-stars in Tamikaze and KonichiWOW.

In the night's undercard bout, North Star's B-team, the Northern Lights, face off against an irregular crew of Minnesota players.

00 Tamikaze // 07 Jackie Daniels // 17 Ol' Drrrty Go-Go // 25 Varla Vendetta // 27 Zoe Trocious // 30 Athena DeCrime // 38 Mya Ssault // 42 Karmageddon // 52 Sargentina // 75 Bork Bork Bork // 219 Hoosier Mama // 303 KonichiWOW // 911 Kola Loka // 999 Yvette Yourmaker

00 Naughty Kitty // H8U Tiki Torture // 9 Killaman Jaro // 13 Medusa // A18 Juke Boxx // 28 Scarmen Hellectra // 55 Venus Thightrap // 75 Harmony Killerbruise // 172 Shiva Shankin // 187 L'exi Cuter // 667 Shiver Me Kimbers // 727 Hurtrude Stein // 1016 Buzz Tight Rear // 1837 Diamond Rough